


The Accidental Animagus

by White_Squirrel



Series: Animagus-Verse [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Adopted Harry Potter, Adopted Sibling Relationship, Animagus Harry Potter, Australia, F/M, Gen, Good Dumbledore, Harry is Lord Potter, Harry with the Grangers, Mexico, Politics, Powerful Enemies, Powerful Wizards, Proactive Harry, Reasonable Ministry, Rwanda, Smart Harry, Wandless Magic, Wizarding World, Wizengamot, World Magic, accidental magic, responsible adults
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-24
Updated: 2018-04-07
Packaged: 2019-04-07 10:25:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 112
Words: 666,696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14078862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/White_Squirrel/pseuds/White_Squirrel
Summary: Harry escapes the Dursleys with a unique bout of accidental magic and eventually winds up at the Grangers' house. Now, he has what he always wanted: a loving family—and he'll need their help to take on the magical world and vanquish the dark lord who has pursued him from birth. Years 1-4.





	1. The Accidental Animagus

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: Harry Potter is owned by JK Rowling, who is gracious enough to open her work up to the interpretation of the Internet.
> 
> This story up through the end of first year was reviewed by the PotterFicWeekly podcast, on which I also gave an author interview.
> 
> Quick Reference:
> 
> Before Hogwarts: Chapters 1-12  
> First Year: Chapters 13-41  
> Second Year: Chapters 42-61  
> Third Year: Chapters 62-81  
> Fourth Year: Chapters 82-112  
> Bonus Material: The World of The Accidental Animagus  
> Years 5-7: in the sequel, Animagus at War

With one beefy hand, a purple-faced Vernon Dursley pinned his nephew to the wall while smacking him across the face with the other. “I will not have any of your freakishness in my house, boy!” he bellowed, following it up with another smack.

Harry Potter’s trouble had started before he could remember, but age five was quickly shaping up to be much worse than the previous four years. It had already been bad enough that he was made to sleep in a cupboard, wear his over-sized cousin’s castoffs and do as many chores as he could handle. Somehow, going to primary school just made things worse. His aunt and uncle hadn’t wanted to send him, but they knew they couldn’t get away with keeping him at home, so they grumbled about taking time away from “earning his keep” and sent him away with Dudley. It took all of two days before his cousin and his friends invented their new favourite game of “Harry hunting,” which they engaged in whenever the teachers weren’t looking. It took all of four days before, while being scolded for a teacher for knocking over his juice (which Dudley had actually done), Harry was shocked to see the teacher’s hair turn neon blue.

That evening was the first time Uncle Vernon had hit him himself instead of letting Dudley do it. Young Harry had no idea what was going on and only a vague idea of why he was in trouble. But he couldn’t mistake his uncle ranting all night about his freakishness and vowing to “stamp that rubbish out.”

Harry still had bruises a week later when the next strange, unexplainable thing happened. He didn’t mind being locked in his cupboard too much most of the time. At least it kept his relatives away from him. But something had changed in him after that first beating. The urge to respond, suppressed by years of conditioning, started to assert itself again. Then, after being beat on some more by Dudley’s gang at school and having his loudmouth cousin stomp on the stairs above his head one too many times, that urge crystallised into a single, overwhelming desire: escape.

“You’re going to stay in your cupboard when you’re told, boy!” Uncle Vernon’s rant continued. “You’re not to let yourself out unless _we_ say so. Just like your good-for-nothing parents, always getting into trouble. Worthless, the lot of you!” He punctuated each sentence with either a slap to the face or a punch to the torso.

Harry’s cupboard door had seemingly unlocked itself and flown open with a bang. Uncle Vernon had rushed over and slammed it shut before Harry could react, but it happened twice more right in front of him, at which point he was forcibly dragged out into the living room. As the beating began, Harry willed himself not to cry, but it was a losing battle, and as expected, it only enraged his uncle more. By now, he didn’t even notice Aunt Petunia and Dudley standing by and scowling at him.

“Don’t you cry at me, boy, or I’ll give you something to cry about!”

With that last punch, Harry’s crying jumped an octave. Then, the lights started flickering, and the doors and windows began to rattle.

“Vernon!” Aunt Petunia cried with a twinge of fear.

“Stop that! Stop that right now, you little freak!”

Harry kicked to try to get away, but his uncle held him too tight. Unseen by anyone, the lights began flipping on and off in all of the rooms at once. The floors began to vibrate.

“Daddy!” Dudley cried.

“ _Stop that this instant_!”

BANG!

As Harry’s cries ascended to an inhuman yowl, every light bulb in the house exploded, every door slammed open, and all three Dursleys were thrown across the room and landed in a heap. When they came to their senses, Harry Potter was nowhere to be seen.

Vernon ran to the door, shouting, “Get back here, boy! Boy? I said _get back here_!” But there was no sign of his nephew. “He can’t have got far,” he said, finally lowering his voice. He saw the neighbours staring, now, drawn to the windows by the minor earthquake that had struck Privet Drive. Grumbling, he gave up and shut the door.

He did not notice a small black cat sitting in the bushes by the door—a cat with white feet, piercing green eyes, and a strange, white zigzag mark on its head. When he shut the door, the cat ran away down the street without looking back.

“Vernon, what happened?” Petunia asked in the half-destroyed living room.

“Little freak ran away, and I say let him go. They’ll find him soon enough. I’ll fix the lights tomorrow.”

The Dursleys closed up the house and took an uneasy dinner by candlelight. They sincerely hoped that their troubles were over for the time being, but they would be visited by strangeness twice more that evening.

With the first visit, two Ministry of Magic Obliviators appeared at the door and stunned the Dursleys before they could even get a word in. There was no sign of any wizards wandering around the neighbourhood, and the Trace showed no underage magic users on the premises, so the Ministry had concluded the magical discharge at 4 Privett Drive was caused by a passing troublemaker. The Obliviators repaired the damaged light fixtures, set right the overturned furniture, mended the splinters broken from the doors, and wiped all memory of the incident from the Dursleys’ minds.

They cast a warming charm on the food just before they _Rennervated_ the family, so that not even the smallest detail was out of place. They left without even looking at the cupboard under the stairs, and the Dursleys awoke thinking nothing unusual had happened.

The other visitor that evening wore a purple robe and a long, white beard. Albus Dumbledore was more worried than he had been in years when he knocked on the door on Number 4. Even from the outside, a quick detection charm told him that Harry Potter was not in the house.

A tall, lanky, horse-faced woman opened the door to the shock of her life. “You!” she shouted. “What are you doing here?”

“A pleasure to see you, too, Petunia,” Dumbledore said flatly.

“Who is it Petunia?” Vernon called.

“It’s that freak who left the boy with us.”

“What?” Vernon barged to the door. “You! You can _have_ that boy back. We never wanted him in the first place.”

Dumbledore’s eyebrows shot up at this. The Dursleys seemed to be even more unfriendly than he expected, and the large man was gearing up for a serious rant. He cut him off quickly by saying, “Where _is_ the boy?”

“He’s right…” Vernon stopped. The boy was _supposed_ to be in his cupboard, but not only could he not get away with saying that, for some reason he didn’t think it was true. He tried to think over what had happened that evening. It was coming back a blur but he managed to recall one true fact: “The boy ran away this afternoon. Just took off down the street, couldn’t keep up with him. And I say good riddance. Let someone else take care of him for a change.”

“And you just let him go off on his own?”

“Yes. He’s been nothing by trouble from the start…”

Dumbledore tuned out the rant. From their behaviour, something was definitely not right. He took a peek inside the two adult Dursleys’ minds, but he didn’t have to look far to find an answer, though he wished he hadn’t: telltale signs of obliviation, and what looked like a pretty lousy job of it, too. Something horrible had happened here and been shoddily covered up.

“…and I won’t tolerate any more of his freakishness!”

“Enough!” Dumbledore shouted before stunning all three of them. Casting a new memory charm to cover the old one, he instructed them: “You are very concerned because your nephew ran away. You will contact the authorities immediately. You will ask Arabella Figg to keep an eye out for him, and you will inform her at once when he is found. You will not remember my visit tonight.” When he was done, he hit them with a delayed _Rennervate_ that gave him just enough time to step outside the property line and apparate to the gates of Hogwarts.

* * *

Minerva McGonagall entered the Headmaster’s office to find him bent over some of his many devices with a frown, muttering incantations, with a look in his eyes that was darker than any she had seen in years. “Albus, what’s wrong?” she asked. “You said it was urgent.”

Albus looked up. “Oh, Minerva, I fear something terrible has just happened,” he said. “I have reason to believe that Harry Potter has been taken.”

“What?” Minerva stumbled in shock, but managed to sit herself down. “Taken? How?”

“This afternoon, he dropped off my trackers entirely. They indicate that he is still alive, but I cannot find him anywhere.”

“You can’t find him? But what could do such a thing?”

“To block my tracking charms would require the boy to be hidden behind very powerful wards that I am not keyed into, possibly a Fidelius Charm. I’ve just returned from his relatives’ house. They claimed that he had run away, but in their minds, I saw obvious signs of obliviation.”

Minerva put the pieces together. “Someone, somehow, got through your wards, kidnapped him, hid him behind these other wards, and obliviated his relatives. And because they didn’t involve you…”

Albus nodded grimly. “We can only assume that their intent is nefarious.”

She shot to her feet. “We must find him, Albus!”

“Yes, we must,” he agreed, “but it must be done discreetly. We cannot risk panicking the public or tipping our own hand.”

“But the boy…”

“Is still alive for the time being, which suggests that their intent is not to kill him. I also saw no indication that the blood wards had been breached, so whoever actually took him did not mean overt harm. We must begin investigating places and individuals who would have access to those kinds of wards, but we cannot allow the boy’s enemies to know he is missing. _That_ would be an even greater disaster.”

Minerva sank back down in her seat. “I suppose you’re right, Albus. I’ll begin looking with what little time I can spare.”

“Thank you, Minerva. I will do the same.”

* * *

Harry Potter, at that moment, was wandering the streets of Little Whinging, very confused. He was happy to have got away from his relatives, but he had no idea how he had done it. From the fur and tail, he could tell that he had been turned into some kind of animal. It wasn’t until he managed to see a distorted reflection in a car hubcap that he figured out that that animal was a cat. He didn’t know how he could have turned into a cat, nor did he know how to change back, but he could guess that it had something to do with the “freakishness’ his uncle had been shouting about, and he decided to get farther away before trying.

Adding to his confusion were the strange sensations that accompanied being a cat. He could see amazingly well in the fading light. His whiskers tickled his face with the slightest breeze. He was surrounded by high pitched squeaks and chirps that he had never noticed before. But the most disorienting part was the smells. He was bombarded by dozens of unfamiliar smells, some of them completely overpowering to his human mind, but all sensed individually. He could only identify a few of them—the most prevalent were the grass, the dirt, and the autumn leaves—but there were many others, trails presumably left by animals, by people, by passing cars, all subtly different in ways he couldn’t explain.

Harry must have looked a rather strange cat, wandering back and forth across the yards, stopping every few steps, looking all around, and sometimes turning around before moving on as he tried to take in everything about the world around him. He quickly got turned around doing this, and he had only made it a few blocks before he had got thoroughly lost.

While he didn’t care about being able to find his aunt and uncle’s house again, he presently realised that he was quite hungry, and thirsty, not to mention sore from the beating he had received, and he didn’t know how to deal with any of those things as a cat.

Water wasn’t that hard to find. He wasn’t used to drinking water from anything but a glass or a garden hose, but enough people in Little Whinging had ponds or pools or fountains, and he wasn’t about to be picky. He came to the first small pond he found, and he was surprised to learn that one of the scents he could now smell was that of water. He was reasonably sure water didn’t have a smell as a human. With a little practice, he was able to lap up the water like he had seen cats do in pictures.

Food was harder to find. Harry knew that cats were supposed to eat mice, but he didn’t know how to catch mice, and he wasn’t sure he could actually eat one if he did. He’d also heard of people feeding stray cats that showed up on their porches. He decided to try pawing at the back door of the house with the pond, only to find himself faced with a woman who acted disturbingly like his Aunt Petunia and shooed him away with a broom. Running away in fright, he resolved to find some other source of food.

He saw a couple of other cats and tried to follow them, hoping they knew where to find food, but they hissed at him when he got too close. But they had to eat, too, so there must be food somewhere nearby. After a while, he decided that since his cat’s nose could smell water, maybe he could follow it to some food. He sniffed the air and got a whiff of a bunch of smells, some of which, though he didn’t know why, _did_ smell tasty. Haltingly, he followed one trail to an open rubbish bin. After scaring away a squirrel that had dived into it, he investigated. The smell of rot was overwhelming, but he could tell that part was coming from further down. He found some table scraps on top, even some meat. They were dirty, but not rotten. He grabbed a big chunk of half-eaten chicken with his teeth and dragged it far enough away that he could stand the smell. After four years of table scraps, it wasn’t much worse than he was used to. Holding it with his paws, he dug in and was surprised how easily the chicken came apart in his sharp teeth.

A little while later, Harry found a warm spot to curl up in (unbeknownst to him, on the other side of a wall from a poorly-insulated water heater) and went to sleep. It had been a hard start, but he began to think that he would enjoy being a cat more than being a human trapped at the Dursleys’ house.


	2. Kitty!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter. I’m just hanging out in the Internet’s largest sandbox.

Weeks passed. Albus Dumbledore and Minerva McGonagall investigated thoroughly, but found nothing. There was no movement from any known former death eaters. Severus Snape reported that he had heard nothing. Amelia Bones, though she was only partially privy to their information, heard no rumblings of Ministry interference, and no whispers seemed to float through any part of the magical underworld. It seemed as if Harry Potter had vanished without a trace.

Harry himself, of course, was oblivious to all of this. He spent his days trying to learn how to be a proper cat. It took some time to figure out all the new smells and tastes. He was a little annoyed that he could no longer see the colour red, and the other colours were strangely muted, but he saw no choice but to accept it. He wandered the streets, often following other cats, dumpster diving for food, and sleeping a lot. After a few days, he found he had wandered out of town. There were few rubbish bins out here, but he could still smell something tasty. He followed the trail just in time to hear some of those high-pitched squeaks and see a mole scamper into its burrow. He immediately backed away and vowed to stick to the rubbish bins (after all, what five-year-old, even a boy, wants to eat live rodents?), but after a couple of days in the country, he realised how hard it was to find food and decided to try again. It took a couple more days before he successfully caught anything and a couple of hours before he could bring himself to eat it, but when he did, he was surprised how good mice tasted. He wondered if they tasted better to a cat or if the humans were just missing out.

He kept wandering from town to town, not really caring where he was going. By November, he had got good enough at hunting to get by and had even started cleaning his fur with his tongue, like a real cat (although he hated the hairballs). Hunting was actually fun when he was the hunter instead of the hunted running from Dudley’s gang. Harry would never hunt people, though, just small birds and rodents. Yes, he was enjoying life as a cat more than he ever had as human, except for one thing: the nights were growing colder and colder. He didn’t want to spend the whole winter outdoors, so he started working up the courage to look for a human who would take him in.

A couple days’ searching had netted him a bowl of cream and little bit of liver, but no entry into anyone’s house. He was just starting his search again on the third morning, when he noticed a little girl with bushy brown hair reading a book on a bench swing in her backyard. The wind blew in his direction, and he caught a scent from her—a strange scent, but an oddly familiar one. He moved closer to investigate, suddenly feeling something he hadn’t felt in weeks and didn’t presently know how to accomplish: a desire to actually talk to someone.

* * *

Hermione Granger was the only girl in her Year 1 class who was already into chapter books. Some of them were still learning to read in the first place. The other kids looked at her funny because she was reading books without pictures in them, but she didn’t care…much. The stories were just too interesting to stick to the short ones with lots of pictures.

She was thoroughly engrossed in one of her chapter books when she heard a small mewling sound and looked down to see and adorable black and white kitten staring back up at her with the greenest eyes she’d ever seen.

“Hello, there,” the little girl said.

The kitten just stared back, then mewled again.

“Would you like to sit with me?” She patted the bench beside her. To her surprise, the kitten leapt onto the bench. Maybe it had been trained. But it didn’t have a collar. She idly wondered if her parents would let her get a cat. She reached out to scratch the kitten behind the ears, but it recoiled at her touch.

“Oh, I’m sorry.” The cat stepped back and mewled again.

Hermione considered going back to her book, but a live kitten was much more interesting, even if not too sociable. “So…what are you doing here,” she asked it.

The kitten took a step forward and gingerly batted at her leg with a paw.

She was sure the kitten was just being silly, but she decided to play along. Not at all expecting a response, she said, “You came to see me?”

The kitten nodded its head.

Hermione’s eyes went wide. She leaned down closer, but it backed a step away. “Can you…understand me?” she said.

The kitten nodded again.

“Wow…neat!” she held her hand out as if to shake its paw. “My name’s Hermione. What’s yours?”

The kitten stared at her for a long moment, cocking its head to one side. Then, something happened that she never expected. In a blink, the kitten grew and changed into a little boy in tattered clothes, sitting on his haunches and staring at her with those same green eyes. Then the boy said, “Harry.”

“Ahhhh!” Hermione dropped her book and ran inside the house.

Emma Granger heard her daughter scream and looked up from making lunch just in time to see her dashing through the kitchen door.

“Hermione—?”

“Mummy, Mummy, there’s a kitty outside who turned into a boy!”

That probably counted as the strangest thing her daughter had ever said, and there had been some pretty odd occurrences before. “What, did that happen in your book?” Emma asked.

“No, Mummy, he’s really there! Come and see!” Her daughter took her by the hand and practically dragged her outside with the same gusto that she usually reserved for the library. Few things would stop her in that state, but the fact that this wasn’t book related—not to mention impossible—was a little strange, even with her imagination.

“Hermione, I have to make lunch, and…” Emma tried to pull away, but she stopped short when she passed through the door and saw the small figure squatting on the bench swing. He looked maybe four or five years old, but he was small and thin. Emma’s general medicine training from dental school told her he was clearly underweight. Worse, he was dirty, dressed in little more than rags, and shivering in the morning air, as if he had been wandering around outside for days, if not longer. He also had a nasty-looking scar on his forehead and a haunted look in his eyes.

“He said his name’s Harry,” Hermione said, but it barely registered for either of them.

The boy locked eyes with Emma and bolted across the yard.

“Wait!” she said.

Harry wanted to run, but four years of conditioning to do as he was told combined with the memory that he _did_ want to find someone to help him stopped him. He turned around and waited, trembling at the matching brown-haired woman and young girl who approached him.

“Are your mum and dad near here?” Emma asked.

The boy stared at her, then down at the ground. After a moment, he shook his head sadly.

Well, it was no use waiting outside, then. “You must be freezing out here. Please come inside; we can get you warmed up.”

The boy took a step back and looked between the two of them, seemingly on the verge of taking off again.

“He’s scared, Mummy,” Hermione said, to her mother’s surprise. Emma hated to admit it, but her daughter’s social skills were not up to the level of her academics. But now, she approached the boy slowly, unbeknownst to Emma, still treating him more like a kitten than a boy, and slowly held out her hand again. “It’s okay, we won’t hurt you…Are you hungry? We were just about to have lunch. Mummy can make you an extra sandwich.”

By now, Harry had no idea what was going on. He couldn’t remember anyone ever _offering_ him a sandwich. He thought about running again. But this Hermione girl actually seemed nice—just nice enough to give him some hope. He nodded and gave her a weak “mm-hmm” before reaching out and taking her hand.

Emma watched the scene unfold with growing fascination—and worry. The little boy not only looked awful, but he also seemed terrified of her and even nervous about taking the hand of a girl his own age, and it wasn’t because of cooties. In her mind, that was a very bad sign.

The fact that Hermione seemed to be instinctively handling him so as not to alarm him, well, that was just unusual.

Emma ran ahead of them to the house and called up the stairs, “Dan, could you get a blanket, please?” She turned around to see the boy standing on the threshold and trembling as Hermione tried to tug on his wrist and bring him into the house. She had, of course, remembered to pick up her book on the way. “It’s all right, come on in,” Emma said. She tried to offer one of her own hands, but he didn’t take it. “This way.” She motioned for them to follow and sat them both down on the sofa in the living room.

“Emma, here’s the blanket. What’s wro—Who’s this?” Daniel Granger stopped on the bottom step of the stairs as he saw the dirty, unfamiliar little boy sitting on the sofa. When the boy saw him, he tensed up and started to pull away, turning to one side while keeping his eyes locked on him.

Harry stared warily at the unfamiliar man. He wasn’t big and fat like Uncle Vernon, but he was tall and intimidating, and he looked a few years younger with his dark brown hair, and in better shape, too. He didn’t look like the kind of person Harry wanted to cross any more than Uncle Vernon did.

“It’s okay, it’s just my Daddy,” Hermione said. “Daddy, this is Harry. He’s a cat.”

“What?”

Emma took the blanket from him and lowered her voice, saying, “I have no idea, but he needs help. He looks like he’s been lost for days, and he seems to be afraid of people.” She turned back the the sofa and gently wrapped it around the boy, giving him a light pat on the shoulder. “Better?” she asked.

He didn’t answer.

“Just stay there. I’ll get you something to eat.”

“He needs some milk, Mummy, “cause he’s a cat,” her daughter called after her.

Dan sat in the chair opposite the two children. “A cat, Hermione?”

“I saw him. He was a cat, and then he turned into a boy.” She looked completely serious. The boy just stared at him.

“And, I think our daughter’s finally snapped,” he whispered to himself. It was bad enough that time she had a nightmare and, somehow, every light in the house switched on. It had taken him all day to find all of them, including a couple he had forgotten they owned and one that he was sure had burned out. Now, she just seemed to be slipping into her own little fantasy world.

He tried turning his attention to the boy. “So what’s your name, son?” he asked.

The boy stared at him and shivered. His voice was barely audible, and he stumbled over the sounds, but he answered, “Harry…sir…” and then after thinking about it a little more, “Harry P-P-Potter.”

“Pleased to meet you, Harry Potter. My name is Daniel Granger, and I think you’ve already met my wife, Emma, and my daughter, Hermione.”

The boy kept staring. Dan wasn’t sure if he was blinking. “P-p-pleased to meet you, sir,” he said, as if he did not for a moment believe it.

Dan could see what his wife meant about Harry being lost for days. He looked scared of his shadow, his face was grimy, his hands were scratched up, and he smelled…well, disturbingly like wet fur. Why he had just shown up like that was anyone’s guess. Dan hadn’t heard of any missing children in Crawley. In fact, there probably would have been a notice for a major case like this anywhere in West Sussex. And the boy didn’t look like he would be quick to volunteer information.

Still, Dan tried to make some light conversation. “So, Harry, what are you doing here?” he asked.

Harry turned and stared at Hermione. He held her gaze without speaking until she answered for him: “He wanted to talk to me.”

“Oh? Do you know him?”

“No, but he said he wanted to.”

“So why did you want to talk to Hermione, Harry? Do you like her?” Dan teased.

“Daddy!”

But the grin was wiped off Dan’s face when he saw Harry look down at his bare feet in shame. “I’m sorry, Harry. It was just a joke,” he said, trying to make amends.

Harry’s gaze shot back up at Dan’s face with a look of confusion. He couldn’t remember the last time someone had apologised _to him_. Once again, he had no idea what was happening.

Just then, Emma returned from the kitchen with a tray of sandwiches and some drinks, including some milk for the children. She set the tray down on the coffee table and made a point of serving Harry first.

Harry just looked at his plate like he didn’t know what to do with it. Even at five years old, he could count four sandwiches and four people, which made some sort of sense, but all of his conditioning told him there must be some sort of mistake.

“Go ahead, eat up,” the woman named Emma told him. The other three were already starting in on their sandwiches.

Moving slowly, Harry picked up his sandwich with both hands, waiting for someone to tell him off, but no one did. When he brought it to his mouth, he sprang into motion and started eating as fast as he could. He vaguely noticed that the sandwich tasted much sweeter than he was used to (in fact, he couldn’t remember tasting anything sweet in quite a while), but he didn’t slow down to pay attention to it.

He also didn’t notice Dan and Emma staring at his eating habits with raised eyebrows, nor Hermione watching with a look that changed from amused to vaguely disgusted and back again. But he did finally hear her giggle and say, “You’re supposed to chew it, silly.” It was the kind of comment that could only come from a dentists’ child. Harry flushed beet red with embarrassment and put the sandwich down. He picked up his glass and tried to lap up the milk, causing Hermione to giggle again and both of her parents to snort in surprise. But Harry quickly remembered that glasses were the wrong shape for lapping and took a large gulp the human way, then went back to the food, being careful to take individual bites.

“Um…now, Harry,” Dan said, more gently this time, “can you tell us what you wanted to talk to Hermione about?”

Harry set down his sandwich and swallowed. Still looking down at his plate, he said, “I…I smelled something.”

“Excuse me?” Hermione said.

He turned to face her. He hesitated before continuing, but it _was_ why he was here: “You smell like me.”

“I do not!” the girl scoffed, putting her hands on her hips. “You smell like a cat—and you need a bath, too.”

“Hermione, be nice,” her mother scolded as Harry just looked back down at his plate. He couldn’t smell whatever he had smelled before as a human. He _could_ tell that he still smelled like a cat, but he knew that wasn’t it.

What Emma really wanted was to get Harry’s story—where he had come from and why he had shown up looking as he did, but she sensed he didn’t want to give away a lot of information, so she tried a slightly more roundabout method. Even that was hard, since he hesitated before each answer, half-whispered them, and was reluctant to meet her eyes. “How did you get here, Harry,” she asked casually.

“Walked.”

“Where do you live.”

He seemed to think hard about this one. “Outside.”

“Did you live somewhere before you lived outside.”

The boy nodded without speaking. Emma backed off from the topic for the moment. “How long did you live outside?”

Harry had to think again. “Long time.”

“Were you out there yesterday?”

He nodded without hesitation.

“Were you out there…were you out there all the time since Halloween.”

He nodded again. That meant a few days, at least.

She didn’t know how well he knew dates, or even would have known under better conditions, but she had a bad feeling where this was going. “Were you…what was…do you remember what the weather was like when you started living outside?”

He thought about it. “Warmer.”

“Do you remember when it was?”

Harry started to look uncomfortable as he remembered how his adventure has started. He had no clue what day it was and hadn’t bothered counting, but he did know the season was changing, and…school! “I-I don’t know…” he stammered. “School had just started.”

Hermione gasped, and her parents suppressed a similar response. “You mean you’ve been living outside since September?” the little girl said.

Harry looked back at her and nodded, very slowly.

“Oh no, that’s awful! What happened?” She leaned over and hugged him, but he fought back, crying out, pushing himself away and finally slapping her blindly to escape her grasp.

Both of her parents shot to their feet. They nearly tripped over each other as Emma sought to interpose herself between Harry and her husband. Dan tried to comfort his crying daughter, but Harry was the louder of the pair.

“I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” he yelled over and over as he struggled to get away. Around them, the lights began to flicker.

Emma held him as gently as she could by his upper arms. “Harry! Harry, it’s okay. Calm down. It’s okay.” She tried to avoid his kicking feet. “It’s okay, I’m not going to hurt you.” She held him there, still, sobbing, and then only sniffling, as the lights went back to normal.

“He wasn’t being mean to you Hermione. You just scared him,” Dan whispered to his daughter, trying to placate her anger. She calmed down too, but she eyed the boy much more warily.

Emma shifted to the sofa, still trying to keep no more contact with the boy than necessary, so he didn’t feel she was restraining him too much, but she wrapped the blanket he had thrown off around him again and put an arm around his shoulders. “Now, Harry, we want to help you. If you tell us what’s wrong, we can help you try to fix it. Can you tell us why you started living outside?”

She felt his muscles tense up; then they relaxed, and he shivered. Then, this repeated itself, and with a look of determination, he began, haltingly, to speak.

It this case, it was probably a good thing that Harry was so young. Uncle Vernon hadn’t _quite_ got the message across that he wasn’t to talk about his home life. And though he felt ashamed of it, it wasn’t to the depth that he would have felt if he were older. So aside from his overall nervousness, he wasn’t all that resistant to telling his story.

“I…uh, Uncle Vernon was mad because I didn’t stay in my cupboard,” he began.

“Your cupboard?” Emma interrupted.

“Yeah…uh…where I sleep,” he whispered.

“You slept in a cupboard?” Hermione demanded in surprise.

Both her parents looked at her. “Hermione, go up to your room, please,” her father told her with a voice that brokered no argument. “Your Mummy and I have to talk to Harry alone. Reluctantly, she grabbed the rest of her sandwich and her book and started climbing the stairs while her father grabbed a pen and paper and feverishly started writing down notes.

Through tears, and with plenty of coaxing from Emma, Harry explained how his uncle had hit him twice and had let his cousin hit him many times, how he was treated by the Dursleys and how they told him to his face that they didn’t want him. Given his age, behaviour, and physical state, and having worked with kids in difficult circumstances through their practice, they couldn’t find any reason to doubt his words. Emma was on the verge of tears herself by the end, while Dan simply looked enraged. With a short word, he stalked off to the kitchen to call the police.

Harry wasn’t sure what to make of these grown-ups’ reactions. They were sad and angry, but they didn’t seem to be sad or angry at _him_. Through the conversation, he had leaned closer to Emma and finally allowed her to hug him. It was a strange feeling. He remembered being hugged by Mrs. Figg twice, his teacher once, and even Aunt Petunia once—a long, long time ago—but none of those felt nearly as warm and comforting as this, especially when Emma began running her fingers through his unkempt hair. He still didn’t like being restrained, but for once in his life, he didn’t feel actively threatened by the contact.

Emma pulled back and looked him in the eyes and said, “Harry, here’s what we’re going to do for you. My husband and I are going to help you find a new home so you don’t have to live outside anymore, and you don’t have to live with your mean aunt and uncle either. If everything you told us is true, I think it will happen soon.”

Harry’s eyes went wide. No one had ever described Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia as mean—out loud, anyway. And he couldn’t believe his ears about the rest of it. He wondered again if this was some kind of cruel trick.

It was a few more minutes before Dan reentered the room. “The police are on the case,” he said. “They said a Harry Potter matching his description was reported missing by a family in Surrey seven weeks ago. They’re sending someone to the address to investigate, and they’re sending a social worker here as soon as one’s available. I told them we could watch him for the afternoon.

“That’s good. Do you think they’ll take action?”

“Are you kidding? If they find half the stuff I told them, those monsters will be hauled right out on their—”

“Dan, language,” his wife stopped him. “Hermione, you can come back down, now,” she called.

Her daughter bounded back down the stairs and took the seat on the couch next to Harry.

“Hermione, Harry doesn’t have anywhere to go right now, so he’s going to stay here for the afternoon until someone can come to help him,” Emma explained.

“Okay.” The girl turned to Harry and asked, “Are you going to turn back into a cat?”

“Hermione, he’s not—” Emma was cut off when the doorbell rang. “That _can_ _’t_ be the social worker already.”

She left the room and opened the front door. Then, she took a step back. Standing there on the threshold was the most bizarre-looking man she had ever seen. He had a long white beard and white hair, both of which descended to his waist. He also wore a large, flowing purple robe with gold stars on it, and a hat that looked like a nightcap.

“Good afternoon, Madam,” the man said in a kindly voice, seemingly oblivious to her stare. “My name is Albus Dumbledore. I’m looking for a young boy named Harry Potter. Have you seen him here?”

Emma blinked at the man’s strange request and even stranger name. “Are you the social worker?” she asked.

Dumbledore went from serene to confused in an instant. “Um, no, I don’t believe so. I am a friend of the boy’s family.”

“Then you can tell his so-called family to get lost,” she spat. “He’s not going back there.”

Dumbledore’s eyebrows shot up under the brim of his hat. His fingers tensed on the tip of his wand, in case this should turn hostile. He didn’t expect any opposition in a muggle neighbourhood, but it would be a good hideout for unsavoury characters. “I’m afraid there’s been a misunderstanding, Ms…”

“Granger. Emma Granger, and there most certainly is not. I won’t see that boy sent back to that hell house—”

At that moment, she was cut off by two loud shouts from the living room. The first was her husband yelling, “Oh my God—Emma!,” and the second, before she could react, was her daughter’s triumphant cry of, “See, I told you he was a cat.”

Albus Dumbledore heard the shouts and surmised that something magical had just happened, though the most obvious explanation was patently impossible. He followed close on Emma Granger’s heels into the living room, where he saw an extremely flustered man backing away from a little girl playing with a black and white kitten on the sofa.

“Dan?” Emma said.

“That…that boy, he just…he turned into a cat!”

“What?” Emma and Dumbledore exclaimed in unison.

At that moment, Hermione looked in their direction and gave a squeal of joy before running straight toward the old man. “Santa Claus!” she yelled, wrapping herself around his legs before her mother pulled her away.

Any other time, and Dumbledore would have laughed at that display. He rarely worked with children young enough to make that mistake, but for now he was too preoccupied with finding Harry. “I’m afraid not, my dear,” he told the girl. “My name is Albus Dumbledore.” The parents both looked torn between half a dozen different questions, so he decided to try his luck with the girl. “What’s this I hear about a cat?”

The girl ran back to the sofa and showed off the kitten. “This is Harry,” she said. “He’s a kitten who turns into a boy…or a boy who turns into a kitten.”

As the parents quickly whispered back and forth to each other, Dumbledore approached the sofa and leaned down close to get a good look at the kitten, which seemed to sniff Hermione’s hand, and then his own. It was black with white feet, bright green eyes, and a white mark on its head—a white mark that looked like a lightning bolt.

“Ha—Harry Potter?” he whispered.

The kitten tilted its head as if in thought, then its form rippled and grew and reformed into that of a grimy and frightened-looking little boy with green eyes and a scar on his forehead. Then, the boy said, “Yes, sir.”

A scream behind them came from Emma Granger.

“Astounding,” Dumbledore said, “an animagus at your age. How did you do that, Harry?”

“I…I don’t know, sir,” he answered, his mind already reeling at the strange old man who seemed to know more than he did.

“Mister D-D-Dumbledore,” Daniel Granger stammered, now pressed against the wall. “What are you doing here, and…how the hell is this possible?”

Dumbledore turned around with a twinkle in his eye as the pieces of the puzzle began to fall into place. “That, Mr. and Mrs. Granger, was magic.”


	3. Magic

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: As awesome as it would be if I were secretly JK Rowling posting alternate versions of her stories online, I am not, nor do I hold any rights to the Potter franchise.
> 
> Fair warning: this story will not feature a Harry/Hermione pairing, for reasons that will soon be obvious. I have a different angle in mind, which I feel has been very under-utilised.

“Magic?” Dan Granger said.

“Yes.”

“Magic?” his wife repeated.

“Yes.”

“…Okay, I guess that makes more sense than anything else,” Dan said, eyeing the ridiculously-dressed old man with unmasked suspicion. “I take it you can also do magic?”

“I can, Mr. Granger. I am a wizard, as is young Harry here, although the ability to change into an animal is not one of my talents.”

“Is that why you smell like me, sir?”

All eyes turned to Harry. This was the most he had said unprompted all afternoon.

“What do you mean, Harry?”

Harry pushed himself against the back of the sofa to try to keep his distance from the strange, apparently magical man. Magic certainly explained the cat thing, but, he thought there might be more. “I could smell you…you smelled like me…sir…Hermione smelled like me, too…but I don’t smell it now.”

“Hmm, I wonder…” Dumbledore muttered to himself. Cats _did_ have a good sense of smell, almost as good as dogs. And there was a reason they were such popular familiars. He turned back around and slowly drew his wand from his sleeve. “Mr. and Mrs. Granger, will you permit me to cast a magic detection charm? It is not dangerous. It will simply identify all sources of magic in this room.”

The Grangers could see where this is going, even if they didn’t want to believe it. Still, their day had got weird enough already, and if this magic could turn a boy into a cat, they probably couldn’t stop him. Dan looked at his wife, shrugged his shoulders, and then they nodded at Dumbledore.

The old man waved the carved stick in the air and muttered a complex incantation. In a moment, a golden aura surrounded him, a fainter aura surrounded Harry…and another one Hermione.

“Extraordinary,” he said. “I must congratulate you, Mr. and Mrs. Granger. Your daughter is a witch.”

Her parents twitched at the strange choice of words, but they said nothing as they processed this information.

“Cool!” Hermione exclaimed.

“Can you turn into a cat, too?” Harry asked her.

“I…I don’t think so…”

“No, Miss Granger, I’m afraid not,” Dumbledore said. “It normally takes years of training to accomplish. I have never before heard of anyone who can do it naturally like Harry. Harry, I believe that as a cat, you were able to smell Hermione’s magic, just as you were able to smell mine. Is that why you came here?”

That actually made sense to Harry. It was a lot to take in, but as he thought about it, it explained everything, all the way back to the blue hair. And the strange smell must have been magic. He nodded to Dumbledore.

“Now wait just a minute,” Dan said, finally breaking out of his shock. “How does that even work? How can Hermione be magical if we’re not? It must be rare, right?”

“Yes, Mr. Granger,” Dumbledore explained. “It is true that magic normally runs in families. However, your daughter is what we call ‘muggle-born’—a magical child born to non-magical parents. And yes, it is quite rare, with only a few muggle-born births in England each year. But surely you have noticed unusual things going on around her? Especially when she becomes emotional?”

“Yes…” Emma confirmed. “But then what does that mean?”

“It means that your daughter has an extraordinary gift. And when she reaches the age of eleven, she will be able to attend Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry with Harry and other magical children from the British Isles.”

“Hogwarts…School of Witchcraft and Wizardry?”

Dumbledore nodded. “I, myself, am the headmaster.”

That raised some eyebrows. Without fully understanding the small size of the wizarding world, muggles were often confused by Albus Dumbledore’s many roles, and the present visit was even outside of those.

“Well if that’s true, what are you doing here?”

“As I said, I am a friend of Mr. Potter’s family—”

Emma’s eyes flashed with fire, and a glare came across her husband’s face. “And I told you we don’t want anything to do with that boy’s horrible aunt and uncle,” she said.

“Wha—? I apologise, Mrs. Granger. I haven’t made myself clear. I meant to say that I was a friend of Mr. Potter’s _parents_.” The wheels in Dumbledore’s mind were spinning at Emma’s last comment, but he didn’t have time to question her further before he heard a small boy’s voice whisper, “You knew my parents?”

All eyes turned back to Harry. Dumbledore absentmindedly conjured a stool and sat down to face him directly, causing everyone else in the room to flinch. “I did, Harry,” he said gently. “Your parents were good people, and their loss was a blow to us all.”

Harry’s eyes were wide in surprise—and confusion. “But…but…but Aunt Petunia said my parents were…” He frowned in concentration, trying to remember the exact words. “They were worthless drunks and died in a car crash.”

“What?” Dumbledore exclaimed, rising right off the stool again. “You mean they didn’t tell you?”

“Tell me what, sir?”

“Why would they tell him anything?” Emma snapped. “They barely fed him.”

“Excuse me?”

“Yes, if you were such a good friend, why didn’t you check up on him,” Dan added.

“I…”

“They made him sleep in a cupboard, too!” the little girl said. She held Harry’s hand, as he had started crying.

“Enough!” A pulse of energy shot out from Dumbledore’s wand, forcing everyone to sit down. The Grangers were shocked at this display of power, even as small as it was by wizarding standards. He raised his wand to them, then hesitated, just for a moment. He would rather not do this to yet another family, but there was little choice. He had to find out what happened and assess any risks to the boy. He would glean any useful information from their minds, wipe their memories of the morning, and take Harry back home.

But as he looked from the eyes of one Granger to the next, he was disturbed by what he saw, or rather what Harry had told them. Even knowing what he knew about Petunia Dursley and his contact with her in September, the boy’s stories about his relatives were shocking. Was it really _not_ the memory charms that had made them behave so unkindly two months ago? It seemed unbelievable, but he could find no sign of deception or memory charms in the Grangers’ minds, and even their daughter had heard some of it. What kind of people could do that to their own nephew?

With growing trepidation, he looked into Harry’s mind. It was a serious risk, since any legilimency contact risked Dumbledore’s own secrets, but if things had got this bad, he had to know, and he was dismayed to find that they had. He searched for the night Harry had left the Dursleys,” and the pieces fell into place: the mistreatment at home, the two beatings, the accidental magic (it must have been Ministry Obliviators who had covered it up), and coming to as a cat and running away. He would have to have a long talk with those people.

“It would appear that there are certain issues with young Mr. Potter’s home life that need to be remedied,” he said, with his hosts silently seething at the profundity of his understatement. “While there is undoubtedly friction within the family, and they may perhaps have been inadequately monitored, I’m sure that…a review of his living conditions there will…”

He stopped as his train of logic unravelled, and a horrifying thought came to him. If love was indeed the power Voldemort knew not, as he suspected, he may well have put the whole game in jeopardy by placing Harry in such a loveless environment. A talk would make his relatives treat him decently, but it wouldn’t cure that sickness. He would have to take more drastic—No!

No, that was something he could not do. Dumbledore sat down on the stool again, his self-confidence shaken. Had he really become the manipulative one after all these years? Just by asking the question, he knew it was a step too far. Compulsion charms and mind-altering potions to keep the boy under that roof were Gellert’s way of doing things. He would have to make a new plan to keep the boy safe, and quickly. Until then, he supposed the Grangers seemed like as good of people as any to babysit…at least for the time being…well, he could still obliviate them later, even if the spell was suddenly starting to sour on him.

He cast a mild Confundus Charm to cover up the fact that he had been staring at them for over a minute and had started talking down the wrong line of thought, then he began to speak again: “Mr. and Mrs. Granger, I do not often make mistakes, but I fear that I have made a very grave one with regards to Mr. Potter. I feel that to explain, I must start at the beginning. It is a very dark tale that I would rather not dredge up, but since it concerns his family, I suppose he deserves to hear at least a little of what happened.”

 _Darker than dying in a drunken car crash?_ The Grangers wondered. Dan looked at Harry, then at Hermione, then back at Harry. “Go on,” he said cautiously.

Dumbledore now looked at the boy and told him, in terms he hoped the five-year-old could understand, “Harry, I’m so sorry that you had to hear it this way, and from a stranger, but your parents did _not_ die in a car crash…they were both killed by a very bad wizard.” Both of the children gasped. “That wizard’s name was Voldemort, and he had already killed many people. Your parents had fought against him, along with myself and many of their friends, and because of that, Voldemort decided to kill your entire family…even you, Harry.”

“What!” Dan and Emma exclaimed. Hermione let out a loud “Eep!” and grabbed Harry’s hand again.

“Wha—what happened, sir?” Harry whispered through a grimace of fear.

“He vanished. Even his own followers didn’t know what happened to him. Most people now believe he is dead. No one knows for sure how you survived, Harry. I can only guess that it was your mother’s love for you when she died protecting you—love is the most powerful magic there is and may well have saved you from Voldemort’s curse. It was the curse that Voldemort cast that gave you that scar.”

Harry’s eyes widened further, and he slowly traced the mark on his forehead with a finger.

“But even after Voldemort vanished, you were still in danger because his followers might have come after you for revenge. As your parents’ most trusted remaining friend, it was my duty to protect you. Your mother’s only living relatives were your aunt and cousin. I gave you to them because there are very powerful magical protections that I was able to use to keep you safe if you were living with a blood relative. As long as you lived at your aunt’s house, no one who meant you harm could enter it.”

“It didn’t work,” Dan snapped. “Certainly didn’t protect him from the people who were already there.”

“No,” Dumbledore said, hanging his head. “I confess that I never considered the possibility. From what you have said, I begin to see my error. Yet I _did_ have someone keeping an eye on the boy…Harry, do you know Arabella Figg?”

“Mrs. Figg…? She’s mean.” Harry surprised himself by working up the courage to say that out loud. He was worried how the strange man would react, but he just raised a single eyebrow.

Dumbledore added questioning Arabella to his mental to-do list. In any case, it seemed she had failed to see the warning signs. Perhaps he should have found a squib with children to watch him. He was about to respond the Grangers’ remaining accusations when the doorbell rang.

Emma blinked her eyes slowly and said, “That’ll be the social worker.” She rose to answer it.

“Mrs. Granger,” Dumbledore called. She looked back at him. “I must urge you not to make any mention of magic to the non-magical authorities.”

Emma shot another glare at him and said, “We’ll see.”

“Yeah, like the outfit’s not a dead giveaway,” Dan said.

Dumbledore considered this and drew his wand. In a few seconds, he had transfigured his robes into a muggle business suit.

Dan flinched again. “Do you do that all the time?” he said.

“Only when it’s called for,” the old man answered as he used a quick charm to pull his long hair back into a braid, though he left his beard alone, and he moved his stool next to Dan’s chair. Hermione’s eyes widened with interest at the hair-styling spell. The suit was an improvement, but Dan thought he looked ridiculous enough with the beard.

Emma led the social worker, an older, matronly woman carrying a sheaf of papers into the room, saying “Yes, Ms. Wilkins, he’s just in here—” before she stopped short at seeing the old man’s new look.

“Mr. Granger, Miss Granger, I presume, and Mr. Potter,” she nodded to each of them in turn, then turned turned her attention to Dumbledore. “And you are…?”

He rose and shook the social worker’s hand. A quick look with legilimency (and he was starting to wonder about _that_ spell, too), and he crafted a story that he hoped the woman would find believable. “My name is Albus Dumbledore, Madam. I was Mr. Potter’s caseworker when he was first placed. I was lucky enough to be in the neighbourhood when the office informed me he had been found, so I came here to look into the matter for myself.”

“Dumbledore?” the woman said. She’d never heard of anyone with that name before, in or out of the office, not to mention the fact that she wasn’t expecting him. “Do you have documentation of the event?” She didn’t notice the Grangers staring at how easily Dumbledore fell into the role.

He placed his hand inside his jacket and touched his fingers to the tip of his wand to conjure and appropriate-looking business card and muggle custody documents. Luckily, the woman had a clear picture in her mind of what to expect. He handed them over, and the woman looked them over sceptically, but seemed to accept them. “Very well, Mr…Dumbledore,” she said, then to all the adults, “Would it be possible to speak with the three of you for a few minutes without the children present?”

Emma turned to her daughter and said, “Hermione, could you take Harry up to your room please?” The girl clearly wanted to stay and listen, but she reluctantly nodded and led Harry up the stairs by the hand.

Dan snickered in spite of himself. When he saw his wife give him a look, he said, “You just _told_ our daughter to take a boy into her room.”

She rolled her eyes at him. “She’s six, Dan. Now, Ms. Wilkins,” she addressed the social worker, “what’s going on, exactly?”

Ms. Wilkins checked her notes and began to speak, shooting a slight cross look at Dumbledore: “I can report to you, Mr. and Mrs. Granger that Vernon and Petunia Dursley, Harry Potter’s guardians, have been arrested for child abuse and neglect. The investigation is still ongoing, but the police found a bed set up in the cupboard under the stairs. There were some bloodstains in the cupboard, and what appear to be the words ‘Harry’s Room’ were scribbled on the wall. It appears that only two of the bedrooms in the house were being used for sleeping, even though it’s a four-bedroom house. The Dursleys’ son has been put into protective custody. Apparently, he is unhealthily _over_ weight.” Like the Grangers, she had immediately noticed how small Harry looked.

“The Dursleys claimed to be “very concerned because their nephew ran away,” but they also expressed displeasure with having to support him. I don’t know anything definite, but I suspect that they’ll willingly give him up to the foster care system,” she concluded.

Dumbledore was silent as he took this all in. It seemed the environment he had placed the boy was indeed as bad as his memory had shown. Oh, why hadn’t he listened to Minerva four years ago? No, for the boy to go back there would to more harm than good, if he could make it happen at all. But to send Harry into the foster care system would still be disastrous. He remembered another boy who had been deeply hurt by the system many years ago. He would have to find a permanent home for the boy, one with both a loving family and a house that could be protected, and he would have to convince the muggle authorities to go along with it. He could think of a few families whom he trusted and would be glad to take him. Unfortunately, they were all in the wizarding world, but he had few options left on that point.

He was snapped out of his musings when, to his surprise, Ms. Wilkins addressed him directly: “Mr. Dumbledore, can you tell me what happened with the boy’s initial placement?”

Dumbledore sighed. Hopefully, his explanation would not cause too much trouble. “Harry Potter’s parents were…killed in a terrorist attack when he was fifteen months old. The Dursleys were his only living relatives, and I thought it would be best for him if they would take him in. I’ll admit that there were a few concerns with the placement, but there was nothing serious enough to contraindicate it. I now fear that I made a grave mistake in my actions.”

“There should have been at least one follow-up visit a year later,” Ms. Wilkins continued with an edge of suspicion. “What happened then?”

“There was.” Well, it was almost true, he thought, since Arabella _had_ visited once or twice. “Again, there were no serious concerns raised.”

“Hmm…” She turned back to the Grangers. “And the boy claimed he had only been beaten recently?”

“By his uncle,” Dan clarified. “Apparently, he got in several fights with his cousin. But he had been in that cupboard for as long as he could remember.”

“I see.” She had been writing everything down on her notepad as they talked and going over a checklist. “Now, Harry Potter was reported missing by Vernon Dursley on the evening of Friday, 13 September. Did he give any indication of where he’s been for the past seven weeks?”

“He claimed he’s been living on the streets,” Emma said. Seeing him in cat form made that make a lot more sense, but she realised that Dumbledore was right—she could never get away with saying that. “I’m surprised he looks that good after this much time. He didn’t exactly say it, but I think he’s been eating out of rubbish bins.” _Or catching mice?_ she wondered, suppressing a shudder at the thought.

“He should be checked out by a doctor immediately,” Ms. Wilkins ordered. “He’s lucky he didn’t freeze to death with the nights we’ve been having. You two are dentists?” They nodded. “He’ll need his teeth checked, and I’ll bet he’s never been to an eye doctor, either…Not that you need to have any further involvement, of course, I was going to take him to a group home this afternoon so he can get checked over on Monday.”

Dan and Emma shared a long, questioning look, but Dumbledore didn’t notice, as he chose that moment to spring into action. “Ms. Wilkins,” he said, “after what’s happened, I think it would be best for the boy to find him a permanent placement _quickly_. I do have a couple of leads on that front—more distant acquaintances of his parents—and I can assure you they will be _thoroughly_ vetted this time.”

The woman eyed him with suspicion. This wasn’t going to be easy. “If you file the appropriate paperwork, I will certainly take your recommendations under advisement, Mr. Dumbledore,” she said.

Ms. Wilkins asked a few more questions about how the Grangers met Harry that morning, “just for the official report,” which they handled surprisingly well, and about what Harry had told them, before asking them to call the kids back down.

“I’ll go get them,” Emma said before anyone else could say anything.

The door to Hermione’s room was open, though neither child noticed when Emma walked in. To her surprise, Hermione and Harry were engaged in a simple board game rather than reading books, although she immediately had to wonder if Harry could even read. On the other hand, could he even play board games? Hermione was clearly wiping the proverbial floor with him.

“Kids…” They both looked up at her. “Ms. Wilkins is done talking to us, and now she wants to talk to Harry. She probably have a few questions for you, too, Hermione.” She leaned down to get closer to Harry’s face. “Harry, the woman downstairs is going to ask you some questions about how your relatives treated you and about your time living outside. She might want to talk to you alone, but it’s okay. She’s not going to hurt you. Just tell the truth about your relatives. You won’t have to go back to them anytime soon, and probably not at all, so you can tell her everything about them…but…but don’t tell her about magic or about being a cat because…well, she won’t believe you. We’re going to talk about that some more, but it’ll be later, with Mr. Dumbledore. Do you understand?”

“Yes, ma’am,” he answered a little too easily. She remembered that he had mentioned something about having to act “normal” with his relatives.

With a nod, Emma escorted the children back downstairs.

Ms. Wilkins questioned Hermione first, asking her about her encounter with Harry that morning, and what they had talked about since. She answered these questions quite sensibly under the watchful eyes of her parents. The woman then asked Harry just a couple of questions before asking him to join her in the kitchen.

Dan and Emma took that as their cue, nodded to each other, and stood up. “Harry, Mr. Granger and I are going upstairs to talk on our own,” Emma said, her eyes darting toward Dumbledore, who now sat quietly reading a magazine. “When you’re done, Ms. Wilkins can call up the stairs for us if we’re not back, okay?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Good. Come along, Hermione,” she added, not wanting to leave her daughter alone with the old man. The Grangers climbed the stairs, but split off to their separate bedrooms.

Albus Dumbledore sat quietly, definitely _not_ reading the magazine in his hands. He kept going over what had happened over the past couple of hours in his mind. He was certainly relieved to find the boy safe, but horrified at the circumstances that had brought him here, and amazed at the determination of the Grangers to help him, even after they were thrown headfirst into the deep end of the magical world. Looking ahead, he would have to report that he had found the boy—and how he dreaded facing Minerva when he returned to school—and find a new home for him, probably doing some work to expedite the process on the muggle side.

He only half-listened to the eavesdropping charm he had silently cast on Harry. That wasn’t _technically_ improper, since he _was_ the boy’s magical guardian, although he would be sure to keep that to himself if the matter came up. Ms. Wilkins was going in detail through all of the incidents of abuse that Harry could remember. He answered with surprising calm, and the social worker skillfully redirected him whenever he seemed on the verge of breaking down. The questioning went on for quite a while, and the Grangers came back downstairs before it was over, though they looked oddly subdued.

Finally, it was finished, and Ms. Wilkins came out of the kitchen with a visibly shaken Harry, who sat down next to Hermione on the sofa and shivered slightly. The woman stood in the middle of the room and addressed the group. “Mr. and Mrs. Granger, I want to thank you for reporting this to us today. I know you’ve done Harry here a great service. What’s going to happen now is that I’ll take him to a group home for the weekend pending a longer-term placement. In the unlikely event that his relatives challenge the loss of their custody rights, you may be called upon as witnesses, and in the much more likely event that they go to trial, you may be called in for that as well. Mr. Dumbledore, could you mail your paperwork on Harry to me? I’ll contact you if I need a formal statement from you.”

Dumbledore nodded, relieved that she didn’t start asking questions he couldn’t answer. This at least gave him time to put together something realistic for the muggle authorities.

“Good. Now, if there’s nothing else, we’ll take our leave of you. Thank you for your time.”

“Actually, Ms. Wilkins,” Emma cut her off, “we could take Harry in here until Monday.”

The woman turned back to her in surprise. “Oh, I’m sorry, Mrs. Granger,” she said, “but even for a short-term placement, you need to be licensed.”

“Oh, but we are licensed,” Dan said as he stood and stepped over to the desk and started filing through papers. “We got licensed a couple years ago, but nothing ever came of it. It should still be good…ah, here it is.” He handed the papers over.

Ms. Wilkins looked them over and saw that the foster care license was, indeed, up to date. She was pleasantly surprised by this turn of events. This would certainly make her day one step easier, and it would probably be better for the boy, too. She opened her own sheaf of papers and pulled out the correct form. She quickly filled it out with Harry’s name and information. “That’s very generous of you,” she said, handing over the form. “If you’re both sure, just sign here.” When she took the form back, she turned to Harry and said, “Harry, you’ll be staying with Mr. and Mrs. Granger for the weekend. I’ll visit you on Monday, and we’ll figure out where you’re going to go then.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Harry said, with a voice that showed neither happiness nor disappointment. He was in a daze by now from all of the strange revelations and all of the questions about his aunt and uncle. He was certainly happy about not having to go back there and about being able to stay with what seemed to be very nice people, but he was far too used to hiding his happiness for fear that it would cause trouble.

Turning to the Grangers one last time, Ms. Wilkins said, “Thank you very much. And do try to clean the boy up, find him some decent clothes, and get him a hot meal. I don’t think he’s had any of those things in a long time. Good afternoon.”

As soon as the woman left, Dumbledore drew his wand and reverted his clothes back to their “normal” appearance.

Emma’s mouth hung open for a few seconds as she vacillated between several questions. She settled on, “Why on earth do you dress like that Mr. Dumbledore?” Her daughter giggled.

Looking slightly miffed, the old man answered, “I’ve always thought bright colours looked rather stylish.”

Emma just shook her head at the comment, while Dan took Dumbledore to task: “I’m sure you can guess that we still have a lot of questions, and not just about Harry, but right now, it looks like we have some shopping to do. Is there any chance you could come back later, say in two or three hours?”

Dumbledore was reluctant to involve a muggle family deeper in the magical world so long before their own daughter would be going to Hogwarts, but they _were_ taking Harry in for the weekend—and probably a good thing for him at that, he thought as well. He could report back to the castle and return here later with no trouble. “Mr. Granger,” he said with a somewhat forced smile, “for Harry Potter, I will happily clear my schedule. I will report to the other witches and wizards who are searching for Harry that he has been found and return here in three hours’ time.”

“Will we be approached by anyone else?” Dan asked.

“I will instruct them not to do so. Harry, I am very glad to find you safe here. We will speak again later. Good afternoon.” With a loud crack, Albus Dumbledore vanished into thin air.

“Whoa!” Dan and Emma exclaimed.

“You don’t think he’s going to just pop back here…right here?” Emma said.

“If he does, I’ll have to teach him some manners. It was bad enough just showing up like that unannounced. Come on, we’ve got three hours. Let’s get Harry cleaned up.”

* * *

Albus apparated to the gates of Hogwarts and quickly made his way into the castle and up to his office, being sure to send for Minerva along the way. It was probably best to get this out of the way immediately.

Minerva McGonagall arrived in the Headmaster’s Office a few minutes later, and she was most disturbed by the look on his face. It was that weary and dejected look that always meant that something had gone horribly wrong. A dozen frightening scenarios flashed through her mind before she could even get a word out. “Albus, what’s wrong?” she exclaimed. “Did you find the boy? Is he alright?”

Albus looked up to face her, but did not rise from his seat. “Minerva, I did, indeed, find Harry Potter, and he is, for the moment, safe. But I am afraid that I owe you a great apology.”

“For what, Albus,” she said, more relieved at the news than anything else.

“I should have listened to you four years ago. You were entirely correct. Harry should never have been left with his aunt and uncle.”

Her relief turned to anger as she wheeled on the Headmaster, drawing herself to her full height and staring over the rims of her spectacles at him. “And you’re just figuring this out now? It should have been plain to see on that very night. What did those horrid people do to the boy?”

“Nothing irreversible, I believe, but we are immensely fortunate that he escaped when he did. For a muggle family, I was most shocked at how much they treated young Harry like a house-elf.”

“House elf? Escaped?” Minerva finally sat down. “Albus, I think you had better explain the whole story.”

As Albus explained how the muggles had treated their own nephew, Minerva’s blood began to boil. She actually caught herself growling. She had half a mind to fly down to Little Whinging and hex them herself until she was placated by the news that they had been arrested by the muggle authorities.

“Well, it seems you have well and truly blundered on this one, Albus. You’re very lucky that your mistake is being fixed. But none of this explains why you couldn’t find the boy for seven weeks.”

Inexplicably, a small smile crossed the Headmaster’s face, and the twinkle returned to his eyes. “Ah, now that is the interesting part,” he said. “I was quite baffled by how he could disappear and reappear like that, but it seems I overlooked a certain method of hiding when I cast the tracking charm.”

“What method of hiding? Where has the boy been?”

“It would appear that Harry Potter has spent the past seven weeks roaming the streets of England…as a cat.”

“A cat!”

“I saw him transform with my own eyes, Minerva. A black kitten with green eyes, white feet, and a white, lightning bolt-shaped mark on his head. He is an animagus already, and he apparently achieved this purely by accidental magic. It is how he escaped from his uncle’s home.”

Minerva was speechless. She considered what this might mean—everything she knew about the animagus transformation—but nothing even hinted at such a strong a childhood or inborn aptitude for it. “I’ve never heard of such a thing,” she concluded. “It should be impossible.”

“So should surviving the killing curse,” Albus said solemnly. _Could_ this _be the power Voldemort knows not?_ he wondered. _Could I have been wrong about that as well?_ Not for the first time, nor the last, he considered confiding the prophecy to Minerva, but he again decided against it. The fewer people who knew _that_ tidbit, the better. “I am beginning to suspect that normal concepts of what is possible do not apply to Harry Potter. But I do not think this news should be mentioned to anyone. Even Severus, I think, has no particular need to know about it.”

Minerva nodded at that. She had never told Severus or his rivals that she knew about that little incident in their sixth year or about the Marauders’ animagus abilities, and she knew this was the kind of news Severus would not take well.

“Harry reappeared this morning because he happened upon a muggle-born witch about his age and apparently untransformed to talk to her,” he continued. “I met him with her family. He claimed he could smell her magic as well as mine when I met him. Do you know anything about that?”

Now _that_ was something she could answer. “Of course. Cats are very good at sensing magic. I believe they are better at it than any other non-magical animal because all cats have at least a little kneazle blood in them. It’s why they are such popular familiars. It is a very useful ability to have, although I have rarely had need of it.”

“Ah, that solves one puzzle, then. I will, of course, modify my tracking charm to follow the boy in his cat form.”

Minerva had once questioned putting a second tracking charm on the boy in addition to the Ministry Trace, but the events of the past two months had convinced her of its necessity. Despite his mistakes, Albus usually knew what he was doing. “What will happen to the boy now?” she asked.

“The muggle social worker wished to move Harry into foster care, which I cannot allow. While it would be a great improvement, I fear it will not be enough to repair the damage. The boy will need a permanent family, and soon—most likely a wizarding family so that we can be certain he will be cared for properly. Andromeda Tonks is his second cousin, and she and her husband would probably be willing to take him in. Failing that, perhaps the Diggorys or the Weasleys would be interested.”

Harry Potter in the chaos that was the Weasley household? Now that would be…interesting.

“I was lucky enough that the muggle family who found him was willing to keep him for the weekend. I will be speaking to them further in a couple of hours. Ah, once the boy is placed with a family, Minerva, I can arrange for you to meet with him about him animagus ability.”

“Yes…thank you, Albus. I think that would be most helpful.” And it would give her a good way to keep an eye on the boy herself from now on.

“Very good, Minerva, that is all I require of you for now. I must go inform Severus that the boy has been found.”

“Of course.” As she left, she wondered whether the potions master would be more relieved or annoyed at the news.


	4. Taking Notes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter (or anybody else in this story).

Harry’s afternoon was a whirlwind tour of new experiences. Mrs. Granger started by giving him a bath. He was uncomfortable with her washing him apart from his time as a cat—while Aunt Petunia had done it until he was old enough, she was never gentle about it—but Emma knew that a boy his age should not be left in the bath alone. After that, they piled in the car and went to the store. Harry had barely even seen the inside of a department store before, and he had certainly never had anyone buy _him_ clothes, but they didn’t leave until they had three complete sets of clothes for him and a new pair of trainers. Back at their house, he changed out of Dudley’s oversize castoffs and was amazed at how comfortable his new outfit was now that he was wearing something his size.

The bewilderment continued as the Grangers allowed him to sit on the sofa and watch television with them until Mr. Dumbledore returned. He kept waiting for the other shoe to drop, but it never did. The Grangers really did seem to be nice people—not just nice like Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia were to Dudley, but nice in a way that he had never personally seen and barely heard about from his limited exposure to people outside his family. It would take him quite some time before he understood that it was simply because they were a normal family—more “normal,” in fact, than the oh-so-proud Dursleys. For now, he was too busy trying to process all of the changes in his life. He was almost tempted to change back into a cat so things would be simpler—almost. The warm house was definitely better on that point.

Exactly three hours after Albus Dumbledore had vanished from their living room, the doorbell rang. Dan rose to answer it, while Emma picked up the notebook that she had been writing questions in all afternoon.

“Thank you for coming back, Mr. Dumbledore,” Dan said coolly when he saw their visitor return in the same absurd robes.

“Of course, Mr. Granger. How is young Harry doing?”

“Much better now that he’s cleaned up and in some proper clothes. But if you don’t mind, my wife and I would like to speak with you privately before you talk to him.”

Dumbledore suppressed a sigh. It was clear that the Grangers weren’t about to give him any slack. Oh well, it was too late to go back now, and besides, they were _supposed_ to be on the same side here. He nodded to them and let them lead the way.

Emma told the children to go upstairs again, something that Hermione was starting to get annoyed with, but instead of occupying the living room, they escorted Dumbledore to the kitchen. He watched as they took their seats: the two of them sitting opposite him across the kitchen table, clearly trying to assert themselves in the position of power. He also noticed that Emma had a muggle notebook open with a substantial list of questions written down one page.

“Alright, first things first,” Dan said, leaving no doubt that there would be a lot more ‘things’ to come. “What are your intentions towards Harry?” Emma suppressed a chuckle at this, but refrained from pointing out that he was supposed to ask that about Hermione. “You said you had some ideas about where to put him. You’ll forgive us if we don’t trust your judgement just yet.”

“That’s quite understandable.” Dumbledore wasn’t use to being put in the position of being interrogated, but today had been quite the humbling experience. “I can tell you that I wish to place Harry with a wizarding family. The several families I have in mind for consideration are friends and acquaintances of mine, with children of their own who are treated well, and any one of them would be glad to take Harry.”

“That’s all well and good that they’re your friends. But we’ve seen how wrong you’ve been before. How certain are you that they would do well with an adopted child?”

“Mr. Granger, I can assure you that almost any wizarding family in the country would jump at the chance to adopt Harry, and if anything, they would probably spoil him.”

“What makes you so sure of that?” Emma said.

“Because Harry Potter is quite possibly the most famous person in all of magical Britain.” Dumbledore himself being the other contended, but that was irrelevant here.

Dan and Emma blinked a couple times at that, not sure how to respond. “Famous…? How’s that?”

“In our world, Harry is hailed as the Boy-Who-Lived. He is considered a hero for defeating Voldemort, even though he was not the one who did it. There are Harry Potter dolls sold in wizarding stores, and a rather successful children’s book series written about him, which of course are complete fabrications.”

“Are you having one over on us?” Dan said. “The boy’s five. According to you, he hasn’t been seen in ‘your world’ since he was one. Are wizards really that messed up, or is this some kind of insane prank.”

“I wish it were, Mr. Granger,” Dumbledore said with a sigh. “I’m afraid it was inevitable given the euphoria caused by the end of the war. I had hoped that having the boy raised in the muggle world, that is, the non-magical world, would keep him grounded. Unfortunately, that plan has backfired.”

“So now you send him off with no real support into a world where he’s already famous that he also knows nothing about?”

“As I said, there are families in our world whom I trust to handle young Harry appropriately. In fact, he has a second cousin on his father’s side who would be quite suitable. And in the magical world, I will be able to check on the boy regularly to ensure he is not having any trouble adjusting.”

“Like you could _and should_ have been doing for him already?” Emma shot back.

He dropped his gaze, saying, “I admit that I have been leaving too much to chance. Unfortunately, the Dursleys were the only serious non-magical option. There are few families who know of us outside our world.”

Both Grangers gave the old man a stern look, but Emma said, “Fair enough…for now.”

Her husband took up the next question: “Now, if our daughter is going to be a part of your magical world someday—which we are still trying to wrap our heads around—then we want to know more about it. Tell us about this V…Vol…”

“Voldemort?”

“Yes, the terrorist. He sounded like a pretty bad guy. Is he still a threat.”

“I assure you that Voldemort is nothing to be concerned about.”

“Please don’t patronise us, Mr. Dumbledore,” Dan said. “You said _most people_ believe he’s dead. I don’t think you believe that.”

He should have known the evasive approach wouldn’t work with this pair. Muggle healers were very well-educated and trained to be inquisitive. “No,” he answered, his face grim. “Voldemort has not been seen since that night, but I believe that what happened four years ago only weakened him. It must have nearly killed him, and it certainly permanently incapacitated him, or he would have been seen afterwards, but even so, there are dark rituals by which he could return to his former power.”

Dan took the next obvious step, “And you believe that if he does, he’ll come after Harry for revenge?”

“I am certain of it. The one thing Voldemort could never tolerate was being bested.” It was true enough, if not complete.

“But a five-year-old boy?” Emma said.

“Age matters nothing to him, I’m afraid. He attacked a one-year-old child for revenge and to prevent revenge from one day being taken again himself. He will not tolerate loose ends. It is simply not in his nature. But that is if he finds a way to return, which could take years or longer, if it happens at all.”

They didn’t look persuaded by his words. “And his followers that you mentioned? You said they wanted revenge, too?”

“Yes, though the threat from them is less, now. Most of them were captured and sent to Azkaban Prison. Unfortunately, there are those who escaped by bribes and claiming to be under mind-control spells who are still at large. But with no attacks in four years, I suspect they do not wish to risk their political power on the chance that their Master might someday return.”

“Political power? You mean there are known terrorists in your government!” Dan yelled. “How the hell can you allow that?” He started to rise from the table, but his wife put a hand on his arm to calm him down, though, she was furiously taking notes on these latest revelations.

Dumbledore shuddered inwardly at the (sadly true) accusation. After so many years in the Wizengamot, he sometimes forgot how different wizarding and muggle politics were. “Mr. and Mrs. Granger, I do not wish to burden your family with the past—”

“It doesn’t sound like the past to me,” Emma interrupted, “and we’re going to learn about it sooner or later. You can’t stop Hermione from reading history books.”

“You can’t stop Hermione from reading _any_ books,” Dan added.

“This is apparently our world, too, whether we like it or not,” Emma continued. “Isn’t it better if we know now?”

“Very well,” the old man said solemnly. He supposed they _would_ have to learn it sooner or later. “Please understand that what you call terrorism, to us was considered a civil war.” Both Grangers’ eyebrows shot up at that, but they said nothing. “There is a small, but vocal minority in our society who believe that purity of magical blood is of paramount importance. In their estimation, people descended from old magical families are superior to muggle-born witches and wizards…like your daughter…and to a lesser degree superior to half-bloods—people who have only one parent with magical heritage. Even so, both Harry and I are half-bloods, and (if his unique ability is any indication) we are both very competent wizards, if I do say so. And beyond that, educational records show that pureblood wizards are no more competent than any others. The prejudice persists, however, because those who hold it can claim to be purebloods themselves, descended from old, wealthy, and politically influential magical families.”

Emma kept jotting down notes, but they still didn’t interrupt.

“In the 1960s, a fanatical wizard who styled himself ‘Lord Voldemort’ began recruiting followers from among the pureblood supremacists. Voldemort believed that muggle-born witches and wizards should not only be treated as inferior, but actually killed.” As children of parents who had lived through World War II, Dan and Emma shuddered at that statement. “His followers were called Death Eaters, and among them—though they deny it in the official record—were at least two of the wealthiest of the fifty lords and ladies of the Wizengamot—our Parliament—and a number of other Ministry officials. Voldemort was known to be involved with dark magic, but he was not considered a serious threat at the time, which allowed him to build up his forces.

“In 1970, however, the Death Eaters began overtly attacking various targets they opposed, such as businesses run by muggle-borns. They continued recruiting, and the violence spread. They attacked purebloods who associated too closely with muggle-borns, whom they condemned as “blood traitors,” and they also attacked muggle targets. Most of the recorded terrorist attacks in the island of Britain from 1970 to 1981 were actually Death Eater-initiated. The Death Eaters wore masks to conceal their identities, so with many accusations flying after the war and and so little proof, the more influential individuals sadly escaped prosecution afterwards. The condition of our government at the time did not help.”

“What do you mean?” Dan said.

“By 1980, the situation had descended into outright civil war. At his height, Voldmort had amassed an army of hundreds and launched into a reign of terror that threatened the Ministry of Magic itself and threatened to spill over onto the Continent.”

“Wait a minute, and army of a few hundred threatened your government?” Dan snapped out of his wide-eyed horror. “Just how many wizards are there?”

“The population of magical Britain is a little less than ten thousand.”

Dan had to reevaluate his vision of the magical world. If ten thousand wizards were a country, then there were probably only about a million of them in the world. And in a nation that small, a police force and a mid-size terrorist group were armies. Counter-terrorism efforts were a civil war. A few hundred bad actors were an existential threat. And one magical school for the whole of the Britain Isles, no matter how necessary the arrangement, gave him an uneasy feeling of putting all of one’s eggs in the same basket.

“So your nation was on the verge of being taken over…” He put the pieces together, hands clenching into firsts as he realised Hermione had already been born at that point. “And a genocide of…muggle-borns would have been the next step…but then Voldemort tried to kill Harry and was defeated. That’s how bad it was?”

“Yes, Mr. Granger, I’m afraid that’s exactly how bad it was.”

“And if he comes back?” Emma asked in a whisper.

“Through his philosophy, even if not overtly, he is still powerful and influential. Unfortunately, the same thing is likely to happen again unless he is stopped quickly.”

“Could we escape him, then? Flee the country? Or do all wizards have the same problems?” Dan said quickly.

“Unless Magical Britain should fall, yes, most other countries will be safe. With the exception of Magical Scandinavia, no other First World countries have been under the influence of dark rulers for many years. You and your family could escape to almost anywhere you please.”

Emma then asked the final question on the matter, the one she had hoped she wouldn’t have to: “But Harry can’t?”

Dumbledore’s breath caught in his throat as he considered the possible implications of her asking that question. _Could they be considering—?_ he thought. It would be a most fortunate break for him. Unfortunately, the answer would probably render it moot. “No,” he answered honestly. “As I said, Voldemort cannot accept defeat. If he returns, he will pursue Harry Potter to the ends of the earth.”

* * *

The questions continued for a long time afterwards. There were a lot about Hogwarts and the alternatives to Hogwarts, since it seemed Hermione would need some kind of magical education. This led to even more questions about things like the glaring gaps in muggle courses in Hogwarts’s curriculum and the reasons why muggle-borns weren’t normally contacted until age eleven. The Grangers also asked how the magical world was set up, and Dumbledore explained the statute of secrecy to them at length, among other things, and they grudgingly admitted that it was probably a good idea. Finally, they had quite a few questions about what magic could do, which Dumbledore could tell were subtle ways of asking just what magic was good for aside from being murdered by a maniac.

The fact that with her magical constitution and magical medicine, Hermione could possibly live to a hundred and fifty _was_ a definite plus, but they clearly weren’t sold on what country she should live out those years in. By the end of the conversation, Emma had pages and pages of notes, and Dumbledore’s voice was becoming hoarse. It was approaching dinner time.

“Mr. Dumbledore, thank you for your patience and honesty,” Dan concluded when they rose from the table, offering his hand to shake for the first time. “We really appreciate you being so forthwith with us.”

Dumbledore shook both Grangers’ hands. He was pleased that he seemed to have brought them around on magic in general despite having to tell them so many of the uncomfortable truths of the wizarding world. Even parents of school-aged muggle-borns rarely learnt as much, or reacted as well. It made him wonder again about their own intentions regarding Harry. It was tempting—oh so tempting—to exert a little influence of his own, but he forced himself to let them make any such decision on their own.

“I’m glad that we could discuss these matters civilly,” he replied. “Now, I really must speak with Harry, but given the time, I will endeavour to keep the questions short. You may certainly join us if you wish.”

“I think we will at that.” Dan was still keeping the old man on a short leash.

The moved back to the living room, and Emma called the kids downstairs. She noted that Harry always seemed to be first when she called, being very quick to obey orders.

“How was your afternoon, you two?” she asked.

Hermione certainly didn’t look as happy as she had hoped about having another child her age in the house, but her concerns were clarified when her daughter said, “Harry’s not very good at games, Mummy.”

Harry dropped his head and mumbled something about his cousin always wanting to win.

“Um, well that’s okay, honey. He can learn and get better. Come along now. Mr. Dumbledore wants to talk to you, Harry.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Harry sat very still on the sofa with his hands clasped in front of him. By now, Dan and Emma noticed his slight squint and hoped he would be able to get to an eye doctor soon.

“Harry,” Dumbledore said, putting on his best grandfatherly face, “I want to apologise to you for what you have suffered for the past four years. I was wrong to leave you with your aunt and uncle, and I will do as much as I can to fix it. I hope that, in time, you can forgive me for my error.”

Harry stared at the old man, unblinking. Forgiveness, in any direction, was not something that was well-taught in the Dursley household. More so than at any other point that day, Harry knew neither what he wanted to say in response, nor what he was “supposed” to say. Luckily, Dumbledore just glossed over the point and moved on.

“On Monday, I am going to try to find a family to take care of you. They will probably be a magical family. I promise you that they will treat you well and will be nothing at all like your relatives.”

Harry lowered his head and whispered, “Thank you, sir.”

“If you are comfortable talking about it, I would like to know what happened when you escaped from your uncle’s house.”

Harry’s head snapped back up, and he flinched in that strange way of his, turning his body away while keeping his eyes locked on Dumbledore. The behaviour seemed familiar to the Headmaster, but he couldn’t quite place it. He had certainly never seen James or Lily do that.

Dumbledore glanced away for a second in thought, and Harry seemed to relax. He then began to tell his tale, though he half mumbled as he spoke. At Dumbledore’s prompting, he explained the strange flickering of the lights and the loud bang that distracted his family, along with how he ran out the door before he fully realised that he had changed. He then explained how he had found food and water and warm places to sleep outside.

For Dumbledore, the pieces began to fall into place. He would have to enquire with the Obliviators to get the rest of the story, but it was clear that Harry had performed an impressive feat of accidental magic on top of unlocking his animagus ability. He was amazed by the boy’s resourcefulness in surviving at that age and wondered how much of it was animal instinct. He would have to ask Minerva after the matter.

Hermione sat by Harry’s side for most of the story. When he flinched, she tried to hold his hand, but he pulled away this time. However he did allow her to rub the back of his hand, since it was close enough to petting, like the people who put out food would sometimes do. When he mentioned catching mice for food, though, Hermione turned green and got up to sit with her mother.

When Harry finished his story with his encounter with Hermione that morning, Emma said the question that everybody was thinking: “So if you didn’t know what happened, how did you find him?”

Dumbledore frowned. He had hoped to avoid this issue, but he felt he needed to be truthful. “I have certain ways of tracking Harry’s movements using magic,” he explained. “This is merely for his safety in case something should happen. However, these spells apparently did not follow him in cat form. But that is easy enough to fix…” Well, nothing else for it. “Harry, if you be so kind as to change back into a cat, I would like to correct the spells. I assure you that they are only there so that I can help you if you are taken somewhere you are not supposed to be.” _Well, that_ _’s what_ his _tracking charm was for._

Dan and Emma considered stopping him, but if the spells were there already, there was not much they could say. From their talk, it sounded like this kind of tracking was not uncommon.

Harry stared at the old man again, then lowered his head. “Yes, sir,” he whispered. He seemed to concentrate for a moment, then his body shrunk down, and there was a black and white kitten sitting there on the couch.

Dumbledore drew his wand and muttered a lengthy incantation. The Grangers couldn’t interpret it clearly, but they caught enough Latin forms to guess the etymology. When he finished, and blue aura surrounded the kitten for a moment, then vanished.

“There, it’s done.”

The kitten kept sitting there, seemingly unconcerned.

“Well…alright, then,” Dumbledore said. He rose to his feet, subtly stretching his legs after such a long day. “I won’t keep you any longer, Mr. and Mrs. Granger. Thank you for your cooperation today. I will return on Monday to meet Ms. Wilkins and the boy concerning his placement. I reiterate that the magical world must be kept a secret from your non-magical friends and associates. And I would like to keep Harry’s animagus ability particularly confidential because it is so…unusual, should you be approached by anyone else from the magical world.”

“Of course,” Dan said. “We understand.”

“Mr. Dumbledore,” Emma added, “we’ve had a lot going on today, and we’ll need some time to process it…but could you possibly come back tomorrow afternoon—um, in case we have more questions?” Dan looked a little annoyed by the prospect, but said nothing.

Dumbledore raised an eyebrow and wondered just what kind of questions they might be that they would want to speak again so quickly, but he tried to answer casually: “Since you’ve been so generous in caring for the boy this weekend, I think I could arrange another visit tomorrow, say, at one o’clock, perhaps?”

“That would be excellent. Thank you.”

“Good. Until then…” Dumbledore once again departed with a loud crack.

“Do they all do that?” Dan wondered.

After Dumbledore vanished, Hermione rose from her seat and sat down beside Harry again. The kitten hadn’t bothered yet to change back into a boy. Hermione watched him for a moment, then reached out and began scratching him behind his ears.

“Hermione!” her mother exclaimed. Something about the action disturbed her. That kitten _was_ still a boy, wasn’t he? It didn’t seem right to just treat him like a cat.

The kitten tensed up under Hermione’s fingers, but after a few moments, he actually seemed to relax. It was only when she tried to hold him with both hands that he gave a meow and slipped away off the sofa.

Emma felt that she couldn’t handle an intelligent cat running around the house on top of everything else, so she tried to draw the boy back out over dinner. “Harry, I’m going to order some pizza for dinner,” she said. “Would you mind…erm, changing back into a person so you can tell me what you want on it?”

“Not mice!” Hermione yelled. Harry stopped in front of Emma’s feet and untransformed, but didn’t speak.

“No, not mice,” Emma said. “Do you like anchovies, Harry?”

“Eww!” her daughter objected.

When he apologetically explained that he hadn’t had pizza before, Emma went with just pepperoni.

* * *

Harry Potter lay in the double bed in the guest bedroom of the Granger household and wondered again how he had got here. It seemed impossibly luxurious just having room to stretch out all the way and actually a little too warm after weeks sleeping outside and years before that with only a threadbare blanket. It was a wonderful place to sleep, but it still made him uncomfortable. There was something profoundly wrong with the fact that he was being treated better by the Grangers, whom he had just met, than by his own family, even though he was too young to fully understand why. He went over it in his mind, how they had invited him to eat with them, held him when he cried, bought him clothes, let him watch the television, and finally Mrs. Granger actually tucked him into bed.

It had been the best day of his life, except that it didn’t make one bit of sense to the confused five-year-old. He felt like being able to turn into a cat was the most normal thing that had happened that day, and even he could tell it was the one part the Grangers really couldn’t handle, although they did a much better job of it than his relatives ever would have. And then there was Mr. Dumbledore. The old man was strange, but at least he seemed to know what was going on. Learning the truth about his parents was a shock, but magic and bad guys, however horrifying, he could understand.

The news that he wouldn’t have to go back to his aunt and uncle hadn’t really sunk in yet. He’d never had much reason to trust anyone about something like that, and he didn’t want to hold out much hope. That he had even come this far still made him uncomfortable. He couldn’t even seem to sleep in this great bed. Finally, he did something that he had never done before as a human: he rolled over to sleep on his stomach. Instantly, he felt more comfortable—more protected, somehow. Harry drifted off to sleep hoping, as he did every night now, that he wouldn’t wake up in his cupboard in the morning, except this time, he also found himself hoping he wouldn’t wake up curled up out in the cold again either.

* * *

While Hermione and Harry were both in bed, Dan and Emma were certainly not sleeping. By unspoken agreement, they were sitting at the kitchen table, since the discussion was a particularly serious one, adding in a late-night cup of tea for good measure.

“What do you think of all this, Dan?” Emma started.

“What part? Our daughter has magical powers, she makes friends with a boy who can turn into a cat, some old goat in a ridiculous outfit shows up on our doorstep, and we apparently get dragged into some stupid race-based war like in some Third World country, not to mention the part where the bad guys still have their own political party.”

“Yes, I know it’s all pretty crazy. But what about Harry?”

Dan sighed and looked up at the ceiling. “I don’t know. For a while, there, I thought we could help him, but…”

“Well, we always _have_ wanted another child.”

“Yeah, we wanted another child who wasn’t a target for terrorists.”

Emma bit her lip and considered letting the matter drop, but she pressed on. “So what do you think we should do?”

“The _smart_ thing to do would be to let Dumbledore take care of Harry, keep our distance, and flee the country at the first sign of trouble.”

“But…?”

Dan set his teacup down with a clatter. “Emma, I’m sorry, but why are we even considering this? Why do we even _need_ to consider this?”

“I—I know he regrets his mistake, but do you really trust Dumbledore to put Harry with a good family?”

He shook his head without hesitation. “Not really, no. _Better_ , sure, but I don’t think I could trust him on _good_ , yet.”

“Exactly. And there is that issue of him being famous in the magical world.”

“But, Emma, it’s not our problem.” He held up a hand. “I’m not just dismissing it. This is serious danger we’re talking about that we don’t even really understand yet. I have to worry about keeping you and Hermione safe first. That boy is not our problem, and this is not our war.”

“I know. I’m worried about our daughter, too, but if it comes to it, it will be her war. Even if we take her overseas, this is still her home, and if she goes to that…Hogwarts school, it’ll be her friends who get caught up in it.”

“All the more reason to get out while the getting’s good.”

“That’s all well and good for us, but Harry’s doesn’t have that option.”

“And he won’t if he stays with us, either.” Dan stopped and took a deep breath. He didn’t want to lose his temper with his wife, especially this late. “I’m just saying, how does it help anyone if we’re stuck here with him?”

Emma rested her forehead on her hand. “If it comes to that, I’ll admit it probably doesn’t,” she said. She met her husband’s eyes again. “But right now, Harry is just a little boy who’s been badly hurt, who needs help, and who doesn’t have anyone in his life who can be trusted to give it to him. Plus, on top of that, Hermione’s finally found a friend, which you have to admit is something she desperately needs. And I’ll bet she’s his first friend, too.”

A light went on in Dan’s mind, and he gave his wife a weak smile. “My God, you’re really taken with this boy, aren’t you?”

Emma blushed. Pressing her lips together, she answered, “I suppose I am—motherly instinct kicking in and all that…but, Dan, how many times have we said in the past couple of years that we were going to adopt, and then it never happens?”

“And we still can, Emma, but it doesn’t have to be Harry.”

“But it’s more than just that. I don’t know…” She took a deep breath and tried to understand her feelings. “You know, my mother always told me, sometimes you have to make a choice between doing what’s right and doing what’s easy. And I’ve just got this feeling that adopting Harry is the right thing to do.”

A scowl crossed Dan’s face. “Emma, are you sure that Dumbledore didn’t, you know, do something to you?”

“I…I doubt it. Else why didn’t he do the same thing to you? I don’t know where this coming from, but…I still think it’s right.”

Her husband just stared at her, amazed at her sudden conviction. He could see in her eyes how strongly she felt about this. And he did have to admit she was right about Dumbledore’s judgement—or lack thereof.

“You know, we really owe Harry for this,” she added.

“What do you mean?”

“If he hadn’t shown up today, Hermione would have walked into that world blind six years from now, and maybe never have been told the full story. At least now she’ll be more prepared if something does happen.”

Well, there was that. “You realise you’re talking about joining a war, though, don’t you—or a counter-terror force, anyway?” Dan pressed her.

“I know.”

“Against people who can use _magic_. All we have is a shotgun.”

“I know. Don’t think I haven’t thought of that; I almost feel like I’ve lost my mind myself. But we don’t even know if there’ll be a war. And if there is, it might not be until the kids are grown. We _do_ know that Harry needs a family, and no matter what he says, I don’t trust that Mr. Dumbledore to find one for him who can really help him.”

“And you think we can? We barely know the first thing about his world.”

“We can better than his abusive relatives or a bunch of magical fans, Dan. That much is obvious.”

Dan rested his head on his hands as he tried to collect his thoughts. As adamant as his wife was being, there were few places he could fault her logic. They _had_ wanted another child,  and that wasn’t likely to happen for Emma. Heck, he’d even liked Harry himself until he found out how much trouble the boy was in. He wasn’t keen to abandon the boy by any means, but the story of that Voldemort lunatic was far more than he wanted to take. And yet, as much as he wanted to assure himself that Dumbledore had things under control with Harry, he couldn’t make himself believe it. He hated to admit it, but the right thing _was_ to at least keep the boy close—certainly to let him be friends with Hermione if they wanted. Emma was right about that, too. A friend was something both children needed. He steeled himself and looked up again.

“So what do you think?” she asked.

“I…I think it’s late. I think we need to sleep on it…Look, I’m not going to just say no. But I don’t want to even consider it until we know something about how we can stay safe.”

“Of course not. I wouldn’t either. That’s why I wanted to talk to Mr. Dumbledore.”

“Yes, of course…” It was only then that Dan understood how many steps ahead of him his wife was. “Although, is he even the person to ask?”

“He did say he fought against Voldemort. We can ask him about that, too.”

“He certainly didn’t keep Harry’s parents safe, though.”

“We don’t know what happened to Harry’s parents, exactly…I’d better write this down.”

Emma started her new list of questions, which she was sure would grow a good deal longer by the time the old man visited them again.

“And…as difficult as it’ll be, if we really want to do this, we need to ask Hermione if she’s okay with it, too,” Dan said.

Emma closed her eyes, blinking back a tear or two. “I know. That’s going to be the hardest part in all this.”

“Come on, we’d better get to bed, then. I feel like it’s gonna be another long day tomorrow.”

“Ha, only tomorrow?”

They broke off the discussion and wearily trudged up the stairs. They were just at their bedroom door when Dan stopped one more time.

“Emma,” he said. “Do you remember how oddly your mother always dressed?”

“Yes, but…no, you don’t think?”

“Well, it wouldn’t even be in the top ten strange things that have happened today…and your parents both died a couple of years before Hermione was born under mysterious circumstances.”

“Something else we need to ask Dumbledore about.”

With the possibilities continuing to spin through their minds, they laid down for what would prove to be a most uneasy night’s sleep.


	5. Welcome to the Family

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: JK Rowling is the acknowledged Lady and Mistress of all things Harry Potter. We are but her humble fans.

Albus Dumbledore returned to the Granger residence precisely on time the next day. Dan answered the door and shook his head slightly when he saw that the old man was now dressed in long maroon robes with black geometric patterns on them and a red nightcap.

“Thank you for seeing us again Mr. Dumbledore,” he said, shaking the man’s hand this time. “Please come in.”

Dumbledore entered the house and found it considerably calmer than yesterday, although the children were not to be seen on the lower level. This didn’t worry him though, as he had checked and found Harry to still be in residence when he left Hogwarts.

“The children are upstairs,” Emma said in response to the unspoken question. “We need to speak with you privately first.”

“Of course. Lead the way.”

Emma smirked slightly as they led him to the kitchen and again took the position of control with the two of them seated across the table from him.

“How is Harry today?” he asked with a light smile.

The Grangers smiled back, but they were more patronising smiles. “Physically, much better,” Emma said. “And he seemed reasonably comfortable last night. He’s going to need lot of time to adjust, though.”

Dumbledore nodded. He supposed that was the best that could be hoped for. He could assess the boy in person later. Noting the notebook that Emma held open on the table, he said, “I see you have more questions, Mrs. Granger. It’s reassuring to see that you are taking such an interest in your daughter’s future and wizarding culture.” Of course, he suspected more, but this was a time to let them do the talking.

“Yes, we’ll get to that in a moment,” she replied. She wanted to get the less important (maybe) question out of the way first. “But there was something we thought of last night. My parents died in 1977 under mysterious circumstances, Mr. Dumbledore. They were both found dead in their home in the aftermath of what looked like a gas explosion, but the coroner never actually determined a cause of death. And we also remembered that my mother always had an unusual habit of dressing in robes, but she never mentioned anything about magic that I can recall. Do you know if there might have been some kind of connection?”

Dumbledore stroked his beard in concern. “How unusual,” he said. “What was your mother’s maiden name?”

“Fawley. Emilie Fawley. My father was Samuel Puckle.”

“Hmm, I don’t know any Puckles, but Fawley _is_ a wizarding name. However, most of that family was killed in Grindelwald’s War.”

“Grindelwald’s War?”

“You would know it as World War II.”

Emma’s eyes widened. “My grandparents on my mother’s side were killed in World War II. They both died in the Blitz.”

“That would fit, then. Mrs. Granger, I believe your mother may have been a squib—a non-magical person born to magical parents. Unfortunately, they are often shunned by pureblood families and leave the wizarding world—even more so before Grindelwald’s War, but their magical heritage may resurface after several generations.”

The Grangers glanced at each other. That explained Hermione, then.

“As for your parents…I’m afraid that their deaths were no accident, either. Voldemort rarely bothered with squibs who left the magical world, but your description bears all the marks of a Death Eater attack. You have my condolences for your loss, Mrs. Granger. It would appear that you’ve had several more unpleasant contacts with the magical world than I expected.”

 _This_ was news. The fact that both her parents and grandparents had been killed by “dark wizards’ was a lot to for her to take. She blinked back tears and buried her face in Dan’s shoulder as she tried to collect herself. Dan just wrapped his arms around her. He looked like he was going to be sick at the thought that his family had already been visited by the violent prejudices of the magical world, and he wondered again if it was worth it to deal with them at all. Though on the other hand, he thought, the fact that World War II was apparently a magical conflict meant that they might not be able to escape it. For the first time, he had to question his dismissal of taking an active role in things.

Dumbledore waited patiently for several minutes while the Grangers dealt with these revelations. They were surprising enough to him and had to be devastating for the muggle family. He pitied the little girl when she learnt the truth. Harry had never had a chance to escape it, but it was sad to see the innocence of yet another child stripped away by the conflict.

At length, he just barely heard Dan whisper to his wife, “Are you okay? It’s fine if you want to back out now.”

It took Emma another minute to think it through, but in the end, she whispered back, “No, it doesn’t change anything now.” With a rather loud sniffle, she looked up and turned back to Dumbledore. Wiping her tear-stained cheeks, she told him, “Th-thank you for—for providing us with some closure about this, sir. It’s…good that we can finally know the truth. But right now, we have more pressing issues. We…” she looked to her husband, and he nodded for her to go on. She spoke slowly to avoid tripping over her words: “We would like to consider adopting Harry ourselves.”

Dumbledore was genuinely shocked at this, which was a rare occurrence. It was all he could do to confine his reaction to a raising of his eyebrows. He was sure that he had lost the opportunity for good after the revelations about her family. He never would have taken the two of them to be that Gryffindor.

“That would be…extraordinarily generous of you,” he answered, not quite sure what to say. “May I…may I ask what led to this decision?”

“We…” her voice caught again. “We thought about what you said about Harry being so famous in the magical world. I’m sure you have good people, but we feel like we can give him a better environment here, where he can just be a kid for once. He deserves that after what he’s been through. We’ve always wanted another child and haven’t been able to have one, and Hermione already seems to like him…and frankly, we do, too.”

This was too good to be true. He had to wonder whether there were ulterior motives at work here, but when he resorted to Legilimency, he could sense no dishonesty from the pair, nor any sign of magical compulsions. He could already tell the Grangers were a fine family, and young Harry would be most fortunate to be a part of it, but he was amazed that they would even consider taking on that kind of risk.

“But you can probably see that there are some obvious problems with this arrangement,” Dan said before he could broach the subject.

Dumbledore nodded in understanding. No use evading the matter. “Voldemort.”

Dan nodded back firmly in response.

Dumbledore took a deep breath and solemnly folded his hands on the table. “Very well, what do you want to know?”

“First off, you said that you and Harry’s parents fought against him, but you also said you’re the headmaster of a school. What was all that about?”

“I have many roles in the magical world, Mr. Granger. There is much that I cannot tell you for security’s sake, but suffice it to say that I was the leader of a covert operation that worked against Voldemort’s schemes. I won’t pretend it wasn’t dangerous work. Over a third of our members died over the course of the war, including the Potters.”

That sounded even more serious than they thought, but they pressed on. “That’s the next question: Harry’s parents. What happened to them? How did Voldemort find them when Harry was with them? It’s doesn’t sound like they were killed in a firefight.”

He wasn’t wrong. Dumbledore told them what sounded like the full story: how Voldemort singled out the Potters for retribution, how they went into hiding, the Fidelius Charm, their betrayal by Sirius Black, who was now in prison, and their deaths at the hands of the dark wizard on All Hallows’ Eve of 1981.

“Why didn’t they have an escape route?” Emma demanded. “Surely, they knew there was a risk of being found out, even with the charm.”

“I do not believe they ever considered the possibility. They trusted Black too highly. But as it happened, they _did_ have an escape route. Unfortunately, they were taken by surprise and could not reach it in time.”

“Then what good was having it? Why weren’t there magical protections there that gave them time to get away?”

Oh, how often Dumbledore had asked himself that very question in the past four years. But all he could do was admit that this had been yet another mistake. “Mrs. Granger,” he explained, “I think we have all seen by now that I am not infallible. I recommended a Fidelius Charm to James and Lily because it is the strongest of all magical wards so long as the Secret Keeper can be trusted. There are many less powerful wards, such as the blood wards at Harry’s former residence, and general wards that can be cast anywhere. Unfortunately, the Fidelius interferes with the application of most other types of wards. Had the Potters been in a conventionally warded house, they would almost certainly have slowed Voldemort down long enough for them to escape through the floo network, that is, magical travel by fireplace, unless he managed to find a way to interfere with the floo network itself, in which case we would have been in far worse trouble.”

“Okay, then,” Emma said after considering this answer. “If, and I do mean if, we choose to adopt Harry, would you be able to put these kinds of wards on our house, and perhaps our practice?”

It would take some paperwork, but it would be doable. “I can arrange that,” he answered. “They won’t be as strong as the blood wards, but they will slow down any attackers long enough to escape. For that event, I would provide a secured, private floo connection directly to Hogwarts, which is much more heavily warded.” That would be even more paperwork, and probably wouldn’t be possible except for his position as Chief Warlock, but no need to complicate things. He decided to sweeten the deal a bit more. “I can also provide you with emergency portkeys, which are portable, point-to-point, instant transport charms. They are less reliable because the Death Eaters sometimes used anti-portkey wards, and they can only be used within the island of Britain, but they are the best form of magical protection available for when you are outside the house.”

“Hmm…” Dan said, “that would make us feel a lot better about the possible arrangement. Although, with all due respect, sir, would it be possible to have these wards and escape routes independently certified?”

More distrust, Dumbledore thought, though he supposed he could hardly blame them. He was beginning to see the downside of not involving families of muggle-borns in the magical world until they enrolled in Hogwarts. Luckily, this one was relatively easy to answer. “I can put you in touch with Gringott’s Wizarding Bank,” he said. “They are experts in wards and security, and they have connections in the muggle world who can vouch for them. You will probably wish to contact them anyway regarding Harry. He inherited a rather substantial trust fund from his parents that can be used to help pay for his accommodation if need be.”

“We’re quite capable of supporting the boy ourselves, but thank you. A certification from this bank sounds reasonable enough. Now, what about the children themselves?

“What about them?”

“Well, since Voldemort or his followers might come after Harry, is there any kind of magical self-defence training the kids can take so they’re more prepared?”

“I’m afraid not. Underage magic use is prohibited outside of school, and children rarely have enough control to learn significant magic until age eleven. In any case, it seems unnecessary to burden children so young with such concerns.”

“We’ll be the judge of that,” Dan quipped.

“There are plenty of muggle martial arts programs that start that young,” Emma added. “You’re saying you really don’t have anything?”

“No, there is nothing like that in the magical world…however…” It was an intriguing idea that Dumbledore had not previously thought of. The twinkle in his eyes came back for the first time all day. “Muggle martial arts could prove helpful. Even though they won’t be that much use in a magical duel, the strength, stamina, and reaction time they build could make all the difference…especially since many Death Eaters rely on House Elves for manual labour and don’t concern themselves with such things. If you _do_ wish to prepare the children, that is probably your best option until they come to Hogwarts.”

“If we adopt Harry, there’s no question,” Emma said. “We _will_ ensure that they are as prepared as possible.”

“Now, the last issue is information,” Dan said. “I don’t know how you normally do this, but if we choose to adopt Harry, you _will_ inform us immediately if Voldemort is sighted in any way, shape, or form.”

“Of course,” Dumbledore agreed. “If he returns, I will need to take immediate action to ensure the integrity of Harry’s protections.”

“And you will also inform us if there is any other new Death Eater activity.”

“Certainly.”

“And any other important developments, like if some other ‘dark wizard’ wants a piece of him.”

“Mr. and Mrs. Granger, you have my assurances that I will do everything in my power to protect young Harry and yourselves and your daughter should you choose to bring him into your family. And I can also take steps to expedite the adoption process if there are any problems with it.”

Both Grangers raised an eyebrow. “Is that legal?”

Dumbledore paused for a moment, tight-lipped, but he answered, “It can be done legally.”

Dan and Emma looked at each other again and whispered back and forth for a minute, but they decided they had no further questions. They rose from the table, and Emma spoke: “Okay, Mr. Dumbledore, we’re going to talk to Hermione about this, and then talk to Harry, and _if_ they’re both okay with it, we’ll agree to the adoption. If you don’t mind waiting, you can stay here; watch the telly if you like. Or you can come back later.”

“I have the time to stay here for the afternoon, Mrs. Granger, thank you.”

They nodded and left the kitchen to head up the stairs. Dumbledore still couldn’t believe his luck with the Grangers. It would mean a lot of work to get all the necessary wards and approvals, but he would be happy to get a second chance with the boy, this time exposing him to the magical world in a controlled manner. As he thought about it, he realised that was probably even better than his original plan. He only hoped they could convince the children, as hard as that would be. In the meantime, he considered investigating the strange box that the muggles called a “telly.”

* * *

“One question first.” Dan said at the top of the stairs. “Do we trust that Dumbledore’s telling the truth?”

Emma had thought of that, too, but she thought so. “He has no reason to lie to us. If he wanted to harm Harry or us, he could have just waved that stick of his and done it. Right?”

“Right.” He felt a little queasy at the thought, though. “So you still want to go through with this after everything?”

She took a deep breath and nodded. “Against all common sense, yes.” She opened the door to her daughter’s room and found her trying to teach Harry to play Go Fish, with limited success. “Hermione, could you come here, please? Daddy and I need to talk to you. Harry, stay there for now. We’ll talk to you in a little while.”

Hermione got up and followed her parents into their bedroom, sensing how serious they were being.

“Have a seat,” her mother said, motioning to the bed. They had decided on the bedroom for this because it was closer and more intimate for such an emotional conversation. They all sat on the bed, and Hermione watched them carefully. Those large, chocolate-brown eyes of hers always seemed to pick up on everything. With the heavy curtains closed, it looked as much like evening in the room as mid-afternoon, which somehow seemed appropriate.

“Hermione, do you remember how Mr. Dumbledore said he wants to send Harry to a nice magical family last night?”

“Uh huh,” she nodded happily.

“Well, we’ve been talking with Mr. Dumbledore some more, and we don’t think that’s such a good idea.”

Hermione’s smile changed to a confused frown. “Why not?”

“Because, in the magical world, Harry is very famous because everyone thinks he beat that bad wizard, Voldemort.”

“The one who killed his parents?” she whispered.

“Yes, him. Everyone thinks Harry defeated Voldemort, even though he was just a baby and didn’t do anything. If he lives over there, everyone will treat him like a famous movie star, and he might get spoilt. And we don’t want him to end up like his mean cousin, do we.”

Hermione gave a slight giggle at this, but then turned serious again. “Do you think Mr. Dumbledore will mess up again?” she asked, reminding them that there was no pulling the wool over their daughter’s eyes.

Her father answered her, “We think Mr. Dumbledore really wants to fix his mistake, and he’ll put Harry with a much better family than his old one, but we don’t know how good of a family they’ll be.”

Emma took a deep breath and continued, “So…your father and I decided that we would like to adopt Harry. Do you know what that means?”

Hermione’s eye went wide. “It means he’d live with us? And he’d be my brother?”

“That’s right—”

“That’s great!”

“Wait,” Dan interrupted. “There’s something you need to know, first. It would be _dangerous_ if we adopt Harry.” He made sure to speak that last sentence especially clearly.

“What…? Why?”

“Because, honey, Mr. Dumbledore thinks that Voldemort isn’t really dead.”

“What!”

“Yes, he thinks that Voldemort might come back someday and try to kill Harry again.”

Hermione clapped both hands over her mouth. Her mother reached out to her and pulled her close, putting an arm around her. “We’re sorry you have to hear all of this, Hermione, but it’s very important that you understand. Do you remember how I told you about my parents, your Grandma and Grandpa Puckle, and how they died before you were born?”

The wheels were already turning, and if it were possible, Hermione’s eyes grew even wider. She nodded while keeping her hands over her mouth.

“We told Mr. Dumbledore about them, and he thinks that Voldemort killed them, too…You see, Voldemort is a very bad man. He hated my mother because she couldn’t do magic when her parents—your great-grandparents—were magical. He hates Harry because his parents fought him. And he also hates people who can do magic, but don’t have magical parents—people like you…” Emma took a deep breath to try to keep her voice steady. “So even if Harry’s not here…if he comes back…he might try to kill you, too.”

“Eep!” Hermione hugged her mother tight and hid her face in her shirt.

“We don’t know if Voldemort is going to come back,” Dan said soothingly. “Even if he does, it might not be until years and years from now. Now, if it’s just the three of us, we can leave the country, and we’ll be safe from him.”

Hermione suddenly went still. She held herself there, clinging to her mother for a few moments, then she very slowly pulled away, looked up to face her parents, and whispered, “But Harry can’t?”

 _She is her mother_ _’s daughter for sure_ , Dan thought as he shook his head. “No, Voldemort especially hates Harry, and he’ll chase him anywhere in the world.”

“But that’s not fair!” She exclaimed, flipping from sadness to anger in a blink. “His parents died, his aunt and uncle hurt him, and now no one wants him because it’s dangerous.”

“That’s not true, Hermione,” Emma said. “We do want him. And Mr. Dumbledore can use magic to protect us. We just want to make sure you’re okay with it.”

She started to process this. Magical protection sounded good, and she was sure she would like having Harry as a brother. But bad guys trying to kill her? Not so much. She wasn’t sure what she wanted.

“It’s okay if you say no,” her father assured her. “There’s other families that want him, too. Like Mummy said, he’s famous—”

“But that’s not fair either! They shouldn’t want him just because he’s famous. They should want him because he’s Harry.”

If there was any doubt that Hermione had inherited her mother’s uncompromising sense of justice, it was gone now. Dan would have been proud of her had it not been the same thing that had been giving him headaches all weekend.

“We know it’s not fair, honey,” he tried again, “but it’s still okay if you say no. You can still be friends with Harry, and as long as it’s safe, you can go to the same magical school with him in a few years.”

“And,” Emma added, “if we do adopt Harry, there’s going to have to be some changes, and I don’t mean just because you won’t be the only kid in the house anymore.”

Hermione’s eyes narrowed. “Like what?”

“Well, one thing is that the way Mr. Dumbledore’s magical protections work, we would all have to be ready to get away really fast—like a fire drill. Another thing is that we want you to be as prepared as possible just in case bad guys do show up. You’re too young to use magic now, but Mr. Dumbledore says that if you learn non-magical self-defence, it will help you be better at magic later, so you would both be taking karate classes. And like Mr. Dumbledore said, we have to keep everything magical a secret, so you can’t tell anyone at school or anything like that.”

“Oh…I understand.” She had been nodding slowly throughout the explanation.

“But we need to decide this as a family, and we need to make sure we _all_ agree,” Dan said.

“Yes, and you need to be really sure about this because if we do adopt Harry, we’re not going to hurt him or abandon him like those other people did,” Emma added.

Hermione didn’t need to be told twice how seriously her parents were taking this, and she knew that if they took this step, there would be no going back. She looked away from her parents’ questioning faces. She thought about how much she would like having a brother, especially one who was magical, like she apparently was, and about how much Harry needed a good family. She also thought about how it would put them against the bad guys, but in the end, she really only had one question. Looking back at her mother, she asked, “Do you think Mr. Dumbledore will keep us safe?”

 _Not completely, no_ , Emma thought, but he _had_ promised the best that magic could give them. “I think,” she said, “that that’s one thing he’s really good at.”

Hermione looked away again, but it was just a few seconds before she looked back and nervously whispered, “I think we should do it.”

Neither of her parents displayed any outward opinion of her decision. They just nodded with a sense of finality.

“Okay,” her mother said, extricating her from her grip. “I’ll go get Harry.”

Harry lay on his stomach on the floor of Hermione’s room, where he had been left, examining the playing cards. He could read enough to tell them apart, but the idea of matching them up was a little more difficult, and any kind of actual strategy was completely beyond him. He didn’t mind being left alone. He had long since learnt to deal with boredom, but now, it gave him time to think about what had happened. He had awoken that morning as a cat again, in the same double bed he had gone to sleep in, and hadn’t remembered to change back until breakfast. It would take him a while to get used to being human again. He had been served breakfast at the table (the pancakes were _definitely_ sweeter than he was used to, and he said so, but he was told that’s how they were supposed to be), watched the telly and just talked for a while, had a sandwich for lunch, and then Hermione started trying to teach him her card games. He might have preferred to teach Hermione his own games, but the only games he knew were Harry Hunting (which he opposed on principle), Rodent Hunting, and the occasional mock fight with another kitten, so that probably wouldn’t work out.

“Harry?”

With a start, he rolled to one side and turned his head to meet Emma’s gaze.

“Come with me, please.”

The boy scrambled to his feet and followed her into the master bedroom. When she asked him to have a seat on the bed, where he wound up facing the three Grangers who reclined against the headboard, it was another new arrangement for him. He knelt on the bed instead of sitting, keeping his legs in a position where he could spring to his feet.

“Harry,” Emma said, “do you remember when Mr. Dumbledore said he would take you to a magical family?”

The boy nodded slowly, still staring intently at the Grangers. “Yes, ma’am.”

“Well, we talked it over with him, and we think that it would be better for you if you stayed in the non-magical world until you’re old enough to go to magic school. So all three of us—” She motioned to her husband and daughter. “—decided that we would like to adopt you into our family. Do you know what that means, Harry?”

He’d heard the word before, and he knew that it had something to do with family, but no one had ever really explained it to him. It was something Aunt Petunia had said once in a while, but never in a nice way. “No, ma’am,” he said, shaking his head.

“It means that we would sign some papers to make you legally our son. We would be your new parents, and Hermione would be your sister. You would live with us from now on, and…and Mr. Dumbledore would help us make sure that you never have to go back to your aunt and uncle again.”

Harry hunched over slightly, gripping the blankets with his fingers. Tears started to form in his eyes.

“Would you like to join our family, Harry?” Emma said.

Harry couldn’t believe his ears. After all the times Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia had complained about having to raise him and called him a burden, these people actually _wanted_ him? When they only met him yesterday? And as a son, not just a nephew or some boy in the house (or a pet)? _Those_ were words he understood. Even he could tell Dudley was spoilt, but at least his aunt and uncle were nice to him. And the Grangers were actually _asking_ him what he wanted? Never having to go back to the Dursleys would have been enough by itself, but these were literally the nicest people he could ever remember meeting, and after staying with them overnight, he could actually start to believe that they meant what they said.

It was almost an involuntary response as Harry blinked very slowly at them and lowered his head slightly, but they didn’t seem to understand the gesture.

“Harry?” Dan asked.

Harry’s tears finally flowed freely as his spring-loaded legs uncurled, and he pounced on the Grangers, trying to reach his arms as far as he could around them. Emma wrapped him in a hug, Hermione piled on his back, and Dan reached an arm around to his shoulder, and for once he didn’t mind a bit. Once they gave him enough room to breathe, he began humming to himself and rubbing his head against Emma’s shoulder in a way that was unmistakably cat-like.

Emma chuckled at the sudden display of affection and started rubbing the boy’s back. At that, he fully relaxed for what seemed like the first time in her presence. “Well, I think that’s a yes, then,” she said softly.

Dan smiled, putting aside the insanity of the decision for the moment, and said, “Welcome to the family, son.” _Wow,_ he thought, _there_ _’s some words I didn’t think I’d use for another twenty years._

* * *

Dumbledore was just starting to understand muggle television in terms of its similarity to the Wizarding Wireless. Anyone who could figure out how to transmit moving pictures with magic would stand to make a lot of money, but that was a matter for another time as he saw the three Grangers and Harry Potter descending the stairs. He didn’t remember exactly how he had turned the device on, but he reached into his pocket and quickly turned it off with a flick of his deluminator. He rose to his feet, but when he saw young Harry hugging Emma’s legs and smiling serenely with his eyes nearly-closed, he rejoiced inwardly and let them do the talking.

“Mr. Dumbledore, we have decided to adopt Harry,” Dan said simply. “We’ll take him to a doctor and get started on the paperwork tomorrow.”

Dumbledore tipped his hat to them and smiled broadly. “Thank you Mr. and Mrs. Granger—and Miss Granger. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate being able to find a loving home for the boy so quickly. I will, of course, contact you within the week about the security arrangements for your house. For the time being, no one else knows where Harry is, so I see no reason that you cannot send him to your daughter’s primary school immediately.”

“Yes, that—that sounds good,” Dan said, having all but forgotten that Harry had spent all of two weeks in school back at the beginning of the term.

Dumbledore now looked down at Harry, whose eyes snapped open to stare back. “Harry, I think you will be very happy here. Your new family are good people. In a few years, I hope you and your new sister will consider coming to Hogwarts to learn magic.”

Harry said nothing, but he blinked slowly at Dumbledore, and the Headmaster suddenly recognised where he had seen the boy’s mannerisms before. Of course, it was Minerva who gave him that same slow blink in almost every meeting, and he had seen the same response from plenty of cats in his time. He remembered his earlier discussion with Minerva and looked back up at the boy’s new parents—now _that_ would take some getting used to—for everyone in the wizarding world someday.

“Also, now that the Harry’s long-term placement is settled,” he said, “I wonder if you might like to meet with my Deputy, Minerva McGonagall, next weekend. She is also an animagus, and by a great coincidence, her form is also a cat. I believe she could teach Harry to properly handle his feline side.”

“That would be excellent,” Emma said. “That’s very fortunate that someone like her is available.”

“Indeed. I will arrange it immediately.”

“And Mr. Dumbledore,” Dan continued, “we still know so little about the magical world, when you get down to it. Is there any way we could learn more about it? Books on magical life or history or something of the sort?”

“Oh, yes, magic books!” Hermione piped up.

Dumbledore chuckled at the girl’s enthusiasm. “Since you are so interested, I think I can pick up a couple of books for you. And now, I will bid you good afternoon. I’m sure you have a lot to catch up on.”

“Good afternoon, Mr. Dumbledore…and thank you,” Dan said. He shook the old man’s hand.

After receiving thanks and shaking hands with the rest of the family—even Harry, at last—Dumbledore took his leave. The Grangers were shocked when he exited through the front door.


	6. First Day of School

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Harry Potter is the intellectual property of JK Rowling. The storyline is mine only insofar as it deviates from her work.

Minerva witnessed Albus returning to the castle after what had clearly been a very emotional meeting and quickly followed him to his office. Oddly, though, she couldn’t get a read on him as he took his seat, and that likely meant something very out of the ordinary had happened.

“Albus, is anything wrong?” she asked. “What did that family want to talk to about?”

“Please sit, Minerva. Nothing is wrong,” Albus said. “In fact, I was most fortunate to solve another of our problems. The Granger family has agreed to adopt Harry Potter and raise him alongside their daughter.”

“Adopt him? So quickly?” Minerva tensed up and shot him one of her trademark unblinking stares. “Albus, if I find out you used a Compulsion Charm on those muggles…”

“I assure you I did nothing of the sort, nor did I even suggest the action to them. They came to their decision entirely on their own.”

Minerva wasn’t placated. “And did you allow them to come to this decision without knowing the risks that Mr. Potter carries with him?”

“On the contrary, the matter had already come up in our conversation yesterday. When I met with them today, they asked me most extensive questions about the nature of the threat and how they might be kept safe before making their decision. I must say that the Grangers are the most proactive set of muggle parents I have met in quite some time, and if their daughter takes after them, she will make a fine addition to your house.”

And there was that slow blink again. The remark had caught her a bit off guard, though there was still something that confused her about the whole affair. “So you found Harry Potter after losing him for seven weeks,” she said, “And then you find a new family for him overnight? How can you possibly explain that?” She started to wonder if Albus could possibly have staged some of it, though why would he?

“I think Sybill would be a better person with whom to discuss the vagaries of Fate…” he replied. “On a good day, anyway. But as I said yesterday, I think that perhaps the normal rules do not apply to Harry Potter.”

Minerva couldn’t help but wonder whether that was a good thing. “So what must be done now?”

“Quite a lot at the moment,” Albus confirmed, “and I will need your help with some of it.”

“How so?”

“First, I will be very busy this week making the security arrangements for the Granger residence. I’m sure you can handle anything that may come up in the meantime. Secondly, I would like to arrange your meeting with Mr. Potter and his new family. Would next Saturday be suitable?”

A much needed meeting, at that. She took only a moment to consider her schedule before answering, “Yes, I think that would work. And I will make contingencies for your being away this week.”

“Very good, Minerva. I do believe we have set Mr. Potter on a much better path.”

“Well, I should certainly hope so,” she huffed. “Will you be informing anyone else of these arrangements?”

“Only those who need to know. He is still safer if his location is not widely known, and as we discussed four years ago, the political consequences of the Boy-Who-Lived being raised by muggles are best put off until he can speak for himself.”

“Of course. I suppose that’s for the best. And that’s one more good reason that the boy escaped his relatives when he did,” she reminded him.

“Quite,” he said curtly.

“And Albus?”

“Yes?”

“Do be sure that you are thorough regarding the boy’s safety.”

Albus smiled at her. “The Grangers are demanding Gringotts certification of their wards,” he said. “I could hardly do otherwise.”

* * *

Harry looked around Hermione’s classroom—his new classroom—the next morning while Mrs. Granger—no, it was Mum, now—had a few words with the teacher. He had only spent a couple of weeks in a classroom before, and those weeks had been only mildly more pleasant than usual. This classroom didn’t look much different from the one in Little Whinging, except for the faces. He hoped they would be nicer than his last class. He didn’t know anyone here besides Hermione, so there was no reason for anyone to start turning people against him, like last time, and if anyone did, he had at least grown some—no, Mrs. Granger said he couldn’t use his claws here. No, she was his Mum now, or would be once she signed the papers. The thought brought tears to his eyes, but he blinked them back, as he had long since grown all too accustomed to doing. Anyway, he could still—no, he couldn’t turn into a cat to escape, either. Being human was hard. He had to be so…normal all the time, even without Uncle Vernon breathing down his neck.

He kept watching, wide-eyed, trying to take in as much as he could. He started to notice some of the other kids staring at him, so he looked away back toward the teacher and Mum—no—yes, he got it right that time. But he saw the teacher shoot him a couple of nervous glances, so he turned to inspecting the walls, floors, tables—generally avoiding people’s eyes, although as he felt more and more eyes on him, he found he couldn’t just look away. He looked at the faces of his new classmates in turn, and he noticed what appeared to be a name tag taped to the little tables in front of each of them. He couldn’t see any unclaimed seats.

Hermione had already sat down. He wanted to sit next to her, next to someone familiar, but there were no empty seats at that table. He started to wonder if there had been some kind of mistake in bringing him here. Hermione saw him standing awkwardly and got up again to stand by his side, but he didn’t pay her much attention, since he was focusing on the teacher again. At last, the grown-ups broke off their conversation.

Their Mum came over first. She leaned down and told them, “Alright, kids, Mrs. Callahan will take over from here. I’ll pick you up right here after classes. Have a nice day. I love you both.” She then kissed both of them on the cheek, an action which, in Year 1, caused them only mild embarrassment. Harry, who was still easily overwhelmed by being told he was loved, didn’t even notice the giggles of the other children.

Then the teacher introduced herself to her new student. She hadn’t had much personal experience with abused children, but she would just have to hope for the best. “Hello, Harry, I’m Mrs. Callahan,” she said with a somewhat forced smile. “I’m going to be your new teacher this year. I know you’ve missed some school, but your parents and I are going to try to help you catch up with your lessons, okay?”

His parents—not even his _new_ parents, she had said. Harry could be forgiven for being a little slow on the uptake, since that phrase constantly made his chest feel tight and derailed whatever he was thinking about at the time. He regarded the woman silently. She looked nice enough, like his previous teacher, whom he couldn’t fault for any of the other trouble he had had, and—wait, he was supposed to answer that, wasn’t he? What was it? Something about catching up with lessons. He blinked slowly at her and answered, “Yes, ma’am.”

“Very good, Harry.” She stood up straight and addressed the class: “Boys and girls, we have a new student today. This is Harry Potter. He just ‘moved’ here from Surrey, and he’s being adopted by Hermione’s family. Everyone say, “Hello, Harry.’”

“Hello, Harry.” the class repeated.

Mrs. Callahan brought in an extra chair and rearranged a couple of the seats so that Harry could sit at Hermione’s table, much to the boy’s relief. Harry noticed the other kids at their table glance at the scar on his forehead a couple of times, but that was it.

Harry was pretty far behind and had forgotten most of what little he had learnt at his school in Little Whinging, but he thought Mrs. Callahan was a good teacher. He was lucky that she was still teaching the basics of reading, and with Hermione’s help, he started to relearn how to sound out words. Mrs. Callahan didn’t call on him to answer any questions, and nobody besides Hermione paid much attention to him in class, which for now, at least, was how he liked it. Any attention he got at his old school usually didn’t end too well for him, but here, his only problem was that he had a hard time seeing the board, although he remembered Mr. Granger—no, Dad—saying that was supposed to be taken care of soon.

But recess was the part he was dreading, even though he had no objective reason to. A large, disorganised group of children definitely wasn’t his thing, he thought. He tended to end up on the wrong end of a gang of bullies when he was around one of those. Hermione wasn’t too enthusiastic about it either, although that was mostly because Mrs. Callahan wouldn’t let her take a book with her. The two of them stuck close together and wandered around for a few minutes. With him not knowing anyone, and her not having any close friends, there didn’t seem to be much point to anything else. Then Harry noticed something that hadn’t interested him the last time he was in a schoolyard: the jungle gym.

It was mostly older kids who were playing on it, since it was a little too advanced for the little ones, but when Harry got the idea into his head, he made a beeline for it. Putting his cat-like sense of balance to good use, he scrambled up the structure with the ease of a boy twice his age.

“Whoa, you’re good,” another boy who looked only a little older than him said from the bar below him.

“Thanks,” Harry said, smiling a little at actually being praised for something.

“Who are you?” the boy asked.

“I’m, uh, Harry—Harry Potter…Who are you?”

“I’m Paul—Paul Talbot, the boy mimicked him.

“Hi, Harry. Hi Paul. I’m Tiffany,” a little girl with short blonde hair said as she struggled up the side of the structure. “Oof, how’d you learn to climb like that?”

“I, uh…watched my cat?” Harry tried to cover for himself. Both of the other kids started laughing. He tensed up, ready to flee, but they didn’t seem to be calling him out. In fact, they were smiling at him. Maybe these two were alright. He looked down at where his new sister was watching from. “Hermione, come up here,” he said.

“I…I don’t think so. I’m not good at climbing,” she answered as she nervously eyed the metal structure.

“It’s not that hard,” he said. He started to descend headfirst, but quickly learnt that his cat-like sense of balance was just a metaphor in human form. He slipped, but caught himself just as the playground monitor had started to run to help him. He managed to slide down the rest of the way unaided, though, and dismissed the slip-up, saying, “No, really. Come on.” He offered a hand to help her up.

That was enough to get her to try it, Harry was glad to see. With his help, and under the watchful eye of the monitor, she shakily made her way to the top of the jungle gym. She clung tight to the bars, though, while he sat comfortably on the top.

“Hey guys, this is my sister, Hermione,” Harry told the others, surprising himself by grinning with pride.

Tiffany giggled at her name, and Paul blurted out, “What kinda name is Hermione?”

Harry glared at him, but the girl in question blushed and averted her eyes, whispering, “It’s from _The Winter_ _’s Tale_.”

“It’s better than Paul,” Harry said, and instantly regretted it, not for defending Hermione, but because he didn’t want to antagonise the other boy (who was, after all, larger than he was), not to mention that it didn’t even make sense.

He was shocked and relieved when Tiffany saved him by saying, “Yeah, “cause she’s a girl.”

That set Paul laughing again. “Yeah, that’d be awful.”

Harry let out the breath he was holding and nearly slipped again before he remembered he was sitting ten feet off the ground on a metal bar, but the crisis seemed to be averted. The four children hung out around the jungle gym for the rest of the recess, mostly just climbing back and forth around the bars and dodging the bigger kids, although both of the girls seemed to be more interested in sitting in one place.

Since they weren’t in the same class, Paul and Tiffany didn’t know about Harry “moving” from Surrey, and they seemed to accept his explanation that he was being adopted by Hermione’s parents when they asked about where he lived. The only other incident came when Tiffany got a good look at his face and asked what had happened to his head. He had to fight the urge to run away at that point, possibly in cat form, but he haltingly mumbled the cover story that he had been in a car crash. Paul and Tiffany both winced, but didn’t make anything else out of it.

Harry and Hermione both walked back to class wondering in amazement that they might have actually managed to make some friends.

* * *

Those first few days were busy ones. Harry had to go to see a doctor that afternoon for a complete physical, with x-rays scheduled for Friday, to make sure he was doing okay and to help build the case against his aunt and uncle. Luckily, they hadn’t contested the loss of custody, so that was one less thing to worry about. Harry was found to be malnourished and to have some old injuries that had not been properly treated, but nothing that would seriously hamper him in the future. In any case, he was now getting plenty to eat.

The next day was the eye doctor, where Harry learnt that he did, indeed, need glasses, since he was already quite nearsighted. He found himself drawn to a pair of round, black frames that could decidedly not be considered stylish, but his family agreed that they actually looked strangely good on him. He was very happy that he could actually read the blackboard the next day, and that the other kids didn’t say much about his glasses.

Dan and Emma had also tried to take him to a barber to make him look more presentable, but his hair was so wild that the only thing that would make it behave was buzz cut, which Harry didn’t like at all. They just shook their heads the next day when they saw that it had grown back out overnight.

In the meantime, there was a lot of paperwork to do. They had to formally extend Harry’s fostering placement pending a preliminary adoption placement, then file for the formal adoption order, for which there was a minimum ten-week waiting period. On top of that, there were school and medical records that had to be pieced together from the Dursleys’ poor record keeping. It was only by luck that they got a hold of a vaccination report. They never learnt if there was any magic being done behind the scenes to help them out, but they certainly felt like they could use some.

Thursday was a mildly calmer day. Harry had managed to wake up as a human for two days in a row. He was getting used to his new glasses and was feeling more comfortable in his new home and school. So of course, that was the perfect time for the magical world to slip back in and cause more chaos. It started when they heard a tapping at the kitchen window that morning.

Emma quickly opened the curtains to the strangest sight she had seen since…well, not all that long, really, but it was strange enough. “What the—?”

“What is it, Emma?” Dan asked.

“There is an _owl_ with a letter in its beak.”

“A what?” He rose and approached the window. Sure enough, there was a rather large short-eared owl with an envelope in its beak, tapping against the window and glaring at the couple. The envelope was clearly addressed to “Mr. and Mrs. Granger,” followed by their street address.

“It must want you to take the letter,” Dan observed.

“Uh huh…” Emma said distantly. She cautiously opened the window and took the letter from the bird. It gave an annoyed hoot and quickly flew away. “It looks like it’s on parchment,” she said, turning it over and breaking the ornate wax seal. She slid a note out of the envelope and opened it.

 

_Dear Mr. and Mrs. Granger,_

_Per your request, I have arranged to place magical protections on your house. Please expect me at 8 o_ _’clock tonight to set them up, and ensure that the fireplace is not blocked. I will also bring a few items of importance to you and Harry._

_Sincerely,_

_Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore_

“Brian?” Dan said. “It sounds so normal.”

“Hmm, eight tonight,” Emma stayed on task. “Well, good to get it out of the way. I wonder what he’s bringing, though.”

“I don’t know. He didn’t seem to think Harry needed anything before.”

“Unless it’s part of the protections,” Emma suggested. “And I assume that’s what the fireplace is about.”

“I think so. He did mention it. Is there anything going on tonight?”

“No, for once. There shouldn’t be any trouble.”

* * *

The Grangers waited for the doorbell to ring at eight o’clock, but it never did. Instead, at the appointed hour, there was a whoosh from the fireplace, and they looked over and saw the head of Albus Dumbledore sticking out from emerald green flames.

Harry and Hermione both screamed and fled from the room, and their parents looked about ready to do the same.

“Wait,” the disembodied head said. The image was blurry and flickering around the edges, and most of his beard was not visible. “I apologise for alarming you, Mr. and Mrs. Granger. This was the quickest way to check the floo connection. May I come in.”

“Um…yes, yes, of course,” Emma said, remembering her manners.

“Thank you.” Dumbledore’s torso followed his head as he stepped through, stooping low to get out of the fireplace. He was wearing his red and black robes again, and Hermione, peering out from around the corner, shouted out what everyone was thinking: “You _are_ Santa Claus!”

Dumbledore laughed at her comment. “No, Hermione, I’m afraid the resemblance is entirely coincidental. I am merely demonstrating floo transport, which is how many witches and wizards travel from place to place. Look, as you can see, as long as the flame burns green, it is quite safe to touch.” He waved his hand through the magical fire.

Dan cautiously reached out a hand to the fire, followed by his wife. The flames were only lukewarm and gave off no heat to the room.

Then, Dumbledore pulled out his wand, pointed it into the flames, and said, “ _Accio_ trunk.” Suddenly, a smallish trunk flew out of the fireplace and straight to the old wizard’s hands. The Grangers noted that this was the first bit of obviously useful magic they had yet seen. A moment later, the green flames changed back to their natural orange, and they could feel the heat from the fire again.

“Gather around, please. All of you will need to see this demonstration.” All four of them clustered around the fireplace, and the Headmaster pulled out a large urn that was taller than the size of the trunk. He placed it by one side of the fireplace and opened it to reveal a green powder inside. “Harry,” he said seriously, then stopped when he saw the boy’s new look.

“Yes, sir?” the boy asked.

“How extraordinary. Those glasses look very much like your father’s.”

“They do?”

“They do, indeed. Did you pick them out yourself?”

“Yes, sir.”

“It would seem that you have inherited your father’s sense of fashion, then.” Dumbledore turned serious again. “As I was saying, though, Harry, I am afraid that it is entirely possible that Voldemort may one day return—or else his followers will come looking for you.”

Harry flinched at the revelation and stared at him intently.

“Should you or your family ever be attacked here, you will be able to escape through the fireplace.” He grabbed a handful of the green powder and said, “This is floo powder. It is used to create a magical fire that connects your fireplace with another one. However, unlike most magical fireplaces, I have set yours up so that it will only connect with my office at Hogwarts. To use it, you must throw a handful of the powder into the fireplace and clearly speak the word, ‘Hogwarts’.” He demonstrated the action, and the flames turned green again. “Now, it is possible to traverse freely from one side to the other.”

“Wow, that _is_ a neat trick,” Dan finally said. If wizards could do this, he wondered why they even needed to go out.

“It’s a little more complex than a “trick,” Mr. Granger, but the sentiment is appreciated,” Dumbledore said. The flames changed back to orange again. “The flames will not change if anyone is in the fireplace,” he continued. “However, do not leave the connection open for too long, because it could produce an ashwinder and risk setting fire to the surroundings. And I would advise you to only use it in case of emergency, or with an appointment. Much less paperwork that way. Now, for the matter of the protections on the house…” He reached back into the trunk and lifted out a stack of flagstones that appeared to be inscribed with Norse writing. “These are rune stones. They are used to power strong and lasting magic that cannot be cast with a wand alone. I will need to place one at each corner of your property and another at each corner of the outer walls of the house. Once in place, they will produce a magical shield that will keep out any attackers long enough for you to escape. If you do not mind, I will place them now.”

Dan and Emma whispered to each other, but Dan said, “Might as well.” He put on a jacket and led Dumbledore outside.

It must have been a strange sight to any neighbours watching, Emma thought, with Dan wandering around with a torch in hand, looking for the corners of the property and what looked like an old man in pyjamas following and placing stones in strategic locations. Of course, what the Grangers didn’t know was that there was no chance of any neighbours watching, since Dumbledore had cast a Notice-Me-Not Charm on the pair of them. After placing each stone, Dumbledore would mutter an incantation, and the stone would glow briefly before sinking into the ground and being covered with soil.

Emma and the children watched from the door. Hermione was fascinated by the complex procedures used to place the protections, by Harry clung to Emma’s skirts with growing concern. “M-M-Mum…?” he said. He was gradually getting better about the names.

“Yes, Harry?”

“Mr. Dumbledore said that Vol…Vol-dee-mort might come back?” He sounded out the name.

Emma sighed and put an arm around Harry’s shoulder. “Yes, Mr. Dumbledore thinks he’s still alive somewhere.”

Harry started shivering. “But…but…why does he want me?” he stammered.

“Because he’s a very evil man. He doesn’t like that you escaped him before, and that’s why Mr. Dumbledore thinks he might come back for you.”

Harry grew alarmed and started to cry. “But now he’ll come here…? He’ll come for you, too! You shouldn’t have taken me!”

“No!” Emma picked the boy up and held him tight. “Don’t ever think that, Harry. Mr. Dumbledore told us about Voldemort before, and we still wanted you—even Hermione.”

Harry looked up to meet her eyes, still sniffling. “Really?”

“Yeah!” Hermione said from below.

“Of course we did,” Emma continued. “You’re part of our family now, and we’re not ever going to let an insane magical terrorist change that. Mr. Dumbledore and some other wizards are going to protect us, and we’re all going to help you and Hermione learn to protect yourselves, too. So if Voldemort ever does come back, we’ll be ready for him.”

Harry cracked a small smile and rubbed his head against his new mum’s shoulder, still too emotional to speak. Emma looked back to the others, wishing she were half as confident as she sounded. They watched as Dumbledore continued his work.

Dumbledore himself, oblivious for once to the conversation at the door, spoke with Dan a little as he cast the wards, asking how Harry was adjusting. He was delighted to hear that the boy appeared to have no lasting injuries and had already made friends at school. He laughed to hear about him regrowing his hair and said that that sounded very much like his father. He also asked about the adoption process to make sure everything was on track.

“By the way,” he said as they neared the end of the work. “Were you planning on changing Harry’s surname with the adoption?”

“Probably,” Dan answered. “Why?”

“Well, that is perfectly acceptable, of course, but I must warn you that for complex legal reasons, the name change would not be accepted in the magical world.”

“Why not?” Dan said suspiciously, turning to face Dumbledore.

Dumbledore squinted in the torch's light and said, “Fame aside, in simplest terms, Harry is heir to a seat on the Wizengamot, and only he himself will have the right to change the family name when he comes of age.”

“The Wizen…gamot? Your magical Lords?”

“Correct. This is of no present importance, of course—merely an early notice for when Harry reenters the magical world. Ah, here is the last one.” He broke off the conversation, leaving Dan to mull over his words in private. At the last stone, he spoke a much longer incantation. Suddenly, a luminous, transparent, orange shell flashed into being around the house and property and just as quickly vanished.

“Wow…” Harry and Hermione exclaimed from their vantage point at the door.

“Thank you, Mr. and Mrs. Granger,” the Headmaster said when he came back in the house. “I will certainly breathe easier knowing that you are protected here.”

“I think we can agree on that,” Emma replied.

“As for certification, you can go to any major chain bank and tell the teller that you are there on Gringotts business. They will provide a wizard liaison to navigate you through the process, for a nominal fee.”

“Thank you,” Dan said.

“Now, there are just a few more things here,” he continued. He returned to his trunk and pulled out two necklaces, which he handed to Dan and Emma. On each one hung a silver medallion inscribed with more Norse writing. “These are Anti-Anti-Muggle Charms,” he explained, “normally given to muggle parents of Hogwarts students. While you wear them, you will be able to see things that are normally hidden from muggles, such as the magical shopping district in London, and Hogwarts itself.”

Dumbledore then pulled two large books from the trunk and placed them on the coffee table. “I believe you requested information about magical history. _A History of Magic_ is the Hogwarts history textbook up through fifth year and covers general historical knowledge, particularly in Britain, up to the end of Grindelwald’s War. _Modern Magical History_ is the most popular reference for more recent history, including the war against Voldemort—although it sadly follows the current fashion of refusing to print his name.”

The family wondered at that last comment, but Dumbledore wasn’t done. Last of all, he pulled two framed pictures out of the trunk. “I also thought you might like to have some family pictures,” he said lightly, handing one over to Emma. “This is a portrait of the Fawley Family taken in 1939.”

Emma gasped when she saw a crisp, vibrant colour photograph of a middle-aged couple in robes surrounded by four children, one of whom was unmistakably her mother at age fourteen. “Mr. Dumbledore, I…I can’t thank you enough…” she said with tears in her eyes as the others gathered around to see. “I never had any pictures of my grandparents.”

“The pleasure is all mine, Mrs. Granger. And the other photograph is for Harry.”

“Me, sir?”

“Yes, my boy. I was dismayed to see that your aunt had no pictures of her sister or her family in her home, so I was able to find this one for you.” He turned the frame around to reveal a picture of a young couple holding their infant son. Only Dumbledore knew that both pictures were magical photographs frozen for public display, but in a muggle home, they would fit right in.

“That’s…that’s me?” Harry asked. “And my parents—my birth parents?”

“Yes, they are. It was taken on your first birthday, I believe.”

Harry gazed silently at the image, and a wistful smile crept over his face. Dan and Emma regarded the picture: baby Harry was being held up by a young man with his same uncontrollable hair and the same face, right down to the glasses, and again by a young woman with auburn hair. It was obvious from the picture that the boy had got his piercing green eyes from his mother.

Emma picked up Harry and held him close. “Thank you, Mr. Dumbledore,” she said again. Dan nodded his agreement.

“It is a pleasure to be of assistance,” the old wizard replied, doffing his cap. “If there is nothing else, I shan’t keep you any later. Good evening.” He threw another handful of floo powder in the fireplace, and in a blink, he was gone.


	7. Cat to Cat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter, and we commend her bravery for allowing her fans to run free with her work.

Minerva McGonagall located the address Albus had given her. It certainly looked nicer than the boy’s previous accommodations. Those had not been in a bad neighbourhood, but the houses here were a little more spaced out, with more trees and green space between them. The house itself looked a little larger, too, but of course, as she knew well, it was the people in the house who mattered. From what Albus had told her, the Grangers sounded like a good family, but she would be sure to investigate them for herself very carefully.

She arrived in the neighbourhood early in the morning, even before breakfast, and immediately took up position next door as a large, grey tabby watching through the windows. She wouldn’t exactly be dining in luxury this morning, but she was willing to do a lot for Harry Potter. In an act that she would never have let her students see (or, indeed, many of her colleagues), she quickly caught herself a vole for breakfast. She had got quite good at it in her younger and more adventurous days, but it was hardly a dignified act for a teacher.

Even by cat standards, Minerva could fix quite a stare. She spent most of the morning watching the Granger family atop a chair from which she could see into the kitchen window. Though they knew she was coming later, they gave no indication that they suspected her. She was relieved to find that things looked perfectly normal, at least as far as she could see from there. It was hard to get a clear look at the boy, and he did look small and quiet, but she could make out the mother making breakfast and the two kittens—ah, the two _children_ sitting at the table, talking and laughing. She didn’t need Albus’s report to know that wasn’t something that was likely to have happened at the Dursley residence, nor was it when the father came in and hugged both of them.

The family spent the rest of the morning in ordinary activities: doing a few chores, the children playing and watching the muggle “telly.” Nothing seemed to be amiss, and Minerva took comfort in the thought that Albus had finally made the right decision—or perhaps had allowed the right decision to be made.

She waited until after lunch (a fresh mouse for her and a plate of sandwiches for the family) and at the agreed-upon time darted off a couple houses down the street where she could untransform without being seen. She walked back up the street in November chill in her black robes and a hat that she hoped would be inconspicuous enough. Coming up to the house as if it were her first time seeing it, she rang the doorbell (such an odd way to announce oneself, she thought).

A tall, brown-haired man answered the door and looked her up and down, assessing Minerva, she could tell, as the second magical person he had ever met besides the children—goodness, and Albus with his eccentric mode of dress had been the first.

“Good afternoon. Mr. Granger, I presume?” she said.

“Yes. You must be Professor McGonagall,” Dan replied warmly, shaking her hand. At this point, he was glad to see that not everyone in the magical world looked as absurd as Albus Dumbledore, although the witch’s robes could hardly be called the height of fashion. “Please come in.”

He led the way to the living room, where Minerva was introduced to a matching mother and daughter, and the family’s newly adopted son. She couldn’t help but stare at the boy. Even at his age, he was a spitting image for another boy who had been her best student in many a year not a decade earlier—except for the eyes, of course. When she saw him staring back at her, she blinked slowly at him, and he returned the gesture. She smiled, and the boy nervously smiled back. It was far too rare that she met someone who actually understood how to communicate with a cat. After all, the students’ cats mostly stayed in the dorms, and none of Filch’s had ever been much for conversation; most of her fellow humans were completely oblivious, though perhaps she could change that here.

“Have a seat,” Emma Granger said when they were all acquainted. “Would you like some tea?”

“Yes, please—milk, no sugar,” she answered. Back in human form, she felt the need to get the taste of rodent out of her mouth.

Emma brought the tea, and Minerva sipped it thoughtfully and said, “Mr. and Mrs. Granger, before we begin, I must apologise for my role in facilitating the mistreatment that Harry has suffered. I had warned Professor Dumbledore that his relatives were wholly unsuited as guardians, but at the time, I trusted his judgement. I see now that I should have taken a firmer hand, or else followed up afterwards.”

The Grangers sat and processed this for a moment. She could tell that they were rightfully unhappy with the news, but Emma told her, “Well, at least you were trying to look out for him. There were clearly a great deal more mistakes made than just your own.”

Inwardly, she was relieved, but she nodded and turned her attention to the boy. “Harry,” she said with what, to her, was a warm smile, “I understand you recently spent quite some time living as a cat.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Becoming an animagus is normally extremely difficult. I have never known a witch or wizard to complete the transformation with less than a year of intense study. I will understand if you don’t wish to dredge up unpleasant memories, but I wonder if might you be able to tell me precisely how you were first able to change into a cat.”

Harry looked to his new parents, who nodded to him, and he nervously began to tell her. Minerva fought to control her anger at his description of his relatives and listened in cool assessment. If she had hoped for some new insight into the animagus transformation, she was disappointed. His explanation was textbook accidental magic: intense fear and an overpowering desire to escape. The precise form that the magic took ought to have been impossible…but was it really? There were few real limits to accidental magic. She wouldn’t have batted an eye if his escape had taken the form of apparition or disillusionment, both very advanced skills. The boy might have just stumbled upon a rare variation.

No, the real puzzle was how he was able to replicate the feat. “It is very impressive that you could achieve such a feat of magic at your age, Mr. Potter,” she said. “Could you then demonstrate this skill to me?”

Harry looked, and Dan nodded to him again. He lowered his eyes and frowned in concentration for a few seconds, and then his form was replaced by a small black kitten.

Minerva was shocked. Albus had told her he had seen him transform, but she had assumed that it would take a few minutes of meditation. The boy was nothing like a novice; he looked well practised, and by the time he came to Hogwarts, he would probably be able to make the change instantly on command.

“Quicker than I expected, Harry,” she said. “Pardon me, Mr. and Mrs. Granger, but since the matter is at hand, I think it might be better if Harry and I continue this conversation without the species barrier.”

“Do you mean you’re going to—?” Dan started.

“Indeed.” With that, Minerva changed into a grey tabby cat with prominent black stripes around her eyes. She noted that Harry’s form had no marking for his glasses and wondered if it was because he first changed before he got the glasses. Or perhaps it was just that they matched his hair.

She relaxed her usual stiff posture and took a more neutral body position, but Harry started back all the same and lay low, watching her warily with his ears pricked up and his tail lowered. As a kitten wandering alone, she knew he probably hadn’t had too many good experiences with other cats. She lowered her own posture a little, and they exchanged blinks again to reassure him that everything was still alright.

Now it was time to really investigate. She had partially used Harry as an excuse to change into cat form, as he was only one of many things she wanted to check out. Using her well-honed feline sixth sense, she regarded the family carefully. She had noticed that the tom and queen—ah, there she went again, so easy to fall into the cat’s thought patterns—that Dan and Emma, who only stared when Harry changed, still flinched a little when a grown woman did the same, while Hermione laughed with glee and clapped her hands a couple of times. They were clearly new to magic, but they were doing an admirable job of adjusting to it so quickly, and if Albus was to be believed, they were learning all they could so as not to be caught out behind. Indeed, she had seldom seen any muggle parents take such news so well, let alone anyone who had had to worry about He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.

What Minerva suspected as a human, she could now confirm as a cat. She sensed no duplicity from the Grangers, nothing to trip her feline sense for the untrustworthy. They genuinely cared for Harry, and they already thought of him as their own son. It was plain to see to her in the way they carried themselves: though barely visible to humans, cats could pick up a fantastic amount of information from body language. And from smell. The Granger house smelled…like family. Looking past the smells of food and some sterile smells that might have been associated with teeth healing, joy, comfort, and love permeated the air. There was plenty of anxiety, too, but no dislike, no serious division.

The other part was to check over Harry himself. Verbal communication was quite rudimentary for cats, but it was usable. Minerva meowed something that roughly translated to, _Boy-Kitten, follow, please_ , before she climbed down off the chair.

Harry took his defensive position again in surprise for a moment upon hearing her “speak.” Apparently, the other cats he had met had not been much for conversation, either. But he followed her off the sofa.

Only a few steps away, just far enough to have room, the two cats circled around each other. Minerva radiated an air of friendliness through her body language, which Harry was surprised he could pick up on. He let her in close enough that she could smell him clearly. He was a very anxious boy, from the smell, which was only to be expected, but he also smelled genuinely happy, curious, and comfortable in his new home.

Harry also got a clear smell from Minerva, but he stepped back as he tried to process it. He gave a meow that translated to, _I don_ _’t understand smells_.

 _Smells are hard_ , she meowed back. _You will learn with practice. How did you live outside?_ It was as good a time as any to get his side of the story unfiltered. After all it was hard to lie as a cat and even harder to lie _to_ a cat.

_Ate mice and food humans didn_ _’t want. Slept anywhere it was warm. Tried to find a human-servant, but found a family instead._

Minerva smiled, as much as a cat could, at the kitten’s natural use of the feline word for “owner.” She had forgotten how easy it was talking to a fellow animagus. His simple explanation conveyed much more about his feelings for life on the road, and even a few of the details, than the words alone. _Be careful outside_ , she warned him. _Loud-rolling-things are the worst predators_.

Harry nodded his head at that, causing Hermione and even their parents a little bit to giggle at what looked like a perfectly normal conservation carried out entirely in meows.

 _What is your new family like?_ she continued.

Harry perked up, and his tail bent into a downward-facing arc with excitement. _Sire and Dam are very nice. Don_ _’t hiss and scratch like old parents’  bad litter-mates. Help groom and feed me and new Girl-Litter-Mate. Girl-Litter-Mate is smart. She is shy and likes human word-papers, but we make friends together. She likes cats, too._

Any human could have seen that last bit. As for Minerva, she could smell the joy coming off the kitten. The boy did like it here, and he loved his new family. It was a sense as clear as she could have got from talking to him in human form all afternoon. She twitched her tail with relief that the problem of his disastrous upbringing was being resolved so well. Now for the _other_ issue. _Is Old Wizard nice to you?_ she asked _._

_Old Wizard hides a lot. Thinks about many other things. But sorry he messed up and protects us from Bad Wizard. Gives look-memories of old parents._

Minerva nodded. She wondered if Albus had any idea how much the boy had picked up from him. _I will visit sometimes. You tell me if Old Wizard causes trouble._ Harry hesitated, but nodded back. She changed back to human form and turned to the others. “Well,” she said, “I am very glad to see that Mr. Potter has found a loving and welcoming family.”

Even though they had seen the conversation for themselves, Dan and Emma were surprised that it contained that much substance. Hermione was clearly brimming with questions. They looked to Harry, but the kitten was still there and had started licking his paws. Minerva made a note to give them some tips on preventing hairballs.

“Harry,” Emma called. The kitten changed back to human form. “He’s been doing that a lot,” she said. “He doesn’t change back until we call him.”

“He’s been waking up as a cat every other day, too,” Dan added.

“Hmm, that _is_ a little unusual,” Minerva said. “Harry, could you show me where you have been sleeping?”

“Yes ma’am.” He led her to the guest bedroom that was slowly being converted to a little boy’s room. It didn’t look quite lived-in, yet, but it didn’t look out of the ordinary.

Minerva had a suspicion that it wasn’t the room. “Can you show me _how_ you sleep?” she asked as the Grangers fell in behind her in the hall.

“Mm-hmm.” The boy flopped down onto the bed, adjusted his limbs a little, then lay still on his stomach.

“Ah, that’s simple, then,” she said. “You’re still sleeping like a cat.” He pushed himself part-way back up and looked back at her. “Harry, I know it will be more uncomfortable for you, but you should try to sleep on your back. It will help you get used to being human again.”

Harry rolled over and tried lying on his back for a few moments, but he quickly sat up.

“That’s alright, Harry, it will take some time to adjust.” She turned to Dan and Emma when they returned to the living room: “I’m not surprised to see cat-like behaviour after spending so long in that form. Some animal traits always persist, but you may wish to help Harry suppress the more obvious ones.” And she explained the basics of how cats interact with those around them: the association of prolonged eye contact with aggression, a slow blink or other ways of showing vulnerability as a sign of trust, huddling in a small space to withdraw, and, of course, rubbing and stroking as a sign of affection. There was a lot more, but there would be a lot fewer headaches and less emotional distress if they understood those first few things, and she was pleased to see that the family was absorbing them well.

The Grangers responded with a few of Harry’s idiosyncrasies that they had observed: sunning himself in the window, occasionally stalking around the house on all fours, licking his hands when he was bored or distracted. They were all perfectly normal for a cat, but they looked more than a little odd for a human. They had noticed his propensity to sleep a lot, too, but it was hard to tell if that was his feline side or if Harry just wasn’t a morning person. Minerva agreed that the more obvious behaviour might need some active correction, and they should focus on that, while the minor things could safely slide. Of course, they should watch carefully how Harry was around other people, since there was a fine line between eccentric and just plain crazy.

Once they had got the matters of cat-animagus care settled, Hermione finally got a chance to ask her question: “Professor, can you teach me how to turn into a cat?”

Minerva was caught off guard for a moment, and it took a couple more moments to register why. No child, even at Hermione’s age, would think to ask such a question in the wizarding world, but it was a perfectly logical question for a muggle-born who had never been taught otherwise. “I’m afraid not, Hermione,” she said. “For one thing, your animagus form is determined by your personality and animal nature, if you even have the innate skill to do it. Yours would most likely not be a cat. But more importantly, learning the skill the normal way is very difficult and can be dangerous…I _might_ be willing to consider it if you had a very good reason.” After all, James and Sirius hadn’t exactly been discreet about their questions. “But certainly not before you began attending at Hogwarts.”

“Oh…” Hermione said in disappointment.

“Transforming is a very rare skill,” Minerva explained. “Very few witches and wizards go to the trouble of learning it. I only did myself as part of my studies on transfiguration. You’ll have a great deal of more useful magic to learn when you come to school.”

Hermione looked partially appeased by that, and Minerva turned back to her parents. “Now, Professor Dumbledore tells me Harry is doing well in school?” she said. “Catching up with the other children and making friends?”

“Surprisingly well, considering he missed two months,” Emma said. “He’s still adjusting, of course, but Hermione’s been helping him learn to read, so he has that going for him, and as far as we can tell, he’s been enjoying himself.”

“That’s good to hear, Mrs. Granger. Have you had any other problems with him so far?”

“Well…it’s not a problem so much as it’s unusual,” Dan said. “Harry is probably the only little boy we know who _doesn_ _’t_ have a sweet tooth. We don’t eat all that much sugar in this house, Professor, but Harry claims that a lot of what we do eat tastes sweet to him. Now, I don’t if that’s because he didn’t get that from his relatives, or…”

Minerva was caught between a smile and a frown. “Given what I’ve heard, that is certainly possible,” she said, “but I think there is a simpler explanation.”

“What’s that?”

“Cats cannot taste sugar.”

“Really? I did not know that.”

“Indeed, Mr. Granger, and an animagus’s tastes often carry over into their human form. I usually find typical dinner fare sweet enough for my tastes, rather than desert. At Harry’s age, it will be different, but even so, am I right in thinking that Harry has also shown a preference for meat?”

“Definitely,” Emma confirmed. “Red meat especially.”

“I thought so. Cats are almost entirely carnivorous, even more so than dogs. You may have some…unique challenges in teaching him to eat a balanced diet.”

 _Because having a son who can turn into a cat isn_ _’t unique enough_ , they thought. “Thank you for warning us,” Emma said. “Is there any way we can contact you if we have more questions?”

“A letter addressed to me at Hogwarts and sent through the muggle post system will be delivered, although it is not as fast as an owl. Please feel free to contact me anytime. I will be happy to help Harry with any troubles he may be having, especially feline-related.”

“Thank you, Professor,” Dan repeated.

“Now, there is one other thing.” She paused to make sure all four of them were listening. “It is _very_ important that no one finds out that Harry is an animagus, even in the magical world. All animagi are required by law to register with the Ministry of Magic, but Professor Dumbledore and I agree that with the unique risks to him, he would be safer if it is not known. He must also be careful in using it so as not to cause trouble. The penalty for failure to register by itself is only a fine, but the Ministry deals harshly with any other crimes committed by an animagus, registered or not. We will support him if such a matter ever comes up, but that will only go so far.”

Dan and Emma paled a little at being advised to actively defy the law, by a respected teacher, no less, even if they could see the wisdom of it. They wanted to instill their children with a healthy respect for authority, but then again, from what they had heard about wizarding politics, maybe a healthy scepticism would be better. They stepped back and whispered to each other for a minute. It was hard to hear, but Minerva could tell they were uncomfortable with it, and not without reason. She picked up something about having five years to think about it.

“Professor, we don’t anticipate any problems with that if that’s how things are set up,” Dan said carefully when they concluded. “And we’ll certainly teach Harry to be discreet about using his ability.”

“Very good, Mr. Granger. Harry, I like your new family very much. I know they will be very good for you. I hope to hear good things about you in the coming years.” Harry smiled at her. “And Hermione?”

“Yes, ma’am?”

“You’re Harry’s older sister, now, and as such, I expect you to keep him out of trouble.”

“Yes, ma’am,” the girl said with a grin.

“Well, I must be returning to school,” Minerva said, shaking the Grangers’ hands on the way out. “Good afternoon.”

“Good afternoon,” Harry called after her and waved, to the surprise of his family. Meeting another cat seemed to have done wonders for his shyness.

Minerva left the meeting with a rare, if subtle, smile on her face. It had been a hard year, between losing her husband last spring to Venomous Tentacula and then Albus managing to misplace Harry Potter in more ways than one, but at least the boy was as well off now as she ever could have hoped. She was humming to herself all the way back to the castle.


	8. First Christmas

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Harry Potter is owned by JK Rowling. Any and all cats may or may not be owned by Erwin Schrodinger.
> 
> My apologies if Christmas seems too Americanised. It was hard enough to find information about popular gifts in 1985 on my side of the pond.
> 
> My knowledge of karate comes exclusively from movies and the Internet, so I’ve been deliberately light on the details, and I make no promises on accuracy. Corrections are welcome.
> 
> Finally, thanks to carick of hunter moon for clarifying the terminology of Parliament vs. Lords.

_December 1985_

A small, red Austin Metro pulled into the driveway at the Granger residence, the back seat filled with luggage and colourfully-wrapped boxes. An elderly couple climbed out and within seconds was hit by a brown-haired missile screaming, “Grandma! Grandpa!” Grandpa Granger was ready, though, and scooped Hermione up in his arms when she reached him—well, mostly ready, she was starting to get too big for this, the way his back was protesting.

“Hey there, Princess,” he said, twirling her around once before setting her down.

“How’s my favourite granddaughter?” Grandma said as she gave the little girl a hug.

“I’m your _only_ granddaughter, Grandma,” Hermione shot back, completing their usual exchange.

The three of them looked back to the front door, where Dan and Emma stood, Emma holding a reassuring hand on Harry’s shoulder.

“And this must be little Harry,” Grandma said as they approached.

“Yes, ma’am—Grandma,” Harry said as she grasped him firmly by the shoulders. He was trying not to stare too much, but it was hard when he was meeting new people and harder when they grabbed hold of him like that. He recognised Grandma and Grandpa from the pictures, of course, but it was a different matter to meet them in person.

Grandma eyed him up and down, noting how small he still looked. She frowned a little at the uncombed hair and the scar on his forehead, but she lightened up and gave him a reasonably gentle hug. “Well, it’s good to meet you, Harry. Now I have a favourite grandson, too.”

“Come here, Sport,” Grandpa said and threw an arm around Harry. He fought the urge to push him away. Even after a month and a half as a human, he still preferred a little scratching behind the ears to an overzealous hug, but he could mostly only get that from Mum.

It was strange having grandparents, he thought. None of his birth grandparents were still alive, nor were Uncle Vernon’s parents. It was strange being able to add two more friendly faces to his new family, at least for the few times when they could come down from Manchester.

“So you finally went and had another kid, Dan?” Grandpa told his son as he ruffled Harry’s hair.

Dan smiled. “Yes, well, you know how it is. He showed up on our porch like a little lost kitten, and we just had to keep him.”

The rest of the Grangers suppressed a snicker at that. They had told Dan’s parents a little about Harry being abused, but nothing of the rest of the story. They had been annoyed to learn that grandparents were something of a grey area with regard to the Statute of Secrecy. They weren’t really supposed to be told about magic, but the Ministry would look the other way if no one else found out. But since the only magic they could actually demonstrate was Harry’s animagus ability, which was supposed to be even more secret, Dan and Emma reluctantly admitted to each other that it wouldn’t do much good to tell them. When the kids went off to Hogwarts, it might be another matter, though.

“Come on, let’s get the car unloaded,” Dan said.

Grandma and Grandpa carried their luggage inside, while Dan and Emma helped with the rest, being sure to place the presents under the Christmas tree in preparation for the festivities two days hence.

* * *

The Dursley family was not having a happy Christmas season. Harry had been lucky enough that the magistrate allowed him to be interviewed on video without appearing in court for the trial. He had not seen his relatives once since he had run away and reportedly never intended to again. That was the one bright spot in their ordeal.

Despite their protests of innocence, with Harry’s interview and the doctor’s report in hand, the case against Vernon and Petunia Dursley was quickly closed. Their continued insistence that they were “very concerned because our nephew ran away,” courtesy of Dumbledore’s memory charm, came across not inaccurately as a blatant lie. Even the magistrate personally expressed his disgust at their behaviour. He had seen objectively much worse cases of abuse before, but keeping the boy in the cupboard was a new one on him. In the end, Petunia was sentenced to nine years in prison for child neglect, and Vernon was sentenced to the maximum ten years for neglect and assault, both of them receiving long sentences for singling out Harry in particular and hiding him from the authorities. The prison guards quickly made sure word got around their respective facilities about what they were in for.

Dudley had been sent to live with his Aunt Marge, who put him to work helping raise her dogs and generally took a much stricter hand with him hand than her brother, believing he needed to be “reformed” of his parents’ mistakes. (It was all Petunia’s bad influence, of course. She should have known with the way her sister had turned out.) Marge sold Number 4 Privett Drive to an older childless couple whom all the neighbours agreed were far more respectable than the previous residents. Hardly anyone noticed when the old cat lady, Arabella Figg, also sold her home to move back to the country.

* * *

Harry was awakened on the 25th of December by his exuberant sister jumping on the bed.

“Wake up, sleepyhead, it’s Christmas!”

He heard her run back out of the room and down the hall to wake their parents and grandparents. Harry groaned and fumbled on the bedside table for his glasses. Christmas had never been very happy for him, but then he remembered that he had seen some of the presents under the tree with his name on them, so it was an improvement over last year. Actually, it had been a much better time than last year already. Everyone in the family was going out of their way to make up for the past four years and give him a truly memorable Christmas. They had started after Grandma and Grandpa arrived, making Grandma’s “secret recipe” Christmas cookies. Then last night had featured a splendid Christmas Eve dinner, lots of laughs singing Christmas carols badly, and a candlelight church service that Harry had enjoyed far more than he expected. The few times the Dursleys had taken him to church had always seemed to feature snide comments about “freaks’ like him getting struck by lightning.

He rolled over onto his stomach and stretched. By now, this was usually the most cat-like part of his day—not without some effort, but at least he was waking up in human form on most days. That would have been awkward with Grandma and Grandpa around.

He checked the clock, now that he could actually tell time. It was 6:43 AM, which Mum and Dad would later say showed admirable restraint on Hermione’s part. Well, he could tell his sister wouldn’t be deterred, so he stumbled, bleary-eyed, out of his bedroom.

Grandma and Grandpa were already up and were snickering as Hermione dragged an equally bleary-eyed Mum and Dad out of their bedroom. Dad shared a sympathetic look with his son when he saw the boy’s excitement was also tempered by the early hour. Harry was improving, but he was by no means back on a human sleep schedule.

“Happy Christmas, everyone!” Hermione exclaimed.

“Mmm…Happy Christmas,” Mum replied, with the rest of the family haphazardly repeating her.

“Come on, let’s go open presents!” Hermione dashed off down the stairs. _Unstoppable force, that one_ , they thought. Both parents blamed the other’s side of the family for that trait.

Harry followed Hermione down the stairs, for some reason half-expecting to see Albus Dumbledore dressed up as Father Christmas in the living room, but it was not to be. He soon noticed, though, that there were more presents under the tree than there were last night. On closer inspection, he also noticed that some of the new presents had his name on them, which honestly made him more suspicious than anything else. Either there were some issues with Santa’s naughty and nice lists, or something else was going on.

But still, presents! That was something he could get behind—probably would have already if he had been more awake. Uncle Vernon had given him a sock last year—one sock, as a gag—so he couldn’t technically say he had never got Christmas presents before, but this Christmas was already better than the previous four put together.

Luckily, the adults didn’t make them wait until after breakfast, although Mum did bring out a plate of toast for the family. Sitting around the Christmas tree, they cajoled Hermione to pass out the gifts to everyone, with Harry helping a little, although he was distracted by how large his pile was growing. In the end, both children had a substantial pile of gifts, roughly equal, and all of the adults had a few.

“Why don’t you open one first, Harry?” Mum said.

Harry nodded, wide-eyed, and considered his pile. He snatched a present off the top, one of them that had mysteriously appeared from Father Christmas, and cautiously tore off the paper. By Dudley’s standards it would have been fairly mundane—a simple toy truck. In fact, it wouldn’t have even stood out among the several toys Mum and Dad had bought him when he moved in last month, but it was his first real present, and he laughed with joy because he couldn’t think of anything else to do as he held it up.

There was a click and flash of light, and he looked over to see Dad winding the film on the camera. He saw grins all around as his entire family looked as pleased as he was about the situation, and he silently thanked again whatever power had brought him here.

“Well, it looks like _someone_ likes it,” Grandma said as Harry started to roll the truck on the carpet.

“Can’t beat the classics, can you?” Grandpa added.

“Okay, Hermione, your turn,” Dad said, saving Harry from having to figure out what happened next.

Hermione picked a small, rectangular parcel off her pile and carefully unwrapped it to reveal a copy of one of the old _Winnie the Pooh_ books. She read off the title and then placed it by her feet as the start of what would clearly become a stack of them.

Mum, Dad, Grandma, and Grandpa each took their turns opening gifts from each other, although Hermione had also given them small trinkets. Harry, being new to the family and less experienced with gift giving, was off the hook on that. A few presents later, it turned out that Father Christmas had given Harry some random toys and had given Hermione some random books and toys. But when Harry reached a present labelled from Grandma and Grandpa, things began to change.

It was a fairly large box, easily large enough for his kitten form to fit inside, but it was light-weight, and when he opened it, he found a large, brown teddy bear. What really caught his eye, though, was that the bear had his name embroidered in red across its chest. There was no question about this toy. It was _his_. After all the grief Dudley had always given him by hogging the toys, that meant more to Harry than his grandparents knew.

“We didn’t know what kind of toys you liked,” Grandma explained, “but we thought every little boy needs a teddy bear.”

“It’s great!” Harry said. “Thanks, Grandma. Thanks, Grandpa.” In a move that shocked everyone, he got up and hugged both of his grandparents unprompted.

“Oh, you’re very welcome, dear,” Grandma said as she hugged him back.

Harry sat back down, still holding the bear. Meanwhile, Hermione’s came to one of her presents that was the wrong size and shape to be a book, and when she opened it, all she could say was, “Oh, wow, that’s a lot of colours.” After all, it’s not every day that one receives a box of 72 crayons.

They kept going, and as they got toward the end of the piles, Harry also came to a rectangular present that was the wrong size and shape for a book, but is his case, it turned out to be a video tape like the ones Dudley liked and his aunt and uncle never let him watch. “ _The Sword in the Stone_ ,” Harry grinned as he successfully read the title.

“It’s about King Arthur,” Dad said. “We’ve got the book around here somewhere, but it might be a few years before you’re ready to read it.”

Harry nodded as he examined the box. He couldn’t help but notice that the picture on the front included a skinny little boy, an owl, and an old man who looked surprisingly like…

“That looks like Mr. Dumbledore.”

“Let me see,” Hermione ordered, leaning over to look at the box. “It does!” she agreed.

“Yes, Mum and I thought so, too. We’ll have to ask him about it,” Dad said with a wink.

“Who’s Mr. Dumbledore?” Grandpa asked.

“Harry’s caseworker, of all people,” Dad told him. “Long white hair and beard, and you wouldn’t believe the way that man dresses. I’ve seen it, and I still don’t believe it.”

“Ahh…” From what Grandpa had heard about Harry’s past, he had to wonder if that explained a few things, but he kept that thought to himself.

“Can we watch it today?” Hermione asked with excitement.

“Sure we can. We’ll watch it this afternoon,” Dad said. “Why don’t you go ahead and open another one, now.”

“Oh, right.” Hermione picked up a large present, and a fairly heavy one for its size. She peeled the paper off and gasped in surprise to see not one book, but seven, which were thicker ones than she had been reading so far. She looked the top of the box and identified the gift: a complete boxed set of _The Chronicles of Narnia_. There had, unsurprisingly, been a theme toward fantasy in the children’s gifts this year. Hermione hugged Mum and Dad in thanks and set the box beside her stack of individual books.

“That should keep her busy for a solid month,” Mum said, considering that it was probably above even Hermione’s prodigious reading level.

“Ha, if we’re lucky,” Dad said.

Mum put on a mock frown. “We’ve created a monster, haven’t we?”

“You’re just figuring that out now?”

Mum broke and chuckled at that before saying, “Go on, Harry, open another one.”

Harry picked up a crudely-wrapped cubical box. It was very light for its size, and he saw that the tag said it was from Hermione. At least he was pretty sure it did—he still wasn’t a hundred percent sure about how to spell her name. Wondering what his sister could possibly have got him—perhaps another stuffed animal—he tore off the paper and opened the lid, and when he did, he burst out laughing.

Inside the box was a giant, multi-coloured ball of yarn. He took it out, eyes wide, and started batting it with his hands with a smile before he remembered that there was company present. Hermione and Mum both smiled at him. They seemed to be the only ones in on the joke, though, since Dad hid his face with his palm, and Grandma and Grandpa simply looked confused.

“A ball of yarn?” Grandma asked.

Luckily, Mum knew this was coming, so she had an answer prepared: “Hermione is _convinced_ that Harry was raised by cats. And Harry always has to encourage her, so we thought it was the perfect gift.”

“Thanks, Hermione,” Harry said. His sister grinned at him.

“Raised by cats, eh?” Grandpa joked. “How are you at catching mice?”

Harry didn’t notice his parents tense up at that. Not quite getting the joke nor realising how close he was coming to a forbidden topic, he just smiled and said, “Pretty good.”

Hermione grimaced a little, knowing that her brother was being completely serious, but the tension eased when Grandpa roared with laughter. “Dan, you never told us he was that sharp,” he said.

“Well, he…does have his moments.”

Mum and Dad were silently relieved when Hermione came to her next gift, one from her grandparents, but the situation unravelled further when she opened it and revealed a stuffed Scottie dog. It had a red ribbon tied around its neck embroidered with her name.

“Thanks, Grandma. Thanks, Grandpa…Look, Harry.” She waved the dog at him and started barking: “Ruff! Ruff! Ruff ruff ruff!”

After the last joke, everyone laughed at that one. Harry playfully batted the dog away. His sister persisted, hoping she could get him to hiss at it, but Harry found he didn’t mind the dog so much for some reason. True, dogs tended to cause trouble for cats, but this one was pretty small, even using his imagination. Or maybe he just had a soft spot for black dogs.

But now, Harry was down to his last gift, and his Mum suppressed a groan as she remembered what that gift was. And it had seemed like such a good idea at the time. Harry hadn’t received many books. After all, he was still in picture books, and Hermione already had a whole library of those for him to read, but this was a new title called…

“ _If You Give a Mouse a Cookie_ ,” Harry read off, to the snickers of his sister and grandparents. He paused and thought for a moment as he looked at the picture of a mouse eating cookies and milk. “Will it taste better?” he said innocently.

That was too much. Even Mum and Dad laughed at that one. Hermione was literally rolling on the floor, despite her usual disgust for the thought of eating mice, Grandma nearly fell out of her seat, and Grandpa was laughing so hard he could barely breathe. Harry wasn’t sure what was so funny. After all, he knew the mouse _wouldn_ _’t_ taste better because cats couldn’t taste sugar. But the laughter was so infectious that he was quickly caught up in it. In fact, he couldn’t remember when he’d laughed so hard before. It was a long time until the family calmed down enough for Hermione to open her final gift.

Harry’s gift to Hermione, the lone gift he had given, was obviously wrapped with their mother’s handiwork, but he had helped pick it out at the store. It was much smaller than his ball of yarn—small and rectangular and shaped suspiciously like many of her other gifts, but it wasn’t yet another chapter book.

It was a small, red book bound in faux-leather. The pages were blank, for on the cover, the word “Diary” was embossed in gold script, and above it, the word “HERMIONE’S” was spelt out in reasonably nice-looking gold stickers. For a six-year-old, it was a pretty high-quality diary, and her eyes lit up when she saw it.

“Harry, it’s wonderful! Thank you!” Hermione exclaimed. Without warning, she pounced on him and hugged him. He tried to squirm away, but as she had learnt to do surprisingly quickly, she reached a hand up and scratched him behind his right ear, which soothed him for a moment. The gesture was not missed by their grandparents who started laughing again.

“Uh, you’re welcome, Hermione,” Harry mumbled, trying to remember his manners. Fortunately, his sister let him go before he could cause a scene.

After a lavish Christmas dinner that was probably the most Harry had ever eaten in one sitting and a truly mesmerising time watching _The Sword in the Stone_ , not to mention playing with new toys and starting in on new books, Harry laid down with his teddy bear for the best sleep he’d had since joining the Granger Family.

* * *

_Dear Mr. and Mrs. Granger,_

_On the matter of your most recent questions, I believe it will be more convenient if we speak via floo. I hope you will be able to meet at 4 in the afternoon on Saturday, the 28th to address these matters. Send a reply with the owl if there are any problems._

_Happy Christmas,_

_Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore_

So the Granger Family was gathered around the fireplace on Saturday afternoon, waiting for one Mr. Dumbledore’s most unusual appearances. The children waited with excited anticipation, having just recently been told what this meeting was about. No one screamed this time when the flames turned green and the grey-bearded face appeared in their midst, but the looks on the Grangers’ faces were still clearly unsettled by the appearance.

“Good afternoon,” said Albus Dumbledore. “I hope your Christmas was pleasant.”

Emma smiled weakly. “I’d like to say “magical,” but that might confuse things.”

This earned her a small chuckle. “Indeed. Harry, I am glad to see you’ve settled into your new home.” The boy was currently sitting at his mother’s feet, wear a new jumper, and, most amusingly, playing with a ball of yarn. He would have to tell Minerva. Perhaps she would actually laugh at that one.

Harry looked up and said, “Yes, sir.”

“Mr. Dumbledore?” Hermione said from her oversize armchair, setting aside her book. She was very interested to learn about Harry, but there was something that had been nagging at her since Christmas.

“Yes, Hermione?”

“Did Merlin really turn Arthur into all those animals?”

Even with Dumbledore’s splendid mind, it took him a moment to switch gears at such an odd question. “Excuse me?”

“One of our films,” Dan explained. “ _The Sword in the Stone_ —”

“Ah…” The title clicked. He remembered the occasional young muggle-born asking the same thing in the sixties, and come to think of it in the forties as well, when the book was published. “No, I’m afraid not. That was merely an invention of muggle storytellers.”

“Did he discover Bermuda?” Harry said.

“What? I don’t believe so, although I might wish to consult a biography of Merlin on that point. Mr. and Mrs. Granger, in your letter, you asked about Harry’s status in our world—”

“Not exactly,” Dan clarified. “We asked about what you said last month: Harry _inherited_ a seat on your…Wizengamot—your, what, magical Lords? Does that mean Harry is a Lord in your world?”

“The terminology does not correspond exactly, but yes. As the last surviving Potter, Harry is the Head of the Noble House of Potter and a Lord of the Wizengamot. However, unlike the muggle Lords, the title is normally only used in the Wizengamot chambers and official correspondence.”

Hermione squealed briefly. Normally used or not, her brother was a Lord, and nothing was going to ruin that for her.

“And this seat, is it vacant now?” Dan continued.

“No, there is no need to worry about that. As Harry’s magical guardian, I appointed his second cousin Andromeda Tonks as his proxy until he comes of age. She was his closest living relative who was…suitable.”

“I have cousins?” Harry perked up.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, you’re going to have to back up for a minute,” Emma talked over him. She had started writing in that notebook of hers again. “Magical guardian? What’s that?”

Dumbledore looked a bit miffed at the digression, but he answered calmly, “Because muggle parents—typically—have very little knowledge or involvement in the magical world, all muggle-born children are appointed a Guardian in Magical Affairs to oversee their upbringing. For students attending Hogwarts, that role falls to the Headmaster, unless there are special circumstances.”

“Which is you,” Dan said darkly, groaning inwardly at the thought of the old wizard being personally responsible for the raising of more children.

“Indeed. In Harry’s case, he was an orphan, and his godfather was…unavailable, so it fell to the Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot to appoint a guardian for him.”

“And he appointed you?”

“Well…in a manner of speaking. I myself sit as Chief Warlock.”

“And, of course, you appointed yourself,” Emma said, barely restraining herself from adding, _Why am I not surprised?_ “And what else does the Chief Warlock do?”

“Merely preside over the Wizengamot,” Dumbledore said, not a little dismissively. “I believe the nearest equivalent in the muggle government would be the Lord Chancellor.”

“What!” Dan, Emma, and Hermione all shouted at once. Harry just looked around, confused.

“You’re a Cabinet minister?” Dan asked in shock before he forced himself to remember the small size of the magical world.

“That would be quite impossible, Mr. Granger, as the Ministry of Magic has no Cabinet.”

“Even so, you say you’re effectively the Lord Chancellor…and the Education Secretary, or close enough, _and_ the head of MI-5. Do you have any other titles we should know about?”

“Well, I’ve never heard it put quite that way, but there is one other. I also sit as Supreme Mugwump of the International Confederation of Wizards, although that is considerably less impressive than it sounds in terms of actual influence.”

Dan and Emma paled at that one. “International Confederation of Wizards?” Emma said, writing down the name. “And that’s like, what, Secretary General of the UN or something?” She barely wanted to think about what more powerful sort of position it might mean in the magical world. It felt like a step short of having entertained royalty and not known it.

Luckily, Dumbledore quashed that notion, at least somewhat: “That might be a charitable interpretation, from what I understand of muggle politics. In all honesty, the only thing ICW has ever been united about is the Statute of Secrecy.”

“Still, you’re basically the most politically powerful wizard in the world, and you also run a school on the side?” Dan said. Something seriously unsettled him about this. It seemed like the more they dug into Dumbledore’s professional life, the less it made sense. What was really going on here?

“No, no, you misunderstand me,” the old wizard said. “I am the Headmaster of Hogwarts first. I merely make a hobby of moderating the fascinating political debates that occur in our world.”

“But how did you come by all those titles in the first place?”

Unexpectedly, he smiled at this, and his eyes twinkled as he answered, “When you have lived as long as I have, Mr. Granger, you tend to accumulate quite a number of unusual things.”

Dan and Emma couldn’t help but stare at each other at the blatant evasion. By silent agreement, they dropped the subject. Something told them that continuing down this line would be unproductive or worse. The kids were also staring at them, now, looking for some clue as to what was going on.

“Okay, then…” Emma consulted her notes again. “Back to magical guardians. Is there any way we could take over that roll for our children?”

“Unfortunately not,” Dumbledore said. “You of course do have broad rights as legal guardians in the magical world, but the law requires all magical children to also have a witch or wizard overseeing their affairs.”

“I see,” Emma said darkly. She flipped to the back of her notebook to where she had started a to-do list, to which she added, _Work to change anti-muggle laws_ , and _Investigate magical guardian options other than Dumbledore_. The wizard in question showed a touch of nervousness as he wondered what she was writing. “There. Now, you said Harry had a cousin whom you appointed as a proxy.” She motioned for Harry to get up off the floor and sit beside her. “I don’t think you’ve told us anything about Harry’s living family. What are they like?”

Dumbledore’s face fell. “Not good, I’m afraid,” he said grimly, turning to face her son. “Harry, your grandmother, Dorea Potter, was born into the Black family, and while your grandmother was a good woman, most of the Blacks are known as dark wizards who don’t like muggles or muggle-borns.”

“Why, sir?” Harry said.

“Because many old families are more worried about holding onto their power than anything else. They don’t like new families coming into the wizarding world. As it happens, you have four living second cousins through your grandmother’s family, but I’m sorry to say that three of them worked for Voldemort in some form or other.” Harry sucked in a sharp breath at so many of his own family turning on him—or at least on his birth parents—and being bad guys. Hermione didn’t look much better. “But the fourth one, Andromeda, is a good woman,” he continued. “She left her family and married a muggle-born wizard named Ted Tonks. She believes in fair treatment for muggles like your birth parents did, which is why I chose her to represent you on the Wizengamot.”

“Do you think we could meet her?” Emma asked. “We’d love to meet whatever family he has left.” Harry nodded enthusiastically. “And maybe she can teach Harry a few things about navigating wizarding politics before he reenters your world.”

“Oh, I don’t think there’s any need to worry Harry with things like that at his age, Mrs. Granger.”

“No, I think that’s actually a good idea,” Dan defended her.

“I have full confidence in Madam Tonks’s ability to manage his affairs until he comes of age. There really is no need—”

 _That_ _’s what we’re afraid of_ , Dan thought. “Mr. Dumbledore,” he cut him off, “you wanted to keep Harry from too much exposure to his fame, which is good, but your plan would have him not learning about his heritage, and it sounds like that’s pretty important. Especially with him holding a peerage and having to deal with that pureblood politics you told us about.”

Harry was still looking back and forth between the adults, confused, but Hermione’s eyes narrowed. Their parents hadn’t said much about what they had talked about with Mr. Dumbledore before besides the threat from Voldemort, but she was starting to pick up on the fact that there were more subtle problems in the magical world.

“Isn’t it better if he learns about that early?” Dan continued. “And am I right in thinking these rich pureblood families I’ve heard so much about teach _their_ children early?” The look on Dumbledore’s face made it clear the answer was yes.

“Besides, we still want to meet her anyway,” Emma gave him an out. “She _is_ Harry’s only good magical family, after all.”

“His _nearest_ magical family to be more precise—all of the old families are interrelated—but, yes, I can understand the sentiment,” he said. “I will enquire with Madame Tonks about visiting you, though perhaps sometime next summer would be best, when you will have more time available.”

After a look and a nod from her husband Emma said, “That would be acceptable. Thank you.”

“Thank you, sir,” Harry added.

“You’re quite welcome, my boy. Is there anything else you wished to discuss? No? Then I really must get back to my preparations for the spring term. Happy New Year.”

“Happy New Year,” the family replied.

The image of Dumbledore’s face vanished from the fireplace, and the flames changed back to their normal orange colour.

“I just had another one of those “What the heck just happened,” moments,” Dan said after a pause. It disturbed him to think that a conversation through the fireplace almost felt normal. He and Emma quickly got up and headed for the kitchen to process what they had learnt.

As soon as they left, Hermione slid out of her chair and whispered to Harry, “They always do that when something’s wrong. I’m gonna check it out.” She tiptoed over to the kitchen door—but not quietly enough.

“Hermione,” he mother called.

“Sorry, Mummy.” She ran back to her chair in embarrassment and opened her book again, but after about a minute, she had an idea. She looked up and grinned at her brother. “Harry, change to a cat and listen to what they’re saying,” she whispered.

Harry smiled back as he caught on. “Okay,” he whispered. After a few seconds’ concentration, he was on all fours and slunk over to the kitchen door. With his acute feline sense of hearing, he could make out every word.

“Talk about a steep learning curve,” Mum said, pouring herself a cup of tea. Harry could smell it from outside—Earl Grey.

“I know,” Dad replied. “I thought there was something up with Mr. Dumbledore before, but this…I don’t even understand it. It’s like he runs everything. How does that happen?”

“I don’t know. And he didn’t seem to want to talk about it either. He seems like a good enough guy and all, but it makes you wonder what he’s doing behind the scenes.”

“I just feel like we’re missing something. The more I look, the less it seems to add up.”

“Well, maybe this Madam Tonks can explain it. Or we can write Professor McGonagall—”

“We can ask, but they both work for Dumbledore.”

“I know, but—” She stopped as something caught her eye. Looking over, she saw a small, black ear poking out from behind the door. “Harry.”

There was a meow and a skitter of paws on the hardwood as the kitten sprinted away.

“They’re both in on this together, Dan,” Emma said with a chuckle. “Give our sweet, innocent daughter a brother, and look what happens.”

“Hey, this was your idea.”

“Oh, come on, you know you wanted him just as much as I did.”

“Yes, I know, dear…What about that Gringotts guy? They seem pretty independent.”

“Maybe, but they don’t seem like the type to talk politics, especially with customers.”

“Maybe not,” Dan said. “It’s odd, though. The pattern actually feels kind of familiar. It’s just so hard to place with the magic and all. It’s…it’s like…it’s small town politics,” he realised with a snap of his fingers. “Remember how there’s only ten thousand wizards in Britain? Their ministry has to be run like a town council—and it sounds like all the worst aspects of it, too. All the councillors are friends, they always help each other and get each other out of trouble, they all have important day jobs in the town, people hold multiple offices, everything runs on personal agendas…”

“My God, you’re right,” Emma said. “Everything we know about their civil war makes more sense that way. Including Dumbledore.”

“ _Especially_ Dumbledore. How else could he get away with what he did to Harry? It’s like they’re just _letting_ him be the Local Education Officer, the Chief Constable, the Council Chairman, _and_ an MP.”

“I think we need to go back over _A History of Magic_ from the start. If it’s more of a town history than a national one…I wonder how much _they_ think of it that way.”

“Hard to say. They _do_ live it. The language may be different, but it sounds like that’s how they do things.”

“The question is how Dumbledore got so many titles on an international scale.”

“That is the question, isn’t it,” Dan concluded. “Unless it’s in the books, I think all we can do is ask around as we get the chance.”

* * *

Albus Dumbledore sat at his desk, wondering how his plans for Harry Potter had changed so much. The boy was sure to develop quite the independent streak with his new family if the parents were any indication. He supposed that was a good thing, on balance, but it certainly changed his calculus.

He had expected Harry Potter to arrive at Hogwarts in five and a half years, perhaps not having had the best childhood—certainly a sheltered one—but a decent one. He expected a shy boy, eager to learn, and with room to grow into his role as the Chosen One when he was old enough to deal with it. Instead, he had already escaped an abusive home and learnt a nearly-untraceable magical skill once thought impossible. Perhaps he would still turn out to be the shy type, like his new sister, but Albus doubted it.

He could see where things were going now. Under the Grangers’ guidance, Harry would rejoin the wizarding world as politically savvy as James Potter, with Lily Evans’s knack for standing up to people well-cultivated. Both were admittedly good qualities to prepare him to face Voldemort and the Death Eaters, but if the boy had also inherited his father’s penchant for shaking things up, well, he hoped the wizarding world would be ready for him.

Albus decided to head down to the Hog’s Head. Somehow, he felt like a conversation with Abe would be the _less_ stressful part of his day.

* * *

_January 1986_

The two children were subdued as their parents drove them through the city streets after school. A warm December had given way to a bitterly cold winter, and it was under a cold, grey sky that they travelled to their destination.

The Grangers had been lucky enough to find a dojo in the Crawley area that was highly rated and respected—and that, though they were very reluctant to put it that way, had a good chance of getting the kids up to a credible black belt level (minus the physical strength) before they left for “boarding school” in five years.

Most children would be excited at starting karate classes—well, maybe not the young bookworm so much—but Harry Potter and Hermione Granger were deadly serious. To the world, they were just two more kids learning karate early as a useful life skill, but in secret, they knew the truth. Today was the day they would start learning how to defend themselves from Voldemort.

The dojo was one of the more traditional-looking clubs, where the instructors wore white gis and answered to “sensei.” An advanced class was just wrapping up, running through some moves that, to the kids at least, looked pretty impressive before filing out. At first glance, the club looked as serious as the two children, but it soon proved a bit lighter. The instructors were friendly and engaged with the children as they arrived. Harry and Hermione soon fell in line with about a dozen other children ranging in age from nine down to four, each wearing a plain white gi, and most of them looking happier than the pair, except for one or two who clearly just didn’t want to be there.

As Dan and Emma watched from the back with a few other parents, the lead instructor introduced himself as Sensei John and started right in, first teaching the students to stand at attention and bow.

“Okay, but this time, everyone do it together. Everyone bow and say, “Hello, Sensei John.’”

“Hello, Sensei John.” Most of the children mumbled it, or the smaller ones were too shy to speak, but Hermione’s voice rang out clearly. She may not have been the most outgoing sort, but she was a stickler for following instructions.

“Very good. Do you know why we do that…? It’s to show courtesy and respect. If the other teachers and I treat you nice, how are you going to treat us?”

“Nice,” a couple of kids said.

“That’s right. Now, courtesy and respect means that when I teach you karate, you have to use karate in a good way. And that means no punching your mum, your dad, your brother, your sister. That’s not nice, is it?”

“No,” a few voices answered.

“Say, “No, Sensei John.’”

“No, Sensei John.”

“Good. If you ever have to use karate outside of class, you only use it to stop people from hurting you, okay?”

Emma wondered if any of the other children would ever have any reason to use karate besides the occasional schoolyard bully. Meanwhile, her own children had to legitimately worry about bloodthirsty terrorists. She hated to admit it, but Dumbledore was right about one thing: they were far too young to have to deal with this—not that the terrorists cared.

After the introductions, the instructors taught the children a few basic stances and moves. Sensei John was a good teacher, the parents decided. He was good at making the lesson into a sort of game, while still getting the point across, and he was a big help in getting the kids to learn the moves correctly. The smaller ones were pretty uncoordinated, but they all made noticeable improvements over the course of the lesson. Harry also started to pick up his sister’s habit of answering the instructors clearly.

The highlight of the lesson was a mini-obstacle course designed to help them with speed and agility. The kids were soon encouraging each other as much as the instructors as they raced each other, and they all wound up having a lot of fun with it, even Harry and, to the bookworm’s own astonishment, Hermione.

At the end of the lesson, each child earned a white belt for their effort and respect, and Dan and Emma were glad to see their children were smiling just as much as the others. Worrying about dark wizards could wait a while longer yet.

* * *

_March 1986_

The Granger Family was eating breakfast before school when they heard the click of the mail slot and flop of letters on the doormat.

“Get the mail, Hermione,” said Dan from behind his paper.

“Make Harry get it,” Hermione said in her best bossy older sister voice.

Dan looked up and, seeing that Harry was more nearly finished eating, complied. “Get the mail, Harry.”

“Make Hermione get it.”

“Hermione’s still eating, Harry. We can make her get it next time.”

Harry quickly took the last bites of his breakfast and ran to get the mail. He brought it back, idly reading over the senders’ names. He didn’t recognise any of them, but Dan picked out one of them and quickly opened it. He read the first line, and called, “Emma, come look at this.”

“What is it, Dan?” his wife said.

“The adoption papers came through.”

“They did?”

“They did?” Hermione echoed.

All four of them clustered together to see the letter, and Dan pointed to the relevant line.

 _Harry James Potter is hereby recognised as the son of Daniel Mark Granger and Emma Julia Granger._ After much discussion, they had decided as a family for Harry to keep his last name to honour his birth parents’ sacrifice, but Harry would have taken any name he had to for this.

“Congratulations, Harry,” you’re officially part of our family, now, Dan said. Hugs and kisses were exchanged all around that morning, and Harry showed up at school that day with an unshakable smile on his face. It was official now. He had a real family.


	9. Small Town Politics

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter and his universe. I don’t know who owns all the reinterpretations around here, but I’m not making any money off of this, so I don’t think it much matters at this point.
> 
> The Black family tree says that several older members of the Black family were still alive in 1986. However, I have chosen to ignore this both because of other mathematical errors in the Black family tree and because it is stated that the Blacks’ “ancestral home” of 12 Grimmauld Place was unoccupied after Walburga’s death in 1985.

_July 1986_

Andromeda Tonks felt a very strong twinge and shivered as she passed through the wards of the house. This place was protected by everything short of a Fidelius Charm, although considering who she was here to meet, that was no surprise.

To say she was nervous would be an understatement. No one had seen Harry Potter for almost five years besides Dumbledore and his closest confidantes. Now, she learnt that he had been adopted by a pair of muggles who happened to have a magical daughter, and now they wanted to meet her.

Andromeda had never met the boy before. Sirius had wanted her to, but the Potters were already in hiding when he was born. She would never understand how her cousin had gone so wrong. Sorted into Gryffindor, left the family and got disowned like her, apparently acting as the perfect godfather right up until the end…but now wasn’t the time to dwell on such things. She rang the doorbell without hesitation. You don’t spend fourteen years with Ted without picking up a few things.

Emma Granger opened the door to let their visitor in, but stopped in surprise when she saw that the woman at the door looked completely normal. She was an attractive woman in her early thirties, clean and formal, with mousy brown hair, and wearing a muggle dress. Her dress was even in style.

“Are you Mrs. Tonks?” she asked.

The woman gave her a nervous smile and shook her hand. “Yes, you must be Mrs. Granger. How do you do?”

“How do you do? Please come in. Harry, your cousin is here,” she called.

Harry ran out to the foyer upon hearing the news, his sister and father in tow, where he saw a strange woman who froze and stared upon spotting him. He was starting to notice a pattern with that. And of course, his natural feline reaction was to get into a stare-down.

It took a moment from Andromeda to figure out that she’d got herself into a staring contest with the Boy-Who-Lived. Yes, this was James’s and Lily’s son, alright, but there was something else in his eyes. Since she didn’t know about his ability, she could only guess that it came from his time with his new family. He was looking well, though. Based on Dumbledore’s rather cagey report, she could figure out that he was doing a lot better than when they’d found him last fall. In fact, he had grown several inches and was well on his way to catching up with his year-mates, and the karate lessons were already leaving him fitter than the average little boy.

As she stared, though, Emma Granger seemed to be more on top of things. She leaned down and whispered something to the boy, who blinked once, slowly, then extended his hand and said, “Pleased to meet you Mrs. Tonks.”

Something long suppressed broke free within her when she heard him speak. The boy seemed so normal. Even she had got a little wrapped up in the Boy-Who-Lived legend, but no, he was just an ordinary child, and suddenly, the formality truly pained her. He was family, after all—indeed, the only family she had besides Dora, Ted, and Ted’s parents whom she actually cared to talk to. Perhaps it was time to redeem the hated nickname that her sisters had given her. She crouched down in front of him and took his hand in both of hers. “It’s good to finally meet you, too, Harry,” she said softly. “Please, call me Cousin Andi…Is this your sister?” She motioned to the girl behind him.

“Yes, ma’am—Cousin Andi, this is Hermione,” Harry said with a smile.

“Pleased to meet you,” Hermione introduced herself.

“Hermione, that’s a lovely name,” Andi said. “It’s a perfect name for a young witch.”

She giggled at the compliment. She was still far more used to people making fun of her name, even with her brother defending her.

“Thank you for having me over, Mr. and Mrs. Granger,” Andi said, standing up. “I don’t have much more family than Harry does, so it’s good to be able to connect with him.”

“Please, call us Dan and Emma,” the latter said. Whether she turned out to be a truly strong supporter for Harry or not, she was still family. “Come, sit down. Would you like some tea?”

“Yes, please.”

“So tell us about your family,” Dan said as they sipped their tea. “I know Harry’s dying to hear more.”

“Oh, I’m sure you know all about us by now,” she said with another nervous smile.

“Not really. Mr. Dumbledore didn’t tell us much besides that you’re Harry’s cousin.”

“Really? He gave me a whole dossier on you—” She stopped as she saw the Grangers groan and roll their eyes. Even the children. “Well…he would, wouldn’t he.”

Dan and Emma glanced at each other and each cocked an eyebrow.

“Alright, then. I come from the Black family, just like Harry’s grandmother, but, frankly, the smart ones all got out at the earliest opportunity. My husband, Ted, is muggle-born—like Hermione—so we try to keep up with goings on in the muggle world. And we have a daughter, Nymphadora. She’s thirteen, and she’s…she’s a force of nature.”

Dan and Emma laughed with her at that, secretly glad that they didn’t have to worry about teenagers for a while yet.

“I know,” she continued. “She thinks she wants to be an Auror already—that’s like a magical detective, more or less. I guess it was too much to expect her to go into the family trade.”

“Family trade?” Dan asked.

“Well, Ted’s and mine. Actually, I think we have that in common. You two are…dentists, right? Teeth healers?”

“Mm-hmm,” they nodded.

“I work as a healer in St. Mungo’s Hospital, and Ted works in the apothecary in Diagon Alley.”

“Really? What’s that like, magical healing?” Emma said.

“According to Ted, it’s not too different from yours. We have potions to match most of your medicines and the same kinds of physical therapies and such. The difference is that it’s easier to do surgeries and heal simple cuts and fractures with a wand.”

“And cleaner, too,” Emma pointed out. “That alone’s got to add a few years to your life expectancy.”

“I can imagine so. We should compare notes sometime. Too few healers ever pay attention to muggle techniques.”

Dan and Emma were thrilled to find someone in the magical world who could speak to them on their level. Emma jotted down a few notes. She had already filled her first notebook with material from _A History of Magic_ and had started in on a second. “And of course, you’ve got into Harry’s family business as well,” she said. “The Wizengamot?”

“Yes, there is that, although they don’t meet that often, thank Merlin. Only once a month unless there’s something big going on. A bunch of self-important, old, rich folks taking themselves too seriously, if you ask me, but that’s politics for you.” Dan and Emma chuckled at that. Some things didn’t change no matter what world you were in.

“Well, we appreciate you representing Harry’s interests there all the same.”

“It’s not that much trouble, really. Someone’s got to do it, and I might as well put all that training my family gave me to good use.”

“So how is the Wizengamot actually set up? I mean, we’ve read through most of _A History of Magic_ that Dumbledore gave us, but what’s it like now—the factions and such?”

Andi was secretly relieved that Dumbledore hadn’t left the Grangers completely in the dark. “Ah—there are forty-four hereditary seats, six elected, and eight appointed,” she explained. That raised some eyebrows. The Grangers had not expected the hereditary seats to still be so dominant. “The seats are roughly equally divided into three factions…and that actually hits close to home in my family. You see, my younger sister, Narcissa, married Lucius Malfoy: leader of the conservative, blood purist faction, accused Death Eater, though he claims Imperius, and if not _the_ richest man in Magical Britain, certainly in the top three. It’s his money that keeps the blood purists in power, and it’s suspected by many that he was bankrolling You-Know-Who.”

“Who?” Dan said.

“You-Know-Who?”

“Uh…no, we don’t know who.”

“Wha—?” Andi sighed. Surely, Harry had been told about his past? “You know…V…V…Voldemort,” she sounded out, looking very uncomfortable.

“Oh, _him_ ,” Dan said casually. Andi’s eyes widened in surprise.

“What’s the matter?” Emma asked.

“Well, it’s just that…people really don’t like to say his name.” The Grangers just looked confused. Even the children. “I mean _really_ don’t like to say it…He’s described in official publications as ‘He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named’.”

“But that’s crazy!” All eyes turned to Hermione. She flinched a little, but she pressed on, “That just makes him scarier.”

Andi suddenly felt like she was being put under the microscope, acutely aware despite the culture shock that she and most of the wizarding community had just been put to shame by a six-year-old.

“She is right, you know,” Dan said. “No one in our world is afraid to say Hitler’s name or anything like that. Besides, Mr. Dumbledore never had any problem using Voldemort’s name.”

Andi struggled not to flinch. “I know, he’s always been like that,” she said. “I’m sorry, it’s just that news travels fast in the magical world, and V…Voldemort…had a habit of…” She glanced at the children. “Making an example of people whom he felt didn’t fear him enough.” Harry turned a little green at that, so she quickly changed the subject. “In any case, there is also a faction that opposes the blood purists—to varying degrees. They range from people who only want equal rights for muggle-borns to Solomon Monroe, who thinks Acromantulas are just misunderstood.” The Grangers didn’t know what an Acromantula was, but it didn’t sound cuddly. “Dumbledore is the leader of the pro-equality faction—the Leader of the Light, as his fans like to say—though for more day-to-day things, it’s probably Augusta Longbottom, and I’m sure Harry could be a formidable force when he comes of age if he chooses to be.

“The other faction is the neutrals, led by Adrian Greengrass, Sr If you want to get anything done at all these days, you have to peel off a few of them. Of course, there are lots of little idiosyncrasies—like I suppose I should tell you about the Black Seat. I assume you know about Sirius Black?”

The family all nodded. Harry had by now been told the story of his traitorous godfather.

“Sirius Black is the last surviving male of the Black line. The last one from a family that even one generation ago seemed to be strong and secure. Since he’s in Azkaban, the Black Seat on the Wizengamot falls to his nearest relatives by proxy. His brother, Regulus, was also a Death Eater, although he apparently got cold feet when the war turned bad, and V…Voldemort…killed him himself. The next in line was his mother, who filled the seat until she died last year. After her was my older sister, Bellatrix—also a Death Eater. She’s in Azkaban, too, for…doing things that aren’t appropriate for children to hear.” Dan and Emma grimaced at that. It had to be pretty bad to beat what had happened to Harry’s parents. “Since I was disowned by my family, I’m not eligible, so his current proxy is Narcissa. While Sirius Black lives, she holds his seat and votes in lockstep with her husband. When he dies, there will be a vacancy, and the Wizengamot will elect a new family to fill it, preferably the nearest blood relative who has an heir and isn’t already ennobled. If things remain as they stand now, Malfoy will nominate Richard Burke, I’ll nominate Enid Croaker, and Malfoy will win that vote.

“But let’s talk about happier things. I want to hear all about what Harry’s been doing these past eight months…”

They conversed for quite a while, telling what they could about their first encounters with Harry and with Dumbledore and how Harry had been faring since then. The children talked at length about their friends and school, and Hermione especially about her many books. When Harry mentioned his love of climbing, Andi said she expected him to take to flying and Quidditch, like his father, though Dan and Emma didn’t look particularly pleased about that. They only knew the basics of Quidditch, but Andi could admit it didn’t sound too safe by muggle standards.

When the children talked about the karate classes they were taking, though she understood how serious it was, she couldn’t help but laugh and say, “Now that I _have_ to see.” Her laughter quickly turned to amazement as Harry and Hermione demonstrated a complete kata to her. Not that they were particularly good—they were only yellow belts by now—and of course they didn’t have wands yet, but if they were doing things like this at ages five and six, she thought, then her pompous, entitled brother-in-law and his cronies would be in for a surprise if they ever tried anything on the children when they were older.

In return, Andi told them some more about her family, particularly Dora’s pranking exploits at Hogwarts and her Quidditch rivalry against Charlie Weasley, which were the source of much amusement. Emma suggested the two families meet sometime, though that might take some doing.

“I definitely need to introduce you to Ted sometime,” Andi confirmed, “but it’s tricky. Officially, I’m not even here right now. You probably know by now how Dumbledore is about secrets. I’ll bring my husband if I can, but I’m not sure if Dora’s ready for that yet.”

As the conversation started to wind down, Andi surprised them by pulling a wrapped parcel out of her handbag. “Harry, I know you have a birthday coming up in a couple of weeks, and since I won’t be able to come for that, I wanted to give you this.”

Harry took the parcel and, after a nod from his parents, opened it. Inside the box, he was surprised to find a toy motorbike, about eight inches long and a matching silver wand of about the same length. He held up the motorbike and studied it curiously. It looked oddly familiar.

“Your father and grandfather were more tinkerers than anything else, Harry—magical inventions, better broomsticks, that sort of thing. That motorbike is a replica of one that your father…and Sirius Black enchanted to fly.”

“Really?” Harry asked excitedly. “I had a dream about a flying motorbike once.”

“Then maybe it was the same one. The original is in our shed. This one doesn’t fly, but it does move around on its own. Go on, set it on the floor.” Harry did so. “Now, do you see that silver stick?”

“Uh huh.”

“That’s a toy wand. It doesn’t do anything besides control the motorbike. Just point the wand at it and say, ‘Start.’”

Harry picked up the silver wand from the box and said, “Start.” Immediately, the toy started rolling forward, perfectly balanced, with a rather electric-sounding whir. Harry soon learnt that it drove wherever he pointed the wand, and he was quickly doing laps around the living room until he tried to turn it too tight, and it wiped out.

“It’s great! Thanks!” he exclaimed.

“You’re quite welcome, Harry. Say ‘Stop’ to turn it off.”

“Um, are we, you know, allowed to have that here?” Dan asked before it could go any further.

“Oh, certainly. Just don’t tell anyone that it’s magical. The Ministry doesn’t trace all magic, just spells. It’s sort of the worst-kept secret in Magical Britain. Tell them it’s a custom toy that runs on…batteries, is that right?”

Harry righted the motorbike and started it again, with Hermione chasing after him.

“Okay, you two, why don’t you take that upstairs if you’re going to play with it—just be careful.”

The kids squealed with excitement as they climbed the stairs, leaving Dan and Emma to ask the main political question that they didn’t particularly want to involve them in.

“Andi, there’s something we’ve been wondering about, if you can answer it,” Dan said.

“What is it?” Andi said seriously, recognising the ploy from when Dora was that age during the war.

“Just how _did_ Dumbledore get all of those titles of his?”

“Oh, that.” Andi chuckled a little in spite of herself, even though she understood how it could be a concern. “It’s actually pretty simple. Albus Dumbledore was hailed as the Saviour of the Wizarding World for years.” Dan and Emma started. “Um, you’ve been reading _A History of Magic_. Have you read about Grindelwald’s War?”

“Not yet.”

“Read those chapters—and come to think of it, have a muggle history book open when you do. I can understand why he didn’t tell you. Dumbledore doesn’t like to talk about his personal life, but the fact is that he _personally_ defeated Grindelwald himself in 1945.”

“What?” Emma exclaimed. “You mean Dumbledore won World War II single-handed?”

Andi nodded. “The Western Theatre, anyway. Everyone knows the story. Dumbledore was one of the planners in the war—he’s always been very clever—but a lot of people thought that he was the only one strong enough to beat Grindelwald in a straight duel. He didn’t want to get involved in the fighting himself, but the Wizarding Allies were desperate—far more desperate than I think the muggle commanders ever knew. Grindelwald was about to break through the Allied lines with his army to take back France for the Germans. So on the 6th of January, 1945, Dumbledore met Grindelwald in the Ardennes and fought him. Three hours of chaos and destruction later in what is widely agreed to be the greatest duel of all time, Grindelwald was in chains, and Dumbledore was leading the Allies to victory.”

“Wait a minute, you said the Ardennes?” Dan said. “My father was _at_ the Ardennes.”

“A lot of people were,” Andi said apologetically. “I doubt he would have seen anything besides explosions. Anyway, Dumbledore was called the Saviour of the Wizarding World from that day forward until…well, honestly, until Harry took over the title five years ago. The world was so grateful that they made him Supreme Mugwump and Chief Warlock before the year was out. He still gets offered Minister about once a decade, too, but he always turns them down. He says he prefers to just moderate.”

“Yes, that’s basically what he told us,” Emma said. “So he got all those titles for winning the war…not from…politicking.”

“Politicking? No, they practically made him take them. After all, what else are you going to give to the most powerful wizard in the world?”

“But…but…” Dan stammered as he grasped for the real thing that was bothering him. “That means the most politically powerful person in your world is _also_ the most physically powerful person as well?”

“Huh…I guess I never thought of it that way…I mean, that’s really a matter of opinion. Everyone thought that…Voldemort was his near-equal.” She was surprised how easy saying that name got after a few repetitions. “And there are others—Minister Grayson in Australia, Fan Tong in China, Old Coyote in America. Any of them could probably give him a run for his money.”

“And you don’t think he’s been doing too much in your world?” Emma said.

Andi laughed darkly. “You wouldn’t be the first to suggest that,” she said. “I’ve wondered it before myself, especially as he isn’t getting any younger. The point is that like it or not, that’s what you get for winning a war in our world.”

 _And they all think Harry won a war_ , they thought. At least Andi seemed like the type who was willing to ask the hard questions. Emma flipped to her to-do list, which was growing quite ambitious by now, and, more in frustration than anything else, added the line, _Introduce democracy to the Wizarding World._

* * *

_October 1986_

“What are you going to be for Halloween, Harry?” Hermione asked.

Harry didn’t look at her. He lowered he head and mumbled, “I don’t know.”

Hermione knew that look by now. “What’s the matter?”

Harry sat still, but his hands began shaking almost imperceptibly.

“Hermione, come here,” her mother ordered, leading her to the far corner of the room. “I think Harry might not want to celebrate Halloween this year,” she whispered.

“What? Why not?”

“Hermione, remember, his birth parents were killed on Halloween,” Emma whispered. “I don’t think he’s going to want to celebrate on that day.”

“But what about trick-or-treating?” Hermione said more loudly.

“Shh.” She should have known this would be a sore spot. Halloween had always been the one day a year when Hermione was allowed excessive amounts of candy. “If Harry doesn’t want to go, he doesn’t have to. Remember, he doesn’t like sweets as much as you do either. If you really want to go, you can go with just your father.”

“Oh…okay…” Hermione said, looking disappointed. She didn’t speak to Harry much after that that evening, but her mother noticed her looking at him guiltily a couple times. Emma soon decided that even if Hermione weren’t going, something needed to be done so that Harry wouldn’t just be moping around the house while all the other kids were out having fun. So after a couple minutes’ whispered debate with Dan, she took action.

Sitting down beside Harry on the sofa, she held him close and scratched him behind the ears. He leaned into her.

“Harry,” she said, haltingly, grasping for words. “We know you don’t really remember your birth parents…And your father and I love having you as our son, but it’s also too bad that you never got to know them…and Halloween is coming up, and it’ll be five years…well, so we thought that it might be nice if we could visit your birth parents’ graves on Halloween after school.”

Harry looked up at her, his eyes shining, but indecisive, questioning.

“A lot of people say it helps them cope, you know? I know it always helps me when I visit my parents’…It’s sort of like being able to meet them and talk to them…even though they can’t talk to you, it’s nice to think that they can hear you somewhere, and you’ll be able to meet them again someday…Would you like to go see them?”

Harry thought for a moment and tried to say, “Yes, Mum,” but it came out as more of a squeak. He nodded and rubbed his head against her shoulder.

“Okay, I’ll write Cousin Andi and ask if she can take us,” she whispered.

A letter sent through the muggle post service always took a few days, but from what they could tell, the reply by owl was always quite prompt. Shortly after they expected Cousin Andi would have received their letter, they got an answer.

 

_Dear Dan and Emma,_

_I agree with you that it would be good for Harry to visit his birth parents_ _’ graves if he wants to. I can fully sympathise with your concerns about his being cut off from the magical world. However, I’m afraid that Halloween itself is out of the question. The memorialisers and dare-I-say tourists will be out in full force that day, not to mention the “Harry Potter Day” celebrations. I cannot in good conscience subject Harry to that, not to mention the fact that he would probably be recognised._

_I think the following Sunday, the 2nd, would be a far better time to visit. Few people will be about that day, and you can be assured some degree of privacy. I would be happy to meet you that afternoon to take you to Godric_ _’s Hollow, and would pay for the trip. Just be sure to cover up Harry’s scar—not many people will be able to identify him without seeing it. I’ll introduce you to Ted when I come. All the best this Halloween._

_Yours Sincerely,_

_Andromeda Tonks_

Emma felt sick when she saw the words “Harry Potter Day.” Putting it that way, they were effectively celebrating a little boy losing his parents. She had to agree with Andi; it would do no good to take him on the day.

Thankfully, Harry seemed to understand when she told him they would have to wait until Sunday—only mentioning the part about there being too many people and him being recognised. Unfortunately, this left Hermione free to ask him if he want to go trick-or-treating because if he did, she said, he needed to get a costume soon. She said it nicely, like she was trying to be helpful and make up for his not being able to go to Godric’s Hollow on the 31st, but the seven-year-old still had a ways to go in the subject of tact.

Emma was about to scold her daughter when, to her surprise, Harry quietly and half-heartedly said, “Sure, I can go.”

“You don’t have to, Harry,” told him. “I know candy isn’t really your thing anyway, and we’ll all understand if you want to stay in and just have a nice quiet evening.”

Harry looked up to face her. “Thanks, Mum…but Paul and Tiffany wanted all of us to go together.

“Oh…” Emma smiled. “Well, that’s very nice that you want to go with your friends. I suppose we’ll have to find you a costume, then.”

It took a last-minute trip to the costume shop the day before Halloween to find the right look for Harry. His wizard costume looked like a midnight blue version of a monk’s robe and hood with gold trim, and he carried the silver wand from his toy motorbike. Hermione wore a plain black witch’s robe with a pointy hat, much like Professor McGonagall’s. Her costume didn’t come with a wand, but it had a miniature broomstick like the one used by the Wicked Witch of the West.

On Halloween night, a ninja dressed all in black and a generic fairy-tale princess met them at their house, accompanied by Paul’s father and Tiffany’s mother.

“Hi, guys, nice costumes,” Paul said.

“Thanks, you too,” Harry replied, idly waving his wand.

“That’s a nice dress, Tiffany,” Hermione commented.

“Thank you. You make a great witch.”

“Come on, let’s go,” Paul cut the conversation short, looking greedy for candy. Being the oldest of the four, he knew most of the tricks to score a good haul, and he was well aware that the Grangers’ was the richest of their three neighbourhoods.

“Alright, just a minute, let me get a picture first,” Dan said. After lining up the four of them to pose for the camera, he was soon dragged off by his children to join the group.

“Have fun kids, and be careful,” Emma called after them.

“Yes, Mummy,” Hermione called back.

They took off while Emma stayed behind to pass out candy. Harry soon found that while the candy was just a minor perk, he really enjoyed trick-or-treating. Under the cover of the costume he could let his real wizard self out a little bit. He even started casting made-up spells with his toy wand, although at one point, to his surprise, sparks shot out of the end of it, and he had to tone it down. Thankfully, everyone just thought it was a fancy part of the costume.

It was his father who reminded him that he should probably not use the word _abracadabra_ , especially on Halloween. _Modern Magical History_ had told them just what spell that particular word sounded like.


	10. Godric's Hollow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I am making no money from this, nor do I have the right to. That right belongs to JK Rowling and her chosen associates.
> 
> No I haven’t forgotten about Sirius. Unfortunately, he’ll have to wait until there is an appropriate opportunity to expose Wormtail. But Harry will be meeting some more of his family in next couple of chapters.

_November 1986_

Andromeda and Edward Tonks arrived on Sunday afternoon to escort the Grangers to Godric’s Hollow. They noted that Harry was wearing a black baseball cap low on his forehead, covering up his scar and his characteristic hair. Even at his one-time residence, few people, if anyone, would be able to recognise the boy like that. Andi nodded in approval as she introduced her husband.

Cousin Ted was blond and heavyset, but, Harry noted, not nearly as large as Vernon Dursley, and his voice was far more pleasant. He shook the family’s hands quickly, saying, “Pleased to meet you all.” He was the first muggle-born any of them had met besides Hermione, and like his wife, he seemed to know his way around a muggle neighbourhood. Dan and Emma were quietly impressed by how he seemed to greet Harry as just one of the family. Knowing how muggle-borns had fared in the war, they wouldn’t have been surprised if he had shown a particular reverence for the Boy-Who-Lived.

“The car’s in the garage,” Dan started to say as the Tonkses started to walk back toward the curb.

“If you don’t mind, it’ll be quicker to take some magical transport,” Andi said. Taking the bus wouldn’t be that much more risky than the visit itself, and she felt she might as well save them from what Ted guessed would be about six hours of driving for the round trip.

“What kind of magical transport?” Dan said, thinking of the floo and the broomsticks.

“You’re wearing Anti-Anti-Muggle Charms, right?” Dan and Emma nodded. “You, uh, you haven’t seen any really big magic yet, so you might want to brace yourselves—we’ll be taking the Knight Bus.” She stepped to the curb and drew her wand from her sleeve. “All you have to do is hold out your wand, and…”

BANG!

Behind Andi and Ted, zipping out of nowhere and screeching to a halt was an enormous triple-decker, bright purple bus. A moment later, a conductor in a purple uniform leapt out and spoke to her:

“Welcome to the Knight Bus, emergency transport for the stranded witch or wizard. Just stick out your wand hand, step on board and we can take you anywhere you want to go. My name is Ernie Prang, and I will be your conductor—say, what’s their problem?” he said, pointing at the family, who were now all four of them standing open-mouthed in shock.

“Mr. Prang, these are our friends, the Granger Family,” Andi told him. The kids just found out they’re muggle-borns last year, and I’m showing them around.

“Ah, starting early now, are we? So where to, then, ma’am?” Ernie Prang said.

She handed over some gold. “Will this do for a round trip to Godric’s Hollow?”

“That it will, ma’am. All aboard, then,” he called.

The Grangers looked considerably less at ease when they boarded the bus and saw that instead of normal seats, there were free-standing wooden chairs in only an approximate semblance of order. A handful of dishevelled-looking witches and wizards in anachronistic clothes were seated near the back.

“You might want to hold on tight,” Ted warned them as they found six seats together.

“What was your first clue?” Emma muttered.

“All right, take it away, Lou,” the conductor said.

“Mm hmm,” the driver grunted, and with another tremendous BANG, they were off—and in a completely different city.

The Granger Family was thrown back in their seats with great force. The chairs seemed to slide freely, though somehow they didn’t topple over. They might have questioned how they were suddenly in London had they not all been too busy screaming. After all, the Knight Bus not only drove at _at least_ a hundred miles an hour, but also didn’t even stay on the road.

It took five minutes and a couple more teleportation jumps for them to realise that any obstacles were simply leaping out of the bus’s path. It took ten minutes to console Harry and Hermione that they weren’t about to crash horribly. The bus made stops all over the country to drop people off and pick them up, but Andi was right about it being fast, as they pulled into Godric’s Hollow in less than an hour, though it left them questioning if it was worth it.

“Why doesn’t this bloody thing have seat belts?” Dan demanded when they finally got off. Emma didn’t even make the effort to correct his language.

“Oh, it’s not so bad,” the conductor said. “No one’s got hurt in about a month. Thanks for riding.”

With a BANG, the Knight Bus zoomed off.

“Sorry,” Andi said under Dan’s and Emma’s disapproving looks. “It’s kind of hard to describe to someone who hasn’t ridden it before.”

“Don’t you have any…better methods of travel?” Emma said.

“Not fast ones. Floo, portkey, apparition—they’re all the same. All powerful magic has a price, and in this case, the price is that it’s really uncomfortable.”

Dan still thought it would be more comfortable with seat belts, but he kept the thought to himself. Hermione, holding his hand and now more or less recovered from the ordeal, looked thoughtful at that tidbit about the laws of magic as they crossed the street.

Godric’s Hollow was a quiet country village, its muggle residents blissfully unaware of the relatively large amount of magic in their midst. A row of pleasant little cottages led down to a village square surrounded by a few shops, a post office, a pub, and a small church. Here, at the end of the row, was one cottage that didn’t look so pleasant.

“This is where most people come on Halloween,” Andi explained softly. “This was where they lived—where you lived, Harry.”

Emma held him close to her as they approached. To muggles, it looked like a fenced-off vacant lot, but to those who were privy to the magical world, there was a cottage like the others, except that a large chunk of the top floor had been blown out by a horrific explosion, and rubble was scattered over the grass. The hedge clearly hadn’t been trimmed in the past five years, and dark green ivy was creeping up the sides of the house. As they stood wondering at the neglected ruin, Andi strode closer and laid a hand on the rusting gate. A sign grew out of the ground in front of it. A description was written in gold letters, still clearly legible though surrounded by graffiti:

_On this spot, on this night of 31 October 1981, Lily and James Potter lost their lives. Their son, Harry, remains the only wizard ever to have survived the Killing Curse. This house, invisible to Muggles, has been left in its ruined state as a monument to the Potters and as a reminder of the violence that tore apart their family._

Emma read the words aloud for her children. Her voice broke as she choked back tears. It had been just shy of a year since Harry had first shown up on their porch, but the reality of what had happened to his birth family hit home when they saw the destroyed cottage. Forget the Killing Curse; how had he survived the explosion?

Harry stepped forward and laid his hands on the sign and stroked the grain of the wood. It took Emma a moment to realise that he was reading off the messages written around the epitaph: five years of magical graffiti, words written over words written over words that rose to the surface in glowing ink and sank down below other messages. Harry started reading aloud, skipping over the unfamiliar names and focusing on the longer messages.

_Thank you, thank you, Harry Potter._

_Goodbye, Lily and James. I wish we could have been closer—Victoria McKinnon._

_Bless you, Harry Potter, wherever you are—Michael Dunbar._

_I failed you, Lily. I am truly sorry. I swear you will be avenged._

_We will forever be in the Potters_ _’ debt. Thank you for all you did for us—Dedalus Diggle._

_Rest well, James and Lily. I only wish I could do more for Harry—Remus._

Harry’s voice gave out, and he sank to the ground in tears with a whiny sort of cry that his family noticed sounded a lot like meowing.

Emma knelt down and held him in her arms. She was in tears, too, but partly for a different reason: after all the talk she had heard of the Boy-Who-Lived—the spurious things that were _written_ about him in _Modern Magical History_ , she found herself moved beyond words that finally _someone_ had got it right. Someone in this messed-up magical world understood and properly memorialised Lily and James Potter instead of fawning over an infant whose fate was merely tragic circumstance.

Presently, a scruffy-looking long-haired cat walked up to the crying pair and meowed. Harry glanced up, blinking back tears to get a good look at it. He could tell it was middle-aged from the way it carried itself and from its yellowing teeth, and its brown coat that was going coarse and even a little grey around the nose. It eyed him warily, as if it had once had a bad experience with him, but it slowly came within arm’s reach. He reached out a hand and half-heartedly scratched it behind the ears. The cat lay down and started purring softly.

For a few minutes, no one really spoke or knew what to say, but finally, Emma and Harry climbed to their feet and looked back. Ted and Andi were arm in arm. Dan was holding Hermione in front of him, but the little girl finally broke free when she saw the tears on her brother’s face and ran over to hug him.

“Oh, Harry!” She cried. Emma laid a reassuring hand of support on each of their shoulders.

Harry sniffled a couple times and gave her a muttered, “Thanks.”

“Come on, if you’re ready…” Andi said. “The graveyard is this way.” She led them down the lane. Only Harry noticed the cat following behind them.

When they reached the square, they noticed an obelisk standing in the centre, a war memorial like the ones set up in so many other villages. But as they approached, Ted said, “They wanted to keep the cottage the way it was…on that night, but some of us in London wanted there to be a proper memorial, so we chipped in and paid for a statue here. Sure enough, when they drew near, the obelisk changed and morphed into a statue of James, Lily, and baby Harry Potter, life-sized and happily smiling out at the square. The Grangers gasped when they saw it. It was clearly based on the picture from Harry’s first birthday that he kept at his bedside.

“It’s very nice,” Emma whispered.

“It is,” Dan repeated.

“Thank you, Cousin Ted,” Harry said, giving the older man a tentative hug.

“I wonder, though…” Dan muttered. Reaching into his coat, he pulled off his Anti-Anti-Muggle Charm. “It’s an actual war memorial, too,” he said in surprise. “It has names and everything.”

“Really?” Hermione said, grabbing the necklace from his hand.

He reached out to feel the granite. “You can even touch it.” To everyone else, it looked like he was resting his hand on James Potter’s knee. Emma started to take off her necklace to see the illusion for herself.

“Hey, it turned back into an obelisk,” Hermione exclaimed. All eyes turned to her. She was wearing her father’s Anti-Anti-Muggle Charm.

“You can see the obelisk?” Andi said.

“Uh huh, when I put on the necklace. I think it works backwards on magic people.”

“It does? May I, Emma?” Andi took Emma’s necklace and put it on. “How interesting. I didn’t know they did that. Hermione, how did you know the charms would do that?”

“I didn’t…but it does make sense, doesn’t it?”

“Yes, I suppose so.”

After everyone had had a turn with the necklaces, and more importantly, after Harry had taken his time to see the statue of the Potters, they continued over to the graveyard beside the church. Filing two by two through the kissing gate, they began to look over the headstones.

“Look!” Hermione exclaimed when they reached a few rows back. She pointed to a large, dark, lichen-spotted headstone that was inscribed at the top with _Kendra Dumbledore_ and the dates 1851 and 1899. Below the initial carving, in smaller letters, were the words, _and Her Daughter Ariana_ with the dates 1885 and 1899. At the bottom, was a quotation: _Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also._

“Albus Dumbledore’s mother and sister, I think.” Ted said. “He’s never talked much about his family.”

Not without reason, they thought, seeing that his sister had apparently died at fourteen.

Dan quietly read off the names as they kept looking: “Williams…Knighton…P—? No, that says Peverell.”

“Peverell?” Andi said. “That must be a really old one.”

They looked closer at the weathered, cracked headstone. It was a tall one, with an odd, triangular symbol at the top that Harry thought looked a little like a cat’s eye. Near the bottom, barely legible, was carved the name _Ignotus Peverell_ along with birth and death dates: 12 July 1214 and 18 May 1291.

“1291? This is nearly seven hundred years old. That’s got to be older than the church.”

“This might have been their family graveyard a long time ago. They were one of the Most Ancient Houses. It’s rumoured that the Potters were elected as their successors, but the records are incomplete…The new ones are probably in the back.”

Harry kept looking with the others with growing apprehension. The deeper they went, the anticipation was growing too much for him, and his feet started dragging of their own accord, but Emma took his hand and led him on.

The headstone in the back row was white marble and obviously fairly new. It was also—they didn’t know how they had failed to notice sooner—surrounded by flowers and tokens of remembrance. Apparently, visitors came back here more than it appeared at first glance. The inscription on the stone looked fresh-cut and was easy to read as Harry brushed trembling fingers across the letters:

 

JAMES POTTER

BORN 27 MARCH 1960

DIED 31 OCTOBER 1981

LILY POTTER

BORN 30 JANUARY 1960

DIED 31 OCTOBER 1981

_The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death._

 

“The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death…” Harry repeated with a look of confusion.

“That’s from the Bible, dear,” Emma said gently. We can look it up later.

He continued tracing the letters uncertainly. “What…what do I say?” he asked.

“Whatever you want.”

He sat down among the flowers and began speaking with a wavering voice, “H-h-hi…Mum…hi, Dad…” he thought he would feel a little uncomfortable saying that to the cold stone, but to his surprise, the words seemed to come naturally. “I…don’t really remember you, but I’m Ha-Harry…your son. I…couldn’t come here before because Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia were really mean, and they didn’t tell me what happened to you, and they didn’t like magic. But…but I ran away from them,” he said quickly, wiping some tears from his eyes. “I found a…a new Mum and Dad, and they’re really nice to me. I’ve got a sister now too. She’s a witch, too…She’s a m-muggle-born witch, like you, Mum. H-Hermione…?” he called.

Hermione stepped forward and sat down beside him. “Um…Hello, Mr. and Mrs. Potter,” she said uncertainly. “I’m Hermione. Uh…Harry’s a really great brother. I’m glad he got to come live with us—you know, away from his aunt and uncle. We’re going to go to Hogwarts together when we’re old enough, but Harry’s really good at magic already…”

Harry looked at Emma questioningly.

She got the message. “Could you…give us some time alone?” she said to Ted and Andi. The two of them retreated to the gate of the graveyard.

“It’s alright, Harry, you can tell them,” Emma said.

Harry smiled a little as he turned back to the white marble. “Guess what…” he whispered. “I can turn into a cat. Professor McGonagall can do it too, but she doesn’t know how I can because I’m still a kid. Did you know anyone else who could do that?” There was an awkward pause as Harry left a gap for a response without thinking. “I, um…we met Cousin Andi and Cousin Ted…I like them, but they can’t visit much…” He looked back at Emma again.

Emma knelt down to join the conversation and help him out. “Hello, James. Hello, Lily,” she said, wrapping her arms around the children. “We all really love your son. I…I don’t know how you saved him from Voldemort, but thank you. He’s such a joy to have in our lives.”

“And don’t worry,” Dan said, standing behind her, “we’ll keep him safe for you and keep him out of trouble. I’m sure he’ll be a great wizard when he grows up.”

With his family’s support, Harry sat there a while longer and told his birth parents about his friends and school and what he’d been doing for the past year. He guessed they probably didn’t want to hear about his time at the Dursley’s, but he found he had quite a bit to say about the time since then.

As he was talking, the scruffy tabby that had been following him walked up beside him and sat as if keeping watch. He exchanged blinks with it, and it let him pet it, but no one paid it much more mind.

When he felt he was done talking, despite all the tears, Harry was glad he had come. Like his mum had said, he did feel like he had got to meet his birth parents, in a way, but more than that, by coming here, his family seemed just a little bit more complete. As they all walked solemnly out of the graveyard, Ted and Andi began to lead them away, but they were interrupted.

“Well, hello, there,” a raspy, creaking voice called. They turned to see a tiny, stooped old woman hobbling down the lane. “Don’t often see visitors paying their respects _after_ All Hallows’ Eve.”

Ted’s and Andi’s eyes went wide as they realised who this was and what she might know having lived in Godric’s Hollow for so long. Best act casual, though. “Professor Bagshot, what a surprise,” Andi said, trying to hide her nervousness. The Tonkses had met Bathilda Bagshot a couple of times before at Ministry functions, but she doubted the old woman would remember them.

As Dan and Emma whispered to each other, the old woman stepped closer to the Tonkses and met their eyes, though she barely came up to Andi’s chin. “Andromeda…” she said when she’d had a good look. “Andromeda Tonks. No doubt about it—you have the Black eyes…”

So she did remember. Just her luck. “It’s good to see you, Professor,” she said. “These are our friends, the Granger Family. Dan, Emma, I’d like to introduce to to Bathilda Bagshot, author of _A History of Magic_.”

“Really?” Hermione yelled, running up to her. “You wrote it? We’ve read all of it, haven’t we, Daddy?”

“Uh, yeah, that’s right,” Dan said. Truthfully, Hermione had mostly listened to her parents reading excerpts, but close enough. “We’re honoured to meet you, Professor.” They didn’t know much about the author other than the fact that they were surprised she was still alive. She looked quite old in her picture in _A History of Magic_ from 1947, as old as Dumbledore now, who was supposedly a hundred and five. Dan and Emma could believe that she was a hundred and forty or so. She had sunken eyes with cataracts forming, skin spotted and streaked, nearly translucent, and badly thinning hair, and from the way she was acting, they weren’t sure how sharp her mind still was.

“You’re very kind,” she said, hobbling closer to them. They caught a strange odour of old age and dust from her. It was too late that they noticed she seemed to be gravitating towards Harry. Harry took a step back.

“Come here, child, let me get a good look at you,” she said.

“Professor, we really need to—” Andi started. Someone getting a good look at Harry was exactly what they didn’t want.

Too late. “Bless my soul, it can’t be Harry Potter, can it?” the ancient woman said, her voice trailing off.

“Professor, I told you this is the Granger Family,” Andi said gently.

“But he must be. I’d know poor Lily’s eyes anywhere.” Bathilda grew misty eyed. “She was a good woman…”

“You knew her?” Harry said, then promptly clapped his hand over his mouth.

“Oh there’s no need for that, young man. I knew your parents well. They had me over for tea most days while they were here. They were both very good people.”

Harry was amazed—as amazed as he had been when Mr. Dumbledore first told him about his parents—that they had also known the woman who had written a book he’d read—or tried to read, anyway.

“Professor,” Andi took charge before he could say anymore, “we were really hoping to keep this visit private. We’d appreciate it if you didn’t tell anyone that Harry was here.”

“Oh, of course,” she said. “I can understand why the boy would want to keep a low profile. I do hope you might be able to come for tea sometime, though.”

“Next time we’re in town, we’ll be sure to make the time,” Andi said, after a glance at Dan and Emma. “Have a nice day.”

“You too, Madam Tonks. Harry, it was very good to see you again.”

Bathilda Bagshot hobbled on home, and Andi summoned the Knight Bus again. As they boarded, the brown tabby climbed aboard with them.

“I think that cat likes you, Harry,” Emma said.

“Alright, let’s go, Lou,” the conductor called, and the bus took off with a bang. The cat was thrown to the back and probably scared out of one of its remaining lives. With no other recourse, it ran to Harry and leapt into his lap, staying there until they made it back to Crawley. Sure enough, it followed Harry off the bus again and eventually tried to follow him into the house.

“Can we keep it?” Harry asked.

“Harry…we already have one cat,” Emma half-joked.

“But I wanna talk to it.”

Emma looked to Dan and shrugged.

“Alright, you can bring it inside to talk to it,” Dan said.

“Thanks, Dad.” Harry pushed past them into the house an changed form.

The cat meowed in surprise and retreated to the far corner of the living room.

Harry almost laughed. Humans and cats, it seemed, reacted much the same way. He blinked at it and dipped his head submissively, and it began to approach cautiously, meowing to itself. He could smell so much more about it in cat form. The cat was female, spayed, and probably about eight years old. She was an ordinary house cat, he confirmed, not an animagus, as he had thought she might be. She had been living mostly outside for a long time, but had the smell of a number of humans on her, both magical and muggle. She must be good at scoring food from them.

A domestic cat’s command of spoken language was even cruder than that of an animagus, but Harry could make out her meowing as roughly, _Strange. Human changed to cat._

 _I can change with magic. Humans don_ _’t know how,_ he tried to explain, but the cat only seemed to partially understand.

 _Know your smell. Human-Servants_ _’ Kitten,_ she said when she got close enough.

 _You knew my old parents?_ he meowed back excitedly. Harry couldn’t remember having a cat any more than he could remember his birth parents themselves, but he knew a lot of wizards did have them.

 _Human-Servants good,_ she said _. Gone long time. Bad Man broke house._

Harry lowered his head. _Bad Wizard hunted old parents. I found new parents. New parents are nice. They can be your human-servants. I will ask them._

The cat seemed to perk up. _Like human-servants. Give food._

_I like having old family here. Do you have family?_

_Dam and Litter-Mates gone long time. Lived with Human-Servants._

Harry supposed that’s how it was for house cats when he thought about it. _What is your name?_ he asked.

The cat meowed a name at him, but it wasn’t any identifiable words. She might have still recognised her human name, but, of course, she had no way to tell it to him.

Harry repeated her cat name with partial success. _I will introduce you to Teacher-Cat when she visits,_ he said, but the cat didn’t seem to understand him. Without any ideas for further conversation, he changed back to human. “Mum, Dad, Hermione, guess what!”

On Hermione’s recommendation, the Potter Family’s cat was rechristened Rowena and moved into the Granger House, and while she never quite became great friends with Harry, they got along well enough. Harry claimed she was much happier being an indoor cat.


	11. Wandless Magic

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: We read and write by the leave of JK Rowling.
> 
> The storm described in this chapter is the Great Storm of 1987, which occurred on the night of 15-16 October, killing 22 people and causing 2 billion pounds’ worth of damage in Great Britain alone.

_December 1986_

Everyone was safely in bed, or at least was supposed to be. Yet a black and white kitten was lurking in the shadows of the living room, his gaze fixed on the Christmas tree. Harry had waited until all the lights had turned out before sneaking out of bed, easily descending the stairs without making noise on his four paws. He paused by Rowena, but she just squinted at him in annoyance for waking her and went back to sleep.

Harry took up watch from a hidden corner of the living room from which he had a good line of sight to the tree and the fireplace. His feline night vision gave him a clear view of the room that would have been practically invisible for a human. It was the perfect spot to see just what happened when Father Christmas’s presents arrived.

He was sleepy, but he didn’t have as long to wait as he feared. It wasn’t even midnight when he heard someone stir, navigating carefully through the darkened house. They stepped over Rowena, but didn’t even notice Harry’s reflective green eyes at the far side of the room. Sure enough, several new presents soon appeared under the tree.

He knew it.

* * *

_February 1987_

“You know, Harry’s never really taken a proper holiday,” Dan said. “We should go somewhere this summer.”

“That sounds lovely,” Emma replied. “Where were you thinking of?”

“Well, we haven’t been to Spain since before Hermione was born.”

“Fancy some summer sun on the beach?”

“I certainly wouldn’t complain. And it would do Hermione some good to get out of the library for a while.”

“Sounds good to me. We can run it by the kids when it’s closer to—”

“Ahhh!”

“Hermione!” Dan and Emma yelled. They ran toward the scream to find their daughter standing on the sofa and pointing at the floor by the television.

“There’s a mouse over there!”

It was then that they saw the little rodent poking around the carpet in the corner. But before they could react, Harry ran down the stairs.

“A mouse? I’ll get it!”

“Harry, wait,” Emma said, but Harry had already changed to cat form and ran after it. The mouse took off along the wall. Harry ran around the telly and tried to corner it by the side table, but it dodged. Soon, the kitten was weaving in and out around the legs of the furniture pursuing it, narrowly avoiding knocking over two lamps and a vase.

“Harry, stop!” Dan said.

The mouse took off toward the foyer with the kitten single-mindedly following it. He meowed for Rowena to help out, but the middle-aged cat only got out of the way and let the younger generation handle it.

A moment later, the family heard a crash and a yowl and ran into the kitchen, only to find a pleased-looking kitten dropping an unmoving mouse on the kitchen floor.

“Eww! Harry!” Hermione yelled in protest.

Harry changed back to human and said. “I told you I’d get it.”

Emma looked green at the sight, like her daughter. Dan took it upon himself to dispose of the creature, thankful that Harry at least didn’t try to eat it. “Harry, we can see you’re good at this,” he told his son, “but in the future, I think we should use traps to get rid of mice…And go brush your teeth right away, please. God knows where this thing’s been.”

* * *

_September 1987_

_The Quibbler_

_Harry Potter Spotted in Barcelona?_

_By Xenophilius Lovegood_

_A family of British wizards vacationing in Spain last month claims to have seen a boy matching the description of the Boy-Who-Lived visiting the Catedral de Barcelona on 17 August. The family, which asked not to be identified, reports seeing an English-speaking boy of about six years sporting the unkempt black hair attributed to James Potter and Lily Potter_ _’s green eyes at the popular muggle and magical tourist site, accompanied by an unknown family._

_Harry Potter has not been seen in public since the night of the defeat of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named nearly six years ago, and both Minister for Magic Millicent Bagnold and Chief Warlock Albus Dumbledore have consistently refused to answer any questions about the boy_ _’s whereabouts, saying only that he is being kept safe in an undisclosed location._

_While most experts have dismissed the report as mere coincidence, refusing to believe that Potter would appear in a foreign country at all, let alone publicly and with an unknown family, this reporter feels that a very real threat has been overlooked: that Harry Potter has been deliberately moved out of the country by agents of the Rotfang Conspiracy in order to prevent him from growing up to oppose their efforts to bring down the Ministry from within with Dark Magic and gum disease._

_We call on the Ministry to conduct an investigation at once to purge undesirable elements from the Auror Office and to confirm the safety of young Mr. Potter. Indeed, the continued integrity of Minister Bagnold_ _’s government demands immediate action…_

_STORY CONTINUES ON PAGE 3._

_FOR MORE ON THE ROTFANG CONSPIRACY, SEE PAGE 5._

* * *

_October 1987_

Rowena was the first up that night, having never gone to sleep with the heavy rain and thunder going on. As soon as the storm picked up, she took refuge under a chair. Harry, having been tucked in hours before the trouble started, was next, but as the roar of the wind and the cracking and snapping of branches rose in the hour past midnight, the entire family soon followed. At first, Harry and Hermione were told not to worry and to go back to sleep. But Harry’s feline sixth sense, even subdued in human form, told him that this was no ordinary storm.

A loud crash sounded as a limb fell against the house. The children screamed in their rooms. At that point, Dan and Emma decided that sending them back to bed again would be a futile gesture, so they took a blanket so that the four of them could curl up on the sofa together. They listened to the radio as the weather reports grew more and more dire, and what was first forecast as a typical autumn thunderstorm became what would later be called a 200-year storm.

The family huddled on the sofa as the wind grew louder. With each gust, there was a clatter of twigs striking the roof. At times, they could hear shingles blowing away. The storm went on for a long time, but even in the middle of the night, no one could more than half-sleep. By two o’clock, they would later learn, the winds had reached hurricane force. The line of trees behind the house was groaning and cracking under the strain. Harry started whining and hid his head beneath the blanket.

The cracking of branches seemed to cascade. There was a flash of light and a sound of an explosion across the street, and the lights went out. Amid the shouts, they flared back on, flashing three times even brighter than normal before going out again.

With a crash, a limb came through the picture window, showering broken glass on the floor. The curtains flew open, and rain and wind lashed through the window frame.

“We have to get out of here,” Dan shouted. “I’ll cover up the window.”

“Into the basement,” Emma said, trying to pull up the screaming kids and drag them out of the room. Harry and Hermione felt a strange tingling in their nerves, reaching out into the chaos of the room. It was a tingling that Harry felt slightly whenever he changed, but almost never reaching outward.

“Watch your feet,” Dan said, stepping over the glass. “There’s a lot of—what the—”

All four Grangers watched in amazement as the shards of glass rose into the air. The children felt the strange energy flowing all around the room, and, suddenly, the shards flew back to the window and arranged themselves into the frame. The cracks melted into a spiderweb pattern and then vanished entirely. The rain and wind beat against the restored window, but it held, leaving only a large branch and a fair amount of water in the living room.

“Wow…” Dan said.

“Did you two do that?” Emma asked the children.

“I…I think so,” Harry said.

“Uh huh,” Hermione nodded.

There was a horrible, wrenching crunch from behind the house as a tree gave way entirely. The children screamed again, and the next thing anyone knew, the sofa flipped itself over and covered both of them. Their parents were caught by their shins and knocked to the floor. When they rose to their feet, all efforts to set the sofa upright again failed, as it seemed to be stuck to the carpet.

“Are you all right?” Emma said.

A face nearly hidden by a bushy head of hair peered out from under the arm of the sofa. “I’m okay,” she said.

A whiskered face poked out from the other end and meowed once before pulling back in. Unable to right the sofa again or coax the children out, Dan and Emma had no choice but to sit on the floor with them until the storm ended.

The house was rattled from the tree’s fall, but they would later learn it was mostly undamaged. The tree apparently fell against another tree, largely missing the roof. Over the next hour, the entire line of trees behind the house blew over one by one like a row of dominoes, miraculously missing all of the houses on the street.

It was past four by the time the wind finally died down. Only when the sounds outside were reduced to the calm patter of the rain did Harry and Hermione come out from under the sofa. When they finally did, their father quickly found that it wasn’t stuck to the floor at all.

* * *

A grey tabby cat walked down the ruined street that afternoon. Limbs were still down everywhere. The street was barely clear enough to be navigable. Minerva was thankful that she had enough time to get away from school for a short while on a Friday. Albus didn’t seem to think the storm was of much concern, but a quick owl to the Ministry confirmed that Accidental Magic Reversal Squad was being run ragged all over England by magical children who were frightened by the storm. Since the Grangers weren’t in the official directory, she took it upon herself to check in on them.

Circling the house in cat form, Minerva could smell the residual magic from last night’s events, focused on the living room. Changing in an inconspicuous spot, she went up to the door.

“Hello, Professor,” Emma said when she answered the door. A letter that morning had warned them to expect company. “Thank you for checking up on us.”

“I’m happy to help, Mrs. Granger. I’m afraid I only have a few minutes free, but after hearing about the storm, I wanted to see for myself that the children were alright and offer any assistance if you needed it.”

“That’s very thoughtful of you. Please come in. Kids, Professor McGonagall is here,” she called up the stairs. The children’s school had understandably been cancelled for the day.

Two tired, but otherwise healthy children descended the stairs, uncharacteristically wearing their shoes in the house. Minerva had noticed the wet floor.

“Hello, Professor,” the children said.

“Hello, Harry. Hello, Hermione. I am glad to see you are doing well. I have heard reports of how bad the storm was, and after seeing your street, I can see they were not exaggerated.”

“No, they weren’t,” Emma confirmed. “They’re already saying it’s the worst in living memory.”

“Yes, well, I understand it was most frightening. My contacts at the Ministry say that nearly every magical child in England experienced some form of accidental magic last night. Would I be right in thinking the same thing happened here?”

The children blushed and looked down at their feet. “Yes, Professor,” Hermione mumbled.

“There is nothing to be ashamed of,” Minerva reassured them. “These things do happen in times of great stress. I daresay I know some adults who would lose control of their magic when faced with this level of devastation. We too often forget that magic pales in comparison with the power of nature. Normally, the Accidental Magic Reversal Squad would repair anything that was damaged by a magical discharge, but given your circumstances, this is not possible, so I came to take care of it myself. If you have anything that needs mending…” She trailed off, noticing that quite a few things needed mending, though not necessarily from magic.

“Actually, Professor, the children didn’t break anything with magic,” Emma said. She explained what she and her husband had witnessed the night before, and Minerva was relieved that all of their expressions of accidental magic were perfectly normal. The last thing she needed was something else impossible happening around Harry Potter.

“Although, if you wouldn’t mind, we would be grateful if you could help us with some of the storm damage,” Emma concluded.

“Unfortunately, I cannot do anything about the outside of the house, since it would arouse suspicion. However, believe I could help you with your living room.” Sure enough, a few drying charms and cleaning charms later, and the living room was as good as new.

“Thank you, Professor. You just saved us a lot of trouble.” Minerva nodded.

“Professor?” a small voice said.

“Yes, Hermione?”

“Is there a way to control magic without a wand?”

Minerva was surprised at the question, though she supposed she shouldn’t be given the girl’s background. It was yet another question that a pureblood wouldn’t even think to ask about. “If you mean accidental magic, then yes,” she explained. “As you grow older, you will find it much easier to control your magic when you are feeling strong emotions…However, if you mean controlling it to _use_ it, that is a rare talent, and not my field of expertise. Professor Dumbledore would have firsthand experience with it, but few others would.” She paused as she saw Harry looking at her eagerly, and she remembered what Albus had said about the normal rules not applying to the boy. “Although I suppose if anyone could manage it, it would be the boy who mastered the animagus transformation at age five and his highly gifted sister,” she said with an inward smirk. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I must be returning to class. Good afternoon.” She left the premises and apparated back to the gates of Hogwarts, wondering if she had just created more headaches for herself down the road.

Meanwhile, Hermione had dragged Harry back up the stairs enthusiastically. He braced himself as he recognised the look his sister got whenever she was on a mission.

“Harry, how did that accidental magic feel to you?” she asked when they had retreated to the privacy of her room.

“I don’t know,” her brother said. “Kinda like…tingling…like, in my arms.”

“Like, sort of an electric feeling?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s how I felt, too. I bet if we can figure out how to control that feeling, we’ll be able to do magic without a wand.”

Harry thought about it. “Maybe…” he said, “but Professor McGonagall says it’s hard.”

“So? She doesn’t know how you can turn into a cat, either.”

“But neither do I.”

“Well, it’s still magic,” Hermione insisted. “Do you feel the same when you change?”

He hadn’t really thought of it that way before. “Um, a little, I guess, but in my chest more, and it’s…kind of…hidden, like I have to go and find it. And then I have to concentrate on my cat form…”

“I think we should try to learn it,” she insisted, matter-of-factly. “Maybe it’s easier than Professor McGonagall thinks. And it could be useful later.”

Harry knew better than to try to argue with his sister on that.

* * *

_November 1987_

Harry scrambled up to the top of the jungle gym. Climbing was second nature to him by now, and his dad had even suggested he take up rock climbing, although no one else the family was quite up to that. Hermione, Paul, and Tiffany followed him up. They had all become decent at climbing the metal bars in an effort to keep up with him, though of course none of them could.

On some days, the foursome climbed up and down all over the jungle gym, or migrated over to the swings, or went out and joined the football game in the field. Other days, like today, they just sat on top of the jungle gym and talked.

Paul was regaling them with stories of his cousin’s wedding, which, by all accounts, had been barely-controlled chaos. First, the sound system failed entirely, then the groom had very nearly thrown up at the altar, and the organist had mixed up all the songs. Then, of course, there was the fact that the wedding cake had collapsed due to what his irate aunt had called “a bloody design flaw.”

But when he told them how his crazy uncle had got drunk and started belting out show tunes to the entire reception, they lost it. Harry and Hermione clung tight, but Tiffany started laughing so hard that she lost her balance and fell off her bar.

Paul’s shout of “Tiffany!” was immediately followed by Hermione’s shout of “Harry!” as her brother lunged for their friend at an angle that seemed sure to knock him off as well. Paul and Hermione reached out to them, and the playground monitor ran to help, but none of them could get close enough past the bars. But everyone in sight stopped and gasped as they saw what happened next.

Harry was hanging upside-down, his knees wrapped around the bar, with Tiffany swinging safely by her hands at the end of his arms in what any Quidditch fan would have identified as a perfectly-executed (and very difficult) Serafini Snatch.

“Whoa!” Tiffany said, looking up to see Harry’s face. “Th-th-thanks, Harry,” she stuttered. She wrapped an arm and a leg around the bars and started to slowly climb down, having had enough heights for one day. “How did you do that?” she asked when she was back on _terra firma_.

“Yeah, that’s what I’d like to know,” the playground monitor said as she checked them over.

“I don’t know. I just kinda did it.” Harry said sheepishly.

“Those are some good reflexes, kid. You should go out for tennis or something.”

Harry nodded, thinking from what he knew of the wizarding world that he would probably be more interested in the “or something.”

* * *

_April 1988_

The Granger Family was out shopping for some new summer clothes when they happened upon a strange-looking individual. They immediately noticed two unusual traits about the little man. First, he was wearing all purple and bore more than a passing resemblance to the Mad Hatter. And second, he was conspicuously _bowing_ to Harry. Either one of those things by itself would have been enough to scream “wizard.”

“Um, excuse me; do we know you, sir?” Dan said, approaching the man.

“Oh, no, you wouldn’t, of course. Diggle’s the name, Dedalus Diggle,” the excited man said. He shook Dan’s hand before zeroing in on Harry. “Delighted, Mr. Potter, just can’t tell you…” He shook the seven-year-old’s hand so vigorously that Harry considered utilising a karate move to get out of it before his mother pulled him away.

“P-pleased to meet you, sir,” Harry muttered, a little shaken.

“Yes, we appreciate the sentiment, Mr. Diggle, but we _are_ trying to keep a low profile here,” Emma said.

“Oh, of course, of course. No one will hear anything out of me; my lips are sealed.”

“Thank you,” she said curtly. They decided to move on to the next shop, away from the well-meaning, but over-eager fan. _Thank God they_ _’re not all like that_ , they thought.

* * *

_August 1988_

Hermione stared at the torch she had set up on her bedside table, trying to feel the energy flowing around her. After comparing notes with Harry, they had determined that the most common effect of accidental magic they had experienced was flickering lights, and they also knew that strong magic interfered with electricity, so it was a natural idea. She decided to start small, and her first experiment in controlling wandless magic was to try to turn a torch off and on again.

She had started working on it off and on during the school year—and pestering Harry to do the same—but she had concentrated on it in earnest during the summer. Often, she didn’t even get the torch out, instead just focusing on sensing her own magic. It was hard work, since her magic was normally buried so deep that she couldn’t feel anything, except when she was too upset to pay attention to it. Harry, even with his control of his animagus ability, wasn’t doing much better. But with careful meditation, recalling how she had felt during the Great Storm, she slowly brought it to the surface.

They had received an unexpected help from the wards around the house. Since they began paying attention to them, both children soon found that they could feel a slight tingle of magic every time they passed through them. That went a long way toward being able to identify the feeling of their own magic.

Though it was still difficult, Hermione now thought that she could sense the subtle feeling of magic flowing through her body, extending from her fingertips and encircling the torch in thin filaments. She grasped at the feeling and tried to channel more power into it. She felt the magic waver, nearly losing her grip, but it strengthened, and after carefully increasing the pressure, without moving the switch, the light bulb in the torch winked out.

“YES!”

Unfortunately, with her flow of magic forced open, Hermione’s excitement had a stronger effect than she expected. The torch bulb exploded with a small pop, and the overhead lights flickered across the entire upstairs.

“Hermione?” her mother knocked on the door. “What’s going on?”

“Hermione?” Harry said from behind her. “I could feel that from my room.”

“Feel what?” Emma said suspiciously.

 _Well, this could get awkward_ , they thought.

* * *

_July 1989_

“Hey, Mum, check it out!” Harry held up his hands, one above the other, with a pound coin floating and spinning in between them. After nearly a year’s worth of work, he and Hermione successfully taught themselves to release their magic without destroying anything—mostly—and they soon turned their attention to levitation, the next obvious thing that Hermione suggested. They started with small things like scraps of paper, paper clips, and feathers, before moving up to slightly larger pens and coins. The results still weren’t entirely reliable, and it usually took them some time to get it started, but they were making great progress, with Hermione consistently coming out a little ahead, to no one’s surprise but her own.

Their parents had tolerated these “studies,” despite the extra headaches they sometimes caused, since they knew it would be useful later, but this was not the best time.

“Harry, quit fooling around. The Tonkses will be here soon,” Emma ordered.

“Sorry, Mum.” He snatched the coin out of the air and pocketed it before going back to cleaning. He reflected that it was unfortunate that they hadn’t figured out a way to clean the living room with magic. Hermione’s efforts to speed up scrubbing the kitchen with magic similarly failed. Thankfully, conventional methods got the job done soon enough.

Outside, Ted and Andromeda Tonks approached the Granger House with their confused, pink-haired, teenage daughter in tow. Dora Tonks wasn’t sure what to expect when her mother said that, as a reward for passing her O.W.L.s and “mostly” staying out of trouble this past year (though that had more to do with being too busy studying for O.W.L.s), “I think you’re ready to see what’s been going at the secret meetings I’ve been going to for the past few years.”

Dora was a little annoyed; since she had been looking towards an Auror career for years, she knew how to keep a secret. But she was mainly torn between curiosity at what kind of secret meetings her parents could be going to and the worry that, even if secret, her mother’s political meetings were likely to be profoundly boring.

But all that was replaced with utter confusion when her parents apparated her to a muggle neighbourhood south of London. This didn’t look like politics; few politicians would be willing to stoop to this, even among the liberals. Moreover, they seemed to be approaching a house with a mailbox marked “The Grangers,” which wasn’t any wizarding family she’d ever heard of. Then, she crossed the property line and promptly froze in shock.

“Whoa, none of my friends have their houses protected this much,” she said as she felt out the wards. “Not even Jason Denbright.” The Denbrights were one of the richest families that had resisted He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named’s call during the war, and they had shelled out for what she had thought were pretty good wards, but not like this.

She could swear she saw her mother _smirk_ at her. What was this place? The whole setup screamed “deep cover,” probably someone in hiding since they were so far from any other wizards. Amazingly, the obvious answer, given her mother’s position, eluded her, mainly because she didn’t pay enough attention to her mother’s political work, and to the extent she did, she had no sense of her consulting with anyone.

Her mother knocked on the door, and a man about her parents’ age answered it, wearing muggle clothes.

“Hello, Andi, Ted,” the man said warmly.

 _Andi? No one_ called Dora’s mother Andi. Not even her father called her mother Andi, and Aunt Narcissa had got out of the habit, too. The only living person who called her that was supposed to be rotting in Azkaban.

“Good afternoon, Dan,” Andi said, apparently unperturbed. “This is our daughter, Nymphadora.”

Dan had looked at her strangely when she felt her hair bleach white in surprise. She willed it back to her normal bubblegum pink as she stammered out, “J-j-just Dora, please. Um, wotcher, Mr. Granger.” She stepped forward and shook his hand.

“It’s good to finally meet you, Dora,” he replied. “Please come in.” He led them into the living room, where the rest of the family was waiting. “Dora, I’d like to meet my wife, Emma, our daughter, Hermione, and you can probably recognise our adopted son—”

She spotted the scar right away. “Bloody hell, it’s Harry Potter!” she yelled, very nearly falling over.

Harry’s eyes went wide as he stared back at her, and the rest of his family flinched. “Bloody hell, your hair turned green!” he yelled back.

“Language!” all of the other females in the room said at once.

Dora’s hair had not only changed to a bright, electric green, but was also sticking out in all directions as if it were electrically charged. With difficulty, she forced it back to normal. Then she laughed. She had just managed to surprise Harry Potter as much as he had surprised her. This meeting was looking up already.

“Dora is a metamorphmagus,” her mother explained. “She was born with a rare ability to change her physical appearance at will. It can get a little out of control when she gets excited, though.”

She rolled her eyes at her mother and matched her mousy brown hair. Then she did something a little harder and copied both Harry’s messy black hair and his facial features. She winked at him before shifting back.

Harry laughed at that. “Can you look like a cat?” he said.

“Harry!” Emma scolded.

But Dora was more than willing to take the challenge for him—and it was better than the boys at school usually asked to see. “Cat, huh, that’s a tough one,” she said. She had to do it step by step to get it right, first growing brown hair all over her face, then changing her nose and mouth to a cat’s muzzle. Then the hard part: she pushed her ears up into large triangles on top of her head and morphed her eyes to vertical pupils. She held the pose for a moment before releasing it, her face snapping back like a rubber band. She took a deep breath of relief and shook her head to clear it.

“Wow, cool…” Harry said. “I grew my hair back once, but I think it was accidental magic.”

“Probably,” Andi said. “Dora’s hair changed colour to whatever she was looking at for eight months after she was born.”

Dora was quick to change the subject. “So, Harry…” she said, leaning towards the boy and working up the nerve to ask it. “How did you end up here in the muggle world?”

Harry told her the story, with just a little help from his…parents, she thought with a start. That was unexpected. He explained how he had been placed with a muggle aunt and uncle who were so mean that he ran away from home, eventually winding up with the Grangers, where his adoptive sister was a muggle-born witch. Dora was sure there was more to it than that, but the pieces still fell into place. She had heard the rumours that Harry had been placed with a muggle family, so he would have been raised with relatively little knowledge of the magical world—though surely more than nothing: he was Harry Potter after all. As his proxy, her mother was probably his main contact. And of course she would let a famous little boy call her Cousin Andi.

“Well, it looks like you’ve done pretty well for yourself,” she told him. “Blimey, do you know how big this news is gonna be when you go to Hogwarts?”

“Unfortunately,” Emma groaned.

“Oh…sorry.”

“That’s why Dumbledore wanted him in the muggle world in the first place,” Andi said. “It’s not about hiding anymore so much as it’s about giving him some space.”

“Dumbledore set up the wards, didn’t he?”

Dan and Emma looked surprised that she made the connection so quickly, but the children just nodded, knowing that she would have felt them upon entering.

“So what’s new on the other side?” Dan changed the subject.

 _The other side?_ Dora thought. That was a new one.

“Well, the most important news is that Minister Bagnold announced her retirement, so there’s going to be an election next spring,” her mother said. “Unless Dumbledore surprises everyone and actually runs this time, it looks like the leading candidates are Barty Crouch, the head of Magical Law Enforcement, and Cornelius Fudge, the head of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes…It’s hard to say who will win right now, and I’m not sure who I’m voting for either. Crouch took a tough line on the Death Eaters in the war, but he also sent his own son to die in Azkaban on, honestly, kind of shaky evidence. He’s become known as rash and belligerent. But Fudge, by all accounts, is ineffective, wishy-washy, and a politician’s politician. He’s been courting the moderates in the Wizengamot so far, but he looks like the type who will be easy for Lucius Malfoy to buy out.”

“Hmm, it sounds like either candidate would be a step down,” Dan observed.

“Sadly, yes. Bagnold’s done a pretty good job. I’ve tried to ask Amelia Bones—she’s the Head Auror, Augusta Longbottom, and Elphias Doge to run, but none of them will touch it with a ten foot pole.”

“Well, you always say, if you want something done right, do it yourself,” Dora said, rolling her eyes. Her mother had been complaining about the election all month.

Andi glared at her. “And then Harry would need a new proxy. We need Enid Croaker free to cover the Black Seat, so the next in line would be Arthur Weasley, and, frankly, as good as he is behind the scenes, they’d eat him alive in the Chamber.” Dora noted that she conveniently left out that she wouldn’t touch the Minister position with a ten foot pole either. She heard Dan mutter something about “small town politics” under his breath.

“Anyway, I have a couple of initiatives I’m trying to push up to before the election, but you can read about those later.” Andi said, handing over a sheaf of papers. “So, any plans for the rest of the summer?”

“Yes, we’re going to Italy next month,” Emma said.

“Oh wonderful,” Andi replied. “I haven’t been since I was a girl. My favourite was magical Naples, but the muggle sites are beautiful, too.”

Dora soon struggled to keep up as her parents asked the Grangers about their plans and then about the children’s time in school and their various exploits. Not having gone to muggle primary school, she wasn’t familiar with some of the jargon, but she quickly got that Hermione was the quiet, bookish one while Harry was the more outgoing one. ( _Good, he_ _’s gonna need it_ , she thought.) But both of them by all accounts were very bright and…surprisingly normal. She hadn’t quite expected Harry Potter to be like the books said, but it was hard not to picture a great wizard waiting in seclusion until the time he was needed, like Merlin.

Dora was interrupted from her thoughts when Hermione started asking her what Hogwarts was like.

“Well, it _is_ the most magical place in all of Western Europe,” she said. “All towers and moving staircases. And floating candles and ghosts and…talking portraits.”

“Talking portraits? Wow.”

This was too easy with muggle-borns. “I bet you’re excited to start learning magic when you’re old enough, aren’t you?”

Hermione blushed uncomfortably at that. Harry grinned nervously and then said, “Can we show them what we’ve been working on, Mum? Please?”

Their parents looked at each other, and Emma said, “Oh, I suppose so. It’s not really a secret.”

Harry smiled broadly. He took a coin from his pocket and placed it in his palm. He waved his other hand over it and started whispering to himself, “Come on, come on, come on…” Dora watched, wondering if he was actually going to do what he looked like he was trying. But with his continued effort, the coin rose into the air.

“Bloody hell!” Dora yelled.

“Sweet Merlin!” her mother said.

Her father fell back on his muggle upbringing with, “Good Lord!”

Dan and Emma started laughing at the Tonkses, which surprised them almost as much. Hermione stared intently at the coin and then, extending two fingers, slowly levitated it towards herself. Their visitors looked back and forth between the two children, open-mouthed.

“Really?” Dan said. “You’re the ones who live in the magical world, and you find _that_ impressive?”

“ _Wandlessly_?” Andi said. “At not quite age nine and ten? Yes. Most people never even try wandless magic, and almost no one gets good at it.”

“But wouldn’t it be useful?” Hermione said. “What if you lose your wand?”

“Losing your wand is a really serious…or at least the way most people think of it, it is. It basically means you’ve lost.”

“Well, if you could levitate your wand back to you, you wouldn’t have to lose.”

Dora took an immediate interest in that. She was fast catching on to the muggle-raised children’s ability to point out the obvious. She bet Mad-Eye Moody could do wandless magic just fine. “But how can you even do that? Haven’t you got a warning for underage magic?”

Andi shook her head. “No, it’s wandless magic. It’ll show up as accidental magic at the Ministry.”

“Oh, _now_ you tell me, Mum. So how did you learn it? Did you get a book or something?”

“Oh, no, they taught themselves,” Emma said.

“Really?”

“Mm hmm,” Hermione nodded. “It took us almost two years to learn this, but it’s getting easier. You have to feel for the magic and…sort of shape it to do what you want.”

“We practised by feeling our wards,” Harry added.

“Well, I know what I’m doing for my N.E.W.T. Charms project, now,” Dora said. “I can’t believe you kids are learning magic before you even start school.”

“Well, we do need to train,” Hermione said firmly.

“Train?”

“We want them to be as well trained in self-defence as possible,” Dan explained soberly. “Just in case Voldemort ever comes back.”

Dora let out a loud yelp and fell out of her chair.

“Dumbledore’s influence,” her mother said before she could cause a bigger scene.

“Blimey, Mum, warn me next time.” The Grangers suppressed a snicker at her expense as she climbed back into her seat.

“Anyway, that’s why they’ve been taking karate since we adopted Harry,” Dan continued.

“What’s karate?”

By the time the demonstration was over, Dora decided that at the rate these children were going, she might be taking lessons from _them_ one day. Both of them were brown belts, now, whatever that meant. Harry was a few months ahead of Hermione, but the speed and force with which they both moved were dazzling. Then Harry goaded their father into letting them use boards. When both children snapped three-quarter inch thick planks of wood clean in two with blows that Dora was sure could equally break her arms, she fell off her chair again. No doubt: if she went up against either of them without a wand, she would assuredly get her arse kicked. The wizarding world was in for a big surprise two years from now.


	12. Telling the Grandparents

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns all, etc., etc.
> 
> And now, we wrap up Hermione’s and Harry’s pre-Hogwarts letters adventures. I know I didn’t expect to be 60,000 words in already, but I’ve been very encouraged by all the positive reviews. Next chapter, Harry reenters the magical world.
> 
> The opening quote is taken from the classic Doctor Who serial Survival, the final episode of which aired on 6 December 1989. The Search out Science episode in question also exists and is just as absurd as Hermione describes. Yes, I am an über-nerd who has seen all 840 episodes of Doctor Who. What of it?

_December 1989_

_“There are worlds out there where the sky is burning, and the sea’s asleep, and the rivers dream. People made of smoke, and cities made of song. Somewhere there’s danger, somewhere there’s injustice, and somewhere else the tea’s getting cold. Come on, Ace—we’ve got work to do!”_

“Ace totally would have been cooler with super cat powers,” Harry said.

“Well, of course _you_ _’d_ say that,” Hermione shot back. “I think it’s better that she resisted violence and let the Doctor solve it.”

“Girls,” he muttered under his breath.

“ _Well_ ,” she put her hands on her hips, “isn’t the show about brains over brawn, anyway?”

“I certainly think so,” Emma defended her.

Harry mumbled something and turned away with a very feline look of ignoring them.

“You’re not going to start going on about the thrill of the hunt, are you?” Hermione said anxiously.

“Maybe…” Harry said, staring back at her. He focused and tried to morph just his eyes and his teeth to cat form, like the Master, but from Hermione’s reaction, he didn’t think it was working.

His sister rolled her eyes at him. “I’m just glad you’re too small to hunt anything bigger than a squirrel.”

Harry grinned evilly at her and hissed slightly, “How fast can you run, sister?”

“Ahhh!” Hermione ran up the stairs with Harry chasing her.

“Kids, behave!” their mother yelled up after them.

The lights flickered from hastily cast wandless magic. It still wasn’t very powerful in direct effects, but the spillover could still be strong when the children got overexcited. A moment later a mewling black and white kitten ran flat out back down the stairs.

Emma took the first couple of steps up, then stopped and shook her head. “No, I don’t want to know.”

* * *

_April 1990_

That Saturday was easily the hardest and longest Harry had ever pushed himself—much harder than his weeks wandering as a kitten long ago, harder than his most rigorous efforts to train himself in magic. He had been specifically preparing for this day for a solid month. It was a full day of demonstrations, assessments, strength tests, and sparring matches. Paul and Tiffany had shown up to cheer him on, and Grandma and Grandpa Granger had come down from Manchester to see him, even though Grandma mostly hid her eyes whenever he was sparring on the floor. Cousins Ted and Andi were there, too, and even old Ms. Wilkins stopped by near the end of the day to see how here one-time case was doing, though no one was sure who had told her the test was that day. Sensei John commented that Harry seemed to be a very popular boy. His family silently recollected that he didn’t know the half of it.

The day nearly ended in disaster early on when he landed a badly mis-aimed strike on his sparring partner, and pain shot up his arm. He knew enough to know that a botched strike like that could have broken his wrist, but after a few minutes of recovery, it seemed to be intact. An ankle rolling out from under him nearly floored him again, but he knew how to fall to avoid putting too much pressure on it, and he bounced right back up.

Most of Harry’s demonstrations did go well, but it was still incredibly hard work. By the end of the day, his arms were aching from the strikes, and he was sure his legs were going to give out, but he somehow managed to keep his feet.

His final sparring match of the day came up, against one of the other equally-tired candidates who had been running the gauntlet all day—a boy who was four years his senior. Making the grade didn’t depend on his winning the match, but it did depend on showing appropriate competence, even after everything else.

They put on their safety gear and bowed to each other, and then the match began, with fists and feet flying. Andi and Ted had been impressed with the children’s demonstrations before, but seeing Harry hold his own like that against an equally-trained boy twice his size, moving like a trained Auror, even after a longer day than any battle of the war had been, brought the thought of the Boy-Who-Lived legend back to their minds. The difference was that he had done this himself by hard work. If he couldn’t escape the legend, they thought, then at least he could make it his own.

An hour later, the candidates were lined up for the promotion ceremony. Most of them had passed, but not all. Sensei John stood up and spoke to the crowd: “Today, we recognise six students who have completed the mental, physical, and technical requirements for promotion to the rank of first dan, commonly known as a first-degree black belt. This rank is both a sign of skill and achievement and a call to continued study and self-improvement. Please step forward when I call your name to receive your belt and certificate…Sarah Armstrong…Charles Connor…Kathy McCoy…Adam Nicholson…Harry Potter…”

Harry’s family and friends cheered as he stepped forward, and his father took pictures as he removed his brown belt, and Sensei John tied a black belt around his waist. “And I will add that Harry is the youngest first dan recipient we’ve had in three years. Congratulations, Harry.” Harry bowed to Sensei John and hugged him in thanks. He returned to the adulation of his family, humming to himself, as “Tyler Spencer” was the last to receive a belt that day.

“Congratulations, Harry,” Hermione said, hugging him. “I just hope I can get mine before we go to…boarding school,” she said with a glance around.

“Of course you will, Mione,” Harry told her. “You’ve still got over a year.”

“But I’m not even at first kyu yet,” she said.

“But you test next week, and you’ll definitely pass. No one else has the moves memorised as well as you do.”

She smiled weakly. She’d been training for her test as much as Harry had been training for his. “Thanks Harry.”

“I think this calls for a celebration,” Dan said. “What do you say we go out for barbecue?”

“Really? Yes!” Harry yelled, leaping in triumph. With his strong taste for red meat, he always enjoyed the one American-style barbecue restaurant for miles around. The rest of his family had never seen the appeal, but this was a day worth celebrating in his preferred way.

* * *

_June 1990_

The Granger Family strolled past the rides during their annual trip to Blackpool Pleasure Beach, heading back for another spin on the Wild Mouse (a ride Harry insisted was very aptly named). Dan and Harry were bigger fans of the roller coasters than Emma and Hermione, but they all had a lot of fun whenever they went, and Harry especially couldn’t get enough of them. After everything he had heard about Quidditch, he was eager to learn to fly, and this was the closest he was going to get until he could get his hands on an actual broom.

They paid no attention to the gaggle of boys and a couple of adults passing them in the other direction until one of the boys yelled out, “Come on, we have to get to the Avalanche!”

“Hold your horses, Dudley,” a stern voice sounded from a woman who was clearly unhappy with having to chaperon.

Harry froze stiff. He knew those voices. And today was the 23rd, wasn’t it? “Dudley!” he squeaked out.

The boy who was shouting stopped and turned to look at him. Harry also snapped around to face the boy, who immediately spotted the scar on his forehead.

“Harry?” Dudley Dursley said in shock. Dudley wasn’t fat anymore; he was still a little chunky, but he looked to be in decent shape and was dressed up more than was really ideal for an amusement park.

“What? What was that?” A large, dominating woman with shoulder-length blond hair and a slight moustache stepped forward and looked down her nose at Harry: Majorie Dursley. She also recognised the scar and the awful messy hair, and a scowl crossed her face.

Harry hunched over, staring up at the woman, unblinking, bared his teeth, and bent slightly at the knees in preparation to flee. He had to fight his first instinct to change to cat form and run away—and his second instinct to throw out a wild karate kick at the pair.

“Harry, calm down,” Hermione ordered, taking him by the shoulder. His family knew that pose too well—the human version of a scared-angry cat pose. It had surfaced a few times when he had first started sparring in karate, and it had never ended well.

Unfortunately, his former aunt couldn’t keep her opinion to herself. “Harry Potter!” she said disdainfully. “I didn’t think I should ever see _you_ again. You’re the little brat who gave my brother so much trouble.”

“Aunt Marge…” Dudley said nervously, trying to warn her off Harry’s obvious anger. He didn’t really know about magic _per se_ , but Vernon had made it abundantly clear to his son that it was Harry’s “freakishness’ that had got him sent to prison.

“ _Excuse me_ , Madam,” Dan stepped in front of Harry, looking her straight in the eye. “I’ll thank you not to talk to our son that way.”

Marge Dursley was not accustomed to people standing up to her. “So you’re the adoptive parents then?” she said, taking the same tone with Dan as she had with Harry. “I do hope you’re keeping that boy in line. I can’t endorse my brother’s methods, but the boy was nothing but trouble from the start.”

Dan bristled. “The only _trouble_ that boy ever had was how _your_ brother treated him, Ms. Dursley. He’s always been the best son we could have hoped for with us.”

Marge wasn’t backing down. “ _If_ that’s so, then you’re lucky,” she said. “Trouble runs in his family. Comes from the mother, of course. I see it all the time in dogs. I’m sure you know about that worthless drunk—died in a car crash, and then her sister—”

“Don’t talk about my mother like that!” Harry screamed. The air began to swirl loudly around them.

“Harry, stop!” Hermione yelled, jumping in front of him.

“Aunt Marge, watch out!” Dudley whimpered. “He’s gonna use his freakishness!”

Emma wrapped her son in a hug from behind. “Harry, calm down, it’s okay.”

Hermione felt Harry’s magic subside and then whirled around to face his relatives. “Both of you leave Harry alone!” she said.

Aunt Marge was unimpressed. “And just who do you think you are, little girl?”

“I’m Harry’s sister, Hermione…and I’m a more powerful freak than he is!”

Dudley went very pale and whispered something that sounded like “Mimblewimble.”

Dan intervened again before Marge could say anything further. “And if you won’t listen to her, you’ll listen to me. Leave. My. Family. Alone.”

She finally broke under his stare. “Come along Dudley,” she said, grabbing her nephew by the wrist and dragging him back to the group. “There’s no need for us to associate with _these_ people. Loons the lot of them.”

She kept muttering under her breath, but Dudley looked back to them and nervously called out, “Harry, I’m…sorry…about before…” He turned away and kept walking. He might not like his cousin, but he couldn’t help but feel a little solidarity with him since Aunt Marge was always so fond of insulting both of their mothers in the same breath.

* * *

_December 1990_

“This is the last easy chance we’ll have to tell them,” Dan said whilst pouring himself a cup of tea. He was sure he was going to need it.

“I know,” Emma replied.

“I wish it didn’t have to be at Christmas, too, but it’s getting harder for them to come around at any other time.”

“Dan, we have this conversation every year. I know it’ll have to be Christmas if we tell them at all. It’s just…it’s going to be hard to spring on them. You know how hard it was for us.”

“How could I forget? But I can’t stand keeping secrets from my parents anymore. They deserve to know their grandchildren are magical.”

“You’re not going to tell them everything, are you?” Emma said. “About Voldemort and all that?”

“No, I don’t think they need to know all the details. But it’s bad enough the kids won’t be able to use wands outside of school—according to Andi. Mum and Dad should at least be able to know where they’re going to school and why.”

“And are we going to have the kids demonstrate their wandless magic for them?”

“Well, that was the idea…Look they haven’t destroyed anything in months, and they’re good enough at it now to do it convincingly.”

“Isn’t that about what you said last year, Dan?”

“Maybe, but…but you can’t deny they’ve got better, Emma. I think they’re ready.”

Emma sighed. “I’m sure _they_ are, but I’m worried about how your parents will react. You know they’re more traditional than we are about that kind of thing. And with Harry’s history…”

“I know, dear, but I really think if we explain it, Mum and Dad will understand.”

Emma sat down and took a sip of tea. “Well, you’re right; it is the last Christmas before they go to school. I guess we can warn the kids, and if they’re okay with it, we’ll tell them.”

Dan kissed her on the cheek. “Thank you, dear. The only other question is do we tell them before or after Christmas.”

She laid her forehead on her hands. “In other words, do we risk ruining Christmas or pull a bait-and-switch on them?”

“Or you could say, do we get it out of the way early or wait until the holiday stress is over?”

“Not helping, Dan.”

“Well, the kids are old enough to make their own decisions, now. Come on, let’s go talk to them.”

The headed out to the living room, where the kids were watching the tail end of whatever the television show _du jour_ was, which didn’t seem to have impressed them.

“I still can’t believe they haven’t made any more _Doctor Who_ ,” Hermione complained.

“Well, there was that _Search Out Science_ episode,” Harry said.

“Which was _completely_ ridiculous. Honestly, why wouldn’t the _robot_ be able to figure out the puzzles? And Ace doesn’t make sense on a quiz show either. I just hope they get the show started again before we go to Hogwarts.”

“Don’t worry, we can always tape it,” Dan interrupted. “Hermione, Harry…we need to talk.”

* * *

The children decided, even after their mother’s warning, to tell their grandparents before Christmas on the evening they arrived. After dinner, they all sat around the living room, with a few candles lit for the season, and Dan turned off the telly for a serious discussion.

“Mum, Dad, listen.” he said, struggling to meet their eyes. “There’s something we’ve been keeping from you…Something pretty major.”

“Dan, what’s wrong?” Grandma said.

“Nothing’s wrong, Mum. That’s not what I meant.” He took a deep breath. “The truth is that Hermione and Harry are…magical.”

Grandma and Grandpa both broke into an uncertain laugh. “Magical?” Grandma said. “What do you mean?”

“I mean Hermione is…” He still thought the term was unfortunate. “…a witch, and Harry is a wizard. They can do magic.”

“Magic?” Grandpa said. “You mean like a stage show…”

He stopped as Hermione waved her hand towards an empty teacup in small a swish-and-flick pattern, and it rose into the air. Harry followed suit with the saucer.

“Oh…my…goodness…”

The children floated the teacup and saucer around the room. Grandpa frantically ran his hands all around them to check for wires. Even after all this time, these were still about the largest things they could levitate, but they could at least do it on command, now, and Hermione reasoned that if it was enough to pick up a wand, that was the most important skill they could learn.

“How…but that’s impossible.”

“No, it’s magic,” Hermione said proudly.

Grandpa sat open-mouthed. He tapped a finger against the teacup, and it drifted away. “You did that just by…just by waving your hand?”

“We’ll be able to do more when we get wands,” Hermione said. “We’ll be old enough to buy wands next summer.”

“So this is…real magic?” Grandma said. “You can wave a wand and say _abraca_ —”

“No!” four voices shouted. The teacup and saucer fell. The saucer hit the corner of the coffee table and cracked in two.

“Sorry,” Harry muttered in embarrassment. He picked up the two halves of the saucer and set them together on the table. He ran a finger over the crack, and the pieces fused together again. Grandma’s and Grandpa’s eyebrows shot up.

“No, I’m sorry,” Dan explained. “I should explain. We uh…we told you that Harry’s birth parents were killed in a terrorist attack. But the truth is that it was a magical terrorist, and he used a dark spell that sounds a lot like that word…He’s gone, now…” _Basically._ “But it’s still not a word that you want to say around magical people.”

“Oh, my! That’s terrible. I’m so sorry, Harry,” Grandma said.

Harry blinked at her slowly and then nodded, snapping back into human etiquette.

“Luckily, as far as we know, _alakazam, bippity boppity boo, hocus pocus, open sesame, presto chango,_ and _sim sala bim_ are all complete nonsense,” Emma said, trying to lighten the mood. Cousin Andi had been quite amused by that list.

“We have been working on some other real spells, though,” Hermione said eagerly.

Grandma and Grandpa looked rather uncomfortable, but they nodded for the children to continue. Hermione pointed at one of the candles, and it blew out. Harry repeated her action with another candle, though noticeably slower, and between them, they extinguished all of the candles in the room. Then, Hermione extended her hand toward the first candle and, with a look of concentration, snapped her fingers. The candle lit up. They didn’t get all of them on the first try, but all of the candles in the room were soon burning again. Their grandparents sat silently.

Hermione then held up a sheet of paper from a notebook and, with a two-fingered swipe, cut it in half. Harry successfully repeated the feat.

“With a little more practice, that’ll be great for chopping vegetables,” their mother said.

“Okay, that’s enough,” Grandpa said sharply. “Look…Dan…I don’t fully understand what’s going on here, but this…this isn’t safe. I mean, dabbling in the occult, conjuring spirits…”

“Dad, it’s not that kind of magic.” Dan was silently relieved that his father’s reaction wasn’t any worse. “They’re not conjuring spirits or anything like that. They were born with it.”

“It’s genetic, Robert,” Emma admitted. “Harry’s birth parents were magical, and so were my grandparents on my mother’s side.”

“But this defies the laws of science. It’s not natural,” Grandpa insisted. Harry stiffened, but said nothing.

“Only as we know them,” Emma countered. “You know Dan and I are trained in the sciences. Believe me; we were as shocked as you are. But electricity, television, computers—they all would have been called magic two hundred years ago. We _still_ don’t understand how the brain works or how life began, but we probably will one day. Everything we’ve seen so far seems to suggest that there’s nothing _really_ supernatural about what wizards call “magic.” It’s just science that we don’t understand yet.”

“She right, Dad,” her husband said. “We’ve seen some magic ourselves, and we’ve read a lot about magical history, and it reads a lot more like inventions and machinery and computer programs than it does mediums and occult rituals. We honestly believe that it could be broken down scientifically if we had the opportunity.”

Grandpa leaned back and his seat and closed his eyes, trying to process what he had just seen.

“But—why didn’t you tell us?” Grandma exclaimed.

“We wanted to, Vera,” Emma explained. “We very nearly did last year. But wizards have laws to keep magic a secret from mu—from non-magic people.” She was amazed at how easily she fell into the jargon after this many years. “Technically, we’re not even supposed to tell you, but they’ll look the other way because you’re close family. You certainly can’t tell anyone else.”

“And more to the point,” Dan added, “we wanted to wait until Harry and Hermione were good enough at magic to demonstrate it to you,” Dan added. “It’s taken them all this time just to get this far, and believe me, they’ve barely got started.”

“Wait, laws?” Grandpa said.

“There’s a whole society with its own government, Dad. There’s about ten thousand of them in Britain.”

“That’s why we wanted to tell you,” Emma said. “Next fall, the kids will be going to a magical boarding school in Scotland to learn actual spells. It’s supposed to be the best in the world. You deserve to know where they’re going and what kind of education they’re getting.”

Grandpa sighed heavily. “A school? A government? Magical science…?” He was silent for a long time. “Well, you’re right about one thing…it _will_ be great for chopping vegetables.”

The tension broke. The other adults started laughing, and the children broke into broad smiles and leapt up to hug their grandfather. Dan and Emma all but collapsed into tears when they went to bad that night over how well Robert and Vera had taken the news.

The next few days were filled with wonder and laughter as the two of them we regaled with tales of the magical world. Dan and Emma told them the “official” story of how they had met Harry, and about his cousins and the few other magicals they had met. The children shared the more humorous episodes they had read in _A History of Magic_ and their favourites from _The Tales of Beedle the Bard_ that Cousin Andi had sent them last year. And of course, they answered the older Grangers’ many questions about Hogwarts and the magical world in general.

When Christmas morning came, two owls appeared outside the kitchen window. Ted and Andi had sent Hermione an autographed copy of _Hogwarts, A History_ by Bathilda Bagshot and had sent Harry an autographed copy of _Quidditch Through the Ages_ , which was somewhat more impressive considering they had never even heard of Kennilworthy Whisp. Dora had sent each of them a box of Honeydukes chocolate, which even Harry had to agree was some of the best he’d ever had. An attached note said that the candy was “safe for muggle consumption,” prompting some concern that there might be some out there that wasn’t. In the end, it was universally agreed in the Granger household that this was the best Christmas ever.

* * *

_January 1991_

“Today, we recognise three students who have completed the mental, physical, and technical requirements for promotion to the rank of first dan,” Sensei John repeated the standard speech. “This rank is both a sign of skill and achievement and a call to continued study and self-improvement. Please step forward when I call your name to receive your belt and certificate…Hermione Granger…”

Hermione ran forward eagerly, barely containing a squeal of glee that really ought to be beneath her maturity level, she thought. She also very nearly bowled over Sensei John when she hugged him after he gave her her black belt.

“Hermione is the second black belt in her family,” he said. “Her brother, Harry Potter, made first dan last year. Sadly, Hermione and Harry will be leaving us this fall when they go to boarding school in Scotland. They have been two of the most dedicated students I have ever had the pleasure to teach, and while we’ll be sorry to see them go, I’m sure they will be continuing their training with the same enthusiasm they’ve put into the last five years.”

“Yes, Sensei John,” Hermione said firmly. Her family smiled knowingly.

* * *

_July 1991_

“Why, Professor McGonagall, what a surprise.”

“Good morning, Mrs. Granger. I hope this is not a bad time,” said the witch who was uncharacteristically dressed in muggle clothes that, if a little old-fashioned, looked perfectly normal.

“Not at all. Please come in.” Emma led her to the kitchen, where the rest of the family was eating breakfast.

“Oh, good morning, Professor,” Dan said when he saw her.

“Good morning, Professor,” the children echoed.

“Cup of tea?” Emma asked.

“No thank you. I’m afraid I can’t stay for long. Harry, Hermione, I’m here because I have something very special for both of you.” She drew two envelopes from a sheaf of parchments. “These are your Hogwarts acceptance letters.”

Both children gasped in delight and rose from their seats. They waved their hands toward McGonagall, and the letters levitated out of her hand and across the table, where they snatched them out of the air. Her eyebrows rose in surprise. These two were becoming entirely too proficient for their own good.

“Children! That’s…not polite,” Emma scolded.

“Sorry,” they mumbled.

McGonagall lapsed back into her stern professor voice: “Mr. Potter, I am certain that you and your sister are going to be just as much a handful as your father and his friends were. Merlin help us all.” A nervous laugh circled the room as Harry and Hermione read their letters.

“We await your owl by no later than 31 July?” Harry asked in confusion.

“Oh, you won’t need to worry about that. I had to remind the Headmaster that you don’t actually _have_ an owl,” McGonagall said. She turned to the rest of the family. “There is an orientation to the magical world for muggle-born students on Saturday beginning from Kings Cross Station in London, which I encourage all of you to attend. You will be able to do your shopping at that time, and I will of course accompany you personally to fend off Harry’s admirers.”

Dan and Emma quickly looked over the letters. “Thank you, Professor. That’s very generous of you. We’ll be there, of course,” Dan said.

“Excellent. I apologise for cutting this short, but I have five more visits to make today, and all of those will require a great deal more explaining.”

The Grangers all nodded knowingly, thanking the fates that they had got their introduction to the magical world out of the way when Harry first showed up on their doorstep.

“We’ll see you Saturday, then,” Emma said.

“Indeed. Good day.” She showed herself out.

“I can’t believe we’re finally going to Hogwarts!” Hermione exclaimed.

“I can,” Harry teased her. “We’ve known about it for years.”

“But we never get to see it. And _Hogwarts, A History_ says it’s unplottable, so we couldn’t even find it without using magic. And we haven’t even been to magical London yet.”

“Well, we’ll all get our chance this weekend,” Emma said. “We should probably send a letter to Cousin Andi. I’m sure she’ll want to know about this…Dan?”

Her husband was still looking over the letters. “Is it a bad sign that this supply list actually makes sense to me?” he said.

Emma laughed. “Get used to it, Dan. We’re in this for the long haul, now.”

“Yes, dear.”


	13. Diagon Alley

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: JK Rowling is watching you.
> 
> Parts of this chapter have been quoted from Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone.
> 
> I have decided to use a high exchange rate of 51.25 pounds to the galleon here, as is common in fanfiction. I know the “official” rate is 5 pounds to the galleon, but most of the prices given in the books suggest a much higher rate.

The Grangers arrived at Kings Cross Station on early on Saturday morning, and in a rare occurrence, possibly the only time it would happen, they knew less than the other muggle-born families did. For starters, it seemed odd to be meeting at a train station when the shopping was in London anyway, which the others had presumably had explained to them.

They reached Platform Ten early. They weren’t sure how they would identify the other muggle-born witches and wizards before McGonagall got there. Harry and Hermione couldn’t sense magic unless someone cast a spell—or if Harry changed to cat form. But they needn’t have worried. When they reached Platform Ten, there was a well-dressed couple and a tall, dark-haired boy wandering around the area, looking confused.

“Oh my goodness,” Emma said, “is that Sir William Finch-Fletchley?”

Dan looked closely at the family. “Yes, I think it is. Who would have thought?”

“Who’s he?” Hermione asked.

“We’ve seen him at charity functions a couple of times,” her mother answered. “The Finch-Fletchleys are very active in London society. They do have that ‘new to magic’ look, though.”

Dan walked up to the man in a suit and said, “Excuse me, Sir William? Are you waiting for Professor McGonagall here?”

The Finch-Fletchleys turned to see the newcomers in surprise. “Yes, we are, Mister…”

“Granger. Daniel Granger. I think we may have met at some function or other.”

“Could be. Pleased to meet you, Mr. Granger. This is my wife, Phyllis, and our son Justin.”

“Likewise,” Dan said. “My wife, Emma, our daughter, Hermione, and our adopted son, Harry Potter. They both start at Hogwarts this year.”

The Finch-Fletchleys raised their eyebrows at how Dan had singled out Harry, but they were interrupted before they could get an explanation.

“Hogwarts?” a voice called from down the platform. “Is this the Hogwarts group?”

“Yes, come on over,” Emma said.

A family of four approached them, and a boy with dirty-blond hair was introduced to Harry and Hermione as Kevin Entwhistle. His sister, Annabel, appeared to be a couple years younger, but excitedly told anyone who would listen that she was a witch, too.

A few minutes later, a single mother came hurrying up to Platform Ten with three children in tow. They introduced themselves as the Boot family; Terry Boot, the oldest, looked excited, but the younger pair seemed to be annoyed that their mother had dragged them out of the house on a Saturday. They were definitely the most dressed-down family on the platform. Even after all these years, Harry could easily tell that all three children were in secondhand clothes, though they at least fit properly.

They had just got through the latest round of introductions when there was a loud crack at the corner of the platform, and Professor McGonagall appeared with a father and daughter, who promptly tumbled to the ground in a heap.

“My apologies,” McGonagall said as they staggered to their feet. “Portkey travel can be difficult for the uninitiated.” She scanned the small crowd that had gathered around her. “Good, it appears that we’re all here. I would like to introduce Malcolm and Sophie Roper. The Perks Family was not able to join us today. Thank you all for coming. This is the official orientation for all muggle-born—and muggle-raised—” she added, eyeing Harry, “students attending Hogwarts this fall. Now, the first order of business is to acquaint all of you with the way your children will be getting to the school.

“The Hogwarts Express leaves at precisely eleven o’clock on the 1st of September from Platform Nine and Three-Quarters. I have all of your tickets here.”

Several heads turned back and forth between the signs for Platform Nine and Platform Ten. McGonagall handed the tickets to the parents and led them a few paces to the barrier.

“The entrance to Platform Nine and Three Quarters is concealed by the barrier here. A witch or wizard, or anyone wearing an Anti-Anti-Muggle Charm, can simply walk through the wall onto the platform, like this.” She turned around and walked forward. There were gasps of astonishment when she reached the wall and disappeared.

A moment later, she came back out of the wall and faced the group. “I would like all of you to step through the barrier so that you know what to expect…Many people prefer to do it at a run until they get used to it.”

There were nervous glances around the group, as no one wanted to step forward to try it, but Harry and Hermione looked at each other and shrugged their shoulders. It wasn’t as if this was the weirdest thing they’d ever done. They took off and dashed through the barrier before anyone could speak. Their parents rolled their eyes and followed them at a brisk walk.

They emerged onto a spacious and brightly-lit train platform with what looked like a solid brick wall at their backs. There was no train at the platform, and the row of little shop stalls that lined the platform was empty, but they could tell it would be quite the sight when all the students were there, going off to school.

The Finch-Fletchleys nearly ran them over when they emerged from the wall behind them. “Adventuresome pair you’ve got there, Granger,” Sir William said.

“Oh, you have no idea,” Dan replied. “Although we’ve seen stranger things. We actually found out about magic a few years ago from, erm, a freak coincidence.”

“Really? Must be nice. The rest of us only found out on Wednesday, besides what we guessed. I really wish they would have told us sooner. When your son starts setting new clothes he doesn’t like on fire with his mind, magic is about the least frightening answer you can think of. Did you ever have anything like that?”

Dan raised an eyebrow and considered advising his children to keep a safe distance from Justin Finch-Fletchley, but he truthfully answered, “Trust me, we’ve seen stranger.”

“Ahem,” McGonagall said after all of them had come through. “Thank you. On the 1st of September, the signage for the Hogwarts Express should be self-explanatory. We will now proceed to Diagon Alley, which is the main magical shopping district in London. It is just a few blocks’ walk to the east. Follow me, please.”

“I wish I could do magic now,” Annabel Entwhistle complained as they left the station. “I have to wait two more years to get a wand.” The two younger Boot siblings nodded in agreement.

Harry and Hermione slipped back to walk beside them. “Actually,” Harry whispered, “we’ve been learning to do magic without wands.”

“Really!” Annabel whispered back. “How do you do that?”

“It helps if you have something magic to practice with,” Hermione explained. “You have to feel for how the magic feels.”

“It’s kinda tingly and electric,” Harry added.

“Or like when you do accidental magic. Once you can feel it, you can try to control it—but it takes a while. It took us over a year.”

“Oh…” Annabel said, disappointed. “Well I’m still gonna try it.” The others agreed. Harry grinned, wondering if they had just started a new trend.

McGonagall led them down the street until they came to a small pub that, even to magical sight, looked a tad on the seedy side. Hermione and Harry hesitated in front of it. They knew that from the moment they stepped into the pub, Harry was reentering the magical world, and nothing would ever be the same after that.

“This is the Leaky Cauldron,” Professor McGonagall said, “where the entrance to Diagon Alley is located. Mr. Potter, you and your family please stay close to me. I think you can guess how this will go.”

“What’s that about,” Justin called after them as the Grangers braced themselves.

“Oh, my sister’s very famous,” Harry said over his shoulder.

Hermione smacked him on the arm. “Prat. My brother’s actually a well-known war hero,” she corrected. That, of course, seemed just as made up to the others, but they would find out soon enough, like it or not. They stepped into the pub.

The place was just as dark and shabby inside as out. A group of old women were sitting down to lunch in one corner and a group of old men in another. A man in a familiar purple top hat was sitting at the bar, causing the Grangers to groan inwardly. Several people looked over and waved happily to the new crop of students coming in.

The bartender had to be over a hundred years old, if Dumbledore and Bathilda Bagshot were any indication. He was completely bald, hunched over the bar, and he adjusted a set of wooden teeth with a knobby hand that everyone prayed he washed regularly. “Good morning, Minerva,” the old man said. “Taking the muggle-born students out today?”

“Yes, Tom, just passing through,” McGonagall answered, trying to hurry Harry along.

Unfortunately, Tom had already fixed his eyes on the boy’s forehead. “Bless my soul, it can’t be…” The entire pub went dead silent. Tom leaned closer, squinting, then he jumped and stumbled out from behind the bar. “It is! Harry Potter, returned at last. Welcome back, sir. Welcome.” Tom was crying as he shook Harry’s hand.

They was a great clatter of chairs being knocked down and feet tripping over one another as Harry suddenly found himself mobbed by the entire patronage of the Leaky Cauldron. His family and McGonagall tried to keep a hold of him while all of the other muggle-born families were unceremoniously shoved back to the walls.

“So proud to be meeting you, Mr. Potter.”

“All of a flutter, sir—such an honour!”

“Doris Crockford, Mr. Potter. I can hardly believe you’re finally back.”

“Thank you so much, Mr. Potter.”

“You saved us all, sir.”

“I just know my family was next on You-Know-Who’s list.”

“Mr. Potter, you gave us all hope.”

The crowd was pressed in too close for Harry to do anything but shake any hands that got close enough. A few karate chops would be useless against this crush, and his father had him tightly by his other arm anyway. He barely noticed McGonagall shouting. He was in imminent danger of being ripped from his parents’ grasp and lifted on the crowd’s shoulders when she drew her wand.

BANG!

A bright flash and a shower of sparks streamed from the end of McGonagall’s wand, and the crowd backed off. “Mr. Potter is just now becoming reacquainted with the magical world,” she said with a voice that could cut steel, “and he could do without this excessive and misplaced adulation for a victory that was, in all likelihood, his late mother’s doing. He also has a great deal of shopping to do today, as, I might add, do the several muggle-born students whom I am escorting, and we really must be getting on our way.”

At that speech, the patrons sat down in shame, though they still stared and craned their necks to get a glimpse of the Boy-Who-Lived. The pub was filled with whispers about “Harry Potter” and “You-Know-Who” as the group made their way to the back.

“Good God, you would have thought Paul McCartney had walked in,” said Sir William Finch-Fletchley. “Granger…is Harry really seen as a war hero here?”

“Unfortunately,” Dan replied, “but he was only a year old at the time, and he’s been laying low in the muggle world ever since. Long story. You’ll find books about it in the shop.”

More eyebrows were raised as the other families wondered just what had happened with this boy. Hermione was shaking as she stood by her brother’s side.

“I apologise to all of you for that,” McGonagall said as they squeezed into the small walled courtyard behind the pub. “The patrons of the Leaky Cauldron tend to be the more…excitable sort, but I’m afraid I underestimated their reactions. The people in Diagon Alley should be more…sober, at least. And Mr. Potter, I really do believe things will be better for you once the novelty’s worn off. Now, then, to get into Diagon Alley, you need to find the brick three bricks up and two across from the rubbish bin. Tap the brick three times with either a wand or one of your charmed necklaces, like so.”

A small hole opened in the brick in question and widened until it became an archway wide enough to walk four abreast. Thoughts of the mob behind them were momentarily pushed aside as the group beheld the wonder of Diagon Alley.

It was by far the most magic even the Grangers had seen. Along the crooked cobblestone street were shops selling all sorts of items from cauldrons to telescopes to broomsticks to barrels of bat wings to things they didn’t even recognise. Owls of every description winged their way through the air with letters in their beaks. Little outdoor stalls sold food and magazines and all sorts of little charmed trinkets, whizzing through the air or hopping in little circles along the ground. The colours were dazzling, if rather gaudy in some places.

When they had all seen their fill from the archway, the group stepped out into the Alley so they had more room. The arch closed behind them.

McGonagall began handing out sheets of parchment to each family. “These are maps of the Alley,” she explained. “I would advise you all to stay in Diagon Alley and not to venture into Knockturn Alley, which is, quite frankly, what you would call a bad sort of neighbourhood. I will be accompanying Mr. Potter and his family personally for the afternoon. I trust you can each handle your own shopping, although if you need help, _most_ of the shoppers and shopkeepers in the Alley are usually helpful to muggle-born students. You will, however, first want to follow us to Gringotts Wizarding Bank. Some of the shops accept pounds, but you will at some point need to convert them to galleons and optionally open up an account. To be safe, you will probably want to convert thirty galleons for supplies and any other purchases you wish to make. Afterwards, we will meet up at Fortescue’s Ice Cream Parlour at five o’clock. Are there any questions? No? Then follow me, please.”

She led the pack of muggle-born families down the Alley. A number of people spotted Harry and pointed him out, but seeing him flanked closely by three adults, one of whom they knew for a strict professor who was now brandishing a wand with a fierce look, they kept their distance. A little ways down the Alley, they came to a towering marble building that looked like something transplanted from ancient Greece. Standing beside the main doors were two strange little humanoid creatures in scarlet and gold uniforms. They were rather unattractive creatures, bald, with pale, dome-shaped heads, long, pointed noses and ears, and very long fingers that ended in yellow claws. They were barely four feet tall, but the large, wicked battle axes they carried dispelled any doubt that they meant business. The newcomers hesitated before coming near.

“Gringotts is run by the Goblin Nation,” McGonagall explained. “They look intimidating, but if you deal with them politely, they will reciprocate.” She walked toward the doors and bowed to the guards, who bowed in return. One of the guards made a subtle gesture, and the doors opened on their own. The other visitors bowed as they passed the guards. The Grangers began to wonder silently, though. _A History of Magic_ spoke far more about “Goblin Rebellions’ than about the creatures running the banks.

A pair of silver doors flanked by another pair of guards led into the building from a small foyer. On the doors was engraved:

 

_Enter, stranger, but take heed_

_Of what awaits the sin of greed,_

_For those who take, but do not earn,_

_Must pay most dearly in their turn._

_So if you seek beneath our floors_

_A treasure that was never yours,_

_Thief, you have been warned, beware_

_Of finding more than treasure there._

“Hey, I like that,” Harry said. “I should put that on the door of my room or something.”

“Ha! _Your_ room?” Hermione shot back. “You’re the one who’s always taking my books.”

“They’re not just your books, Mione—”

“Kids, not now,” Emma cut them off.

They entered through the silver doors. A long row of counters lined each side of a large, if dimly-lit chamber. Dozens of goblins sat behind them, figuring and ciphering and weighing coins and jewels. Behind the counters, tellers were leading witches and wizards through doors to stone passages that must have led off to the vaults. McGonagall made for one of the counters seemingly at random.

“Good morning,” she said. “Harry Potter needs to access his vault, and I suspect his adoptive parents would like to open one for his sister.”

The goblin eyed said adoptive parents with suspicion. There were enough people coming in lately pretending to be Harry Potter to get access to the Potter Vault. “Do you have his key, madam?” he asked McGonagall.

She pulled a small gold key out of her handbag and placed it on the counter. The goblin picked it up and recognised its magical signature at once as a genuine Gringotts key. “Excuse me a moment,” he said.

The Grangers looked at each other in confusion. Behind them, the other families had fanned out to convert their money. A minute later, the teller returned with a stack of papers. Dan and Emma were surprised to see the one on top was a copy of Harry’s muggle adoption papers. Under that was what looked like an account statement written in a strange, angular script on parchment.

“How interesting,” the teller said as he examined the statement.

“Yes?” Dan said.

The teller looked up and stared at him with black eyes. “It would appear that a portion of the Potter fortune was set aside in trust by James and Lily Potter for education costs—tuition and supplies—both for Harry Potter _and_ any adoptive siblings of his.”

Dan’s and Emma’s eyes went wide. “You mean…You mean Hermione’s education is completely paid for?” he said.

“May I?” McGonagall said, looking pointedly at Harry. At a nod from him, she examined the statement for herself. “It would appear so, Mr. Granger. There are five thousand galleons in this allocation, easily enough to put three students through Hogwarts or two through a mastery.”

Dan and Emma stared at each other and started laughing, prompting annoyed grunts from the tellers. Hermione began crying and hugged her brother. Of course, they could have supported both children through school on their own if they had to, but it was wonderful to see that Harry’s birth parents had been so considerate to pay for the children of any family that had taken him in. Harry had to wonder if some of that money had been once been intended for Dudley—almost certainly not _intended_ , he decided, but they must have considered the possibility.

Dan took the statement to see it for himself, and Hermione broke away and stood on her toes to look. “And how much is a galleon, exactly?” he asked.

“The current rate is fifty-one point two five pounds,” the goblin huffed.

Hermione looked at the bottom line and let out a loud squeak. “Eighty thousand galleons! Harry, you’re a millionaire!”

Harry stumbled and braced himself against the counter. “I am…?”

“The Potters have always been a fairly wealthy family,” McGonagall explained, “like most of the members of the Wizengamot—”

A low growl made them jump as the goblin cleared his throat. “If you’re _quite_ ready, Griphook will escort you to Mr. Potter’s vault.”

“Follow me, please,” a gruff voice said from beside them before they could delay any further. Griphook led the Grangers and McGonagall out of the marble chamber to a dark stone passageway. He then stepped into a mine cart and motioned for the others to join him. Even McGonagall looked uncomfortable as they did. They soon found out why, as the cart took off down the track, running as fast as any roller coaster and far less securely, steering itself through a maze of twisting passages and a dozen different forks. They could just make out the tunnel as it was lit by flaming torches, and some of the stalactites appeared to come perilously close to the riders’ heads. Hermione screamed most of the way, and her mother wasn’t much better off.

“Somebody really needs to introduce the magical world to the Health and Safety Executive!” Dan shouted as the cart jerked around a particularly tight corner. Griphook responded by letting out a low, guttural laugh.

The cart levelled out over an underground lake in an enormous cavern, and the Grangers finally calmed down and looked about in wonder at the massive columns that stretched from floor to ceiling and stalactites and stalagmites that grew nearly as far. Not far past the lake, they finally rolled to a stop.

“Here it is,” Griphook said. “Vault Six Hundred Eighty-Seven.” He unlocked the door, and a suspicious green smoke briefly billowed out.

Even after seeing how much money Harry had on paper, the Grangers gasped when they saw the inside of the vault. Gold coins were stacked up almost as tall as Harry, and there were multiple piles of mingled silver and bronze. A stack of life-sized magical portraits leaned against one wall. The one on top showed what they guessed was a Potter ancestor from the seventeenth century sleeping in a gilded chair in front of a picture window. That same chair, they soon realised, was sitting in the opposite corner of the vault with several other pieces of antique furniture. A wardrobe stood beside the door, which they found contained several very expensive-looking dresses and dress robes, including a wedding dress, all surprisingly well-preserved. Several large boxes were stacked against another wall. Harry opened one of them with his family watching over his shoulder. They gasped again when they saw what was inside: twenty generations’ worth of family jewelry in gold and silver and stones of every colour.

“Wow, Harry, you’ve got enough stuff here for a whole ball,” Hermione said, before squealing with delight when she saw the true prize in the vault: a box underneath the jewelry labelled “Rare Books.”

The family bookworm was a little disappointed when she found that a majority of the rare books were not in English, but the ones they could interpret were intriguing: there was an autographed first edition of _Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them_ ; an older tome on the same subject called _Rare Arcane Faunae of Western Europe_ ; treatises on alchemy by Nicolas Flamel, Paracelsus, and Judah Loew; something that from the pictures looked like an ancient Runic copy of _Tales of Beedle the Bard_ ; a book in a language they couldn’t identify that seemed to be about wands; surprisingly, a copy of James VI’s witch-hunting guide, _Daemonologie_ ; and, most astonishingly, a book called _Magicae Lucis et Opticarum_ by Sir Isaac Newton.

“Hermione, we have a lot of shopping to do. We can always come back another time,” Emma told her daughter gently. Hermione reluctantly tore herself away from looking through the remaining books, insisting on taking with her (with Harry’s permission) only a nineteenth century text called _Magic of the World_ _’s Cultures_. Meanwhile, Emma counted out sixty galleons from the stacks and stashed them in her purse. “How much are the other ones?” she asked.

“Seventeen sickles to the galleon, twenty-nine knuts to the sickle,” Griphook said curtly.

“What, prime numbers?” Dan said.

“Yes,” the goblin replied, as if it were perfectly reasonable. “Come on, if you’re finished.”

After another very rough cart ride back to the front, Dan and Emma opened an account for Hermione, putting in most of the money they had brought for supplies, leaving ten galleons for general spending money and the extra books Hermione was sure to want, before finally stepping back, blinking, into the sunlight.

* * *

_First year students will require:_

  1. _Three sets of plain work robes (black)_
  2. _One plain pointed hat (black) for day wear_
  3. _One pair of protective gloves (dragon hide or similar)_
  4. _One winter cloak (black, silver fastenings)_



_Please note that all pupils_ _’ clothes should carry name tags_

After grabbing lunch at one of the shops, the Grangers proceeded to Madam Malkin’s for their uniforms. Madam Malkin, to her credit, was calm, professional, and saw them through quickly without letting anyone approach Harry. The fact that Professor McGonagall was hovering over her shoulder might have contributed to that a little.

 

_1 cauldron (pewter, standard size 2) set_

_1 set of glass or crystal phials_

_1 set brass scales_

Potage’s Cauldron Shop had a few of the well-wishers from the Leaky Cauldron hanging around it, but they were still keeping their distance from McGonagall. Dan and Emma weren’t too happy about the requirement of a pewter cauldron. (“Shouldn’t be brewing _anything_ in something that melts that easily,” Dan said.) But that was the requirement, and they were reassured that the cauldrons had fire-protection charms. They went with the collapsible variety, since they knew all the spare space in the trunks would be filled with books.

 

_1 telescope_

 

The whole family had more than a passing interest in space, so they checked out all of the options. Harry was drawn to a high-end model with a five-inch lens, a tripod, automatic star alignment, and magical contrast enhancement, but on the advice of the very eager shopkeeper, he accepted the two-inch student model that he could actually carry up to the top of the Astronomy Tower.

 

_PARENTS ARE REMINDED THAT FIRST YEARS ARE NOT ALLOWED THEIR OWN BROOMSTICKS._

“Come along, Harry. Do well this year, and we’ll think about getting you one next summer.”

_Students may also bring, if they wish, an owl OR a cat OR a toad._

“Are you going to take Rowena with you?” Emma asked.

“I don’t know. I’ve been talking to her, and I don’t think she wants to go,” Harry said.

“Oh? Why not?”

“She’s getting kind of old. I think she’s thirteen, and that’s like seventy in cat years. I don’t think she wants to move at her age.”

“That’s probably for the best at that age, Harry,” Professor McGonagall said. “I would recommend that you buy an owl, though. It would be very helpful for sending messages, and having your own, they will usually be more loyal and reliable than the school owls.”

“That sounds like a good idea,” Dan said. “Would you like an owl, kids?”

“Sure.”

“Yeah.”

They went over to Eeylops Owl Emporium, which was too dark to see in properly, but that meant that the owls were awake and active. Harry immediately gravitated toward a beautiful snowy owl, and no one could fault his choice, even if she did have a bit of a chip on her shoulder around him. After all, given Harry’s youth, she was probably the superior predator of the two.

“What are you going to name her?” his father asked.

“How about Helga?” Harry said. The owl gave him what he could swear was a disapproving glare.

“I don’t think she likes it, Harry,” Hermione said. “I think she looks more like a…Hedwig.”

“Who?”

“Hedwig of Vienna. She invented the Flame-Freezing Charm to fight the Inquisition.”

The owl hooted at Hermione and…did she just nod her head?

“See, she likes it.”

“Alright, you win, _Hedwig_ ,” Harry told the owl.

_1 wand_

A tinkling bell announced their entrance into the shabby little shop. It was like no other place the children had visited. It was positively humming with magic from the thousands of wands stacked from floor to ceiling, like the singing of a great choir, far away. Hermione thought she could hear a particular note rising above the rest, but they both felt that they could almost swim in the magic. As they took it in, an old man with wild white hair and unblinking silver eyes looked up from where he was carving a piece of wood. “Good afternoon,” he said.

“Hello,” the Grangers replied.

“Ah, yes, I thought I’d be seeing you soon, Mr. Potter,” he said. “You have your mother’s eyes, you know. It seems like it was only yesterday when I sold her her first wand.”

“You remember her?” Harry said.

“Oh, I remember every wand I’ve ever sold, Mr. Potter. Every single wand.” He began to lean closer to Harry as he spoke. Emma unconsciously tightened her grip on her children. The old man was starting to get creepy. “Your mother’s wand was ten and a quarter inches, willow, and unicorn hair—nice and swishy, great for charms work. Your father’s wand, on the other hand, was eleven inches, mahogany, and dragon heartstring—pliable and excellent for transfiguration.

Harry backed away as the man came almost nose to nose with him. He seemed to be staring at his scar.

“Ah, but I’m terribly sorry,” he seemed to snap out of it and turned to the rest of his family. “I don’t believe we’ve met.”

“Mr. Ollivander, these are Harry’s adoptive parents, Dan and Emma Granger,” McGonagall said. “Their daughter, Hermione, is also starting at Hogwarts this year.”

“I _see_. I _have_ seen some other muggle-borns come through here today. “Well, then, let’s get you out of the way first, my dear. I suspect your…brother may have more…particular tastes.”

 _Not helping the creepiness_ , Emma thought.

“Which is your wand arm, Miss Granger?”

“Well, um, I guess it’s this one,” Hermione said, holding out her right arm.

“Very good.” Mr. Ollivander pulled out a long tape measure, which leapt from his hand and began measuring her arm. The tape measure held a quill with its far end like the tail of a snake and was writing figures on a ledger.

“A very complex business, wand-making,” Ollivander monologued in that strange, almost sing-song voice of his. “It is the wand that chooses the witch or wizard, rather than vice-versa—at least if it is done properly. The wand wood will be sensitive to your temperament and personality—we use dozens of types of wood here. Of course, only the highest quality wood is made into an Ollivander wand, and no two Ollivander wands are alike, just as no two trees are alike.

The tape measure took the distance around Hermione’s head, and then measured the distance between her nostrils.

“But each wand also contains a core of a powerful magical substance. We use the heartstrings of dragons, the tail hairs of unicorns, and the tail feathers of phoenixes. It is the wand core that is sensitive to your natural magical talents. Every wand has different magical talents of its own, and it will desire to find a match who shares them. Only when matched to the wand that chooses you will you be able to cast spells to your full potential, whereas any other wand will resist your command.”

Just when Dan and Emma were starting to wonder if Ollivander was barmy talking about wands having minds of their own, he stopped the tape measure with a snap of his fingers and went back into the stacks. He didn’t even look at the measurements.

They had no idea how he could pick out a wand from all the possibilities, but just a few moments later, they heard him cry out, “Oh! Oh my! Could it be?” He came back, removing a light-coloured wand carved with an intricate leafy design from a long, thin box. “Vine wood and dragon heartstring,” he said excitedly, placing it in Hermione’s hand. “Ten and three quarter inches—go ahead, give it a wave.”

Hermione felt that distinct high note of magic rise to a fever pitch. When she took the wand in her hand, she felt as if her whole arm was electrified. She knew instinctively, even before she waved it, that it was the one for her. But she still gave the wand a tentative flick, and a stream of pure white sparks shot from the end and spread out in a ring around the room. She jumped back with a squeak and nearly dropped the wand, but Ollivander’s face lit up.

“Oh, marvellous!” he exclaimed. “Vine will show—by far the most eager of all woods, though it’s very rare that I’ve seen such a connection before even touching it. I could already feel it humming on its shelf, something I have only felt twice before in all my years of wandcrafting.”

“Really, sir?” Herimone said.

“Oh, yes. You must be very in tune with your magic to make such a strong connection. That is a powerful wand, Miss Granger—a wand of hidden depths and great vision, undoubtedly like yourself. I will be eager to hear of your exploits in the coming years.”

Hermione grinned at the compliment, though her parents were sceptical. That description sounded more like a horoscope than anything else, though Harry’s ordeal would soon show them how difficult finding a match could be.

“Now…for Mr. Potter…” the old man started up his tape measure again.

Ollivander didn’t find Harry’s wand on the first try, nor on the second or the third. In fact, the pile soon grew to over two dozen. Every wand Harry tried gave off a quiver of magic, but it always felt cold, or dulled, or sharp, like a slap across his hand. And they all seemed to push away from him, some less and some more, like the wrong pole of a magnet. He was starting to understand what Ollivander said about unsuited wands resisting him.

“Mr. Ollivander, has your family really been making wands since 382 BC?” Hermione asked to pass the time.

“Of course,” the old man said without slowing his pace of testing wands. “Well, not precisely. Modern wands were not invented until the twelfth century. The earliest wizards used large staffs. But the first Ollivander came to Britain with the Romans and settled here to take advantage of the high quality of the local trees. We are one of the oldest families in Britain.”

“Wait, the Romans?” Dan said. “The Roman conquest wasn’t until 43 AD.” Ollivander gave him a bemused look.

In frustration, Harry tried to force his magic through one of the wands. It backfired, blasting out of his hand with a little flash of light and stinging his hand. Ollivander turned back to him.

_“Tricky customer, eh? Not to worry, we’ll find the perfect match here somewhere—I wonder, now—yes, why not—unusual combination—holly and phoenix feather, eleven inches, nice and supple.”_

_Harry took the wand. He felt a sudden warmth in his fingers. He raised the wand above his head, brought it swishing down through the dusty air and a stream of red and gold sparks shot from the end like a firework, throwing dancing spots of light on to the walls._

_Mr. Ollivander cried,_ _“Oh, bravo! Yes, indeed, oh, very good. Well, well, well…how curious…how very curious…”_

_“Sorry, but what’s curious?”_

_Mr. Ollivander fixed Harry with his pale stare._

_“It so happens that the phoenix whose tail feather is in your wand gave another feather—just one other. It is very curious indeed that you should be destined for this wand when it’s brother—why it’s brother gave you that scar.”_

Harry flinched back and to the side, cat-like, as he rarely did anymore, and fixed his eyes back on the wandmaker. The others sucked in a breath. “What does that mean, sir?” he asked, nearly hissing the question.

“That is for you to decide, Mr. Potter. The wand chooses the wizard, remember, but it is the wizard who must choose how to wield it. But _I think we must expect great things from you, Mr. Potter_ _…After all, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named did great things—terrible, yes, but great_.”

Harry took his wand uneasily, pondering the old wandmaker’s words, and the Grangers paid seven galleons apiece for the pair. That seemed like quite a lot for something as delicate as a stick, but Ollivander assured them they were charmed to be considerably stronger than ordinary wood. They left the shop in silence, even Professor McGonagall, wondering just what kind of consequences might come about from Harry’s unique match of wand.

_First students should have a copy of each of the following:_

_The Standard Book of Spells (Grade 1) by Miranda Goshawk_

_A History of Magic by Bathilda Bagshot_

_Magical Theory by Adalbert Waffling_

_A Beginners_ _’ Guide to Transfiguration by Emeric Switch_

_One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi by Phyllida Spore_

_Magical Drafts and Potions by Arsenius Jigger_

_Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them by Newt Scamander_

_The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self Protection by Quentin Trimble_

They already had one copy of _A History of Magic_ , but the others were all lined up for incoming students at the front of the shop. Most of the course books were quite large, but they were also used over multiple years. But even after picking them up, Hermione (and the others, for that matter) wanted to browse the store. She quickly grabbed a copy of _The Standard Book of Spells (Grade 2)_ , the only additional book for second years, to “work ahead,” while Harry, perhaps influenced by Mr. Ollivander’s words, collected the two other Defence textbooks used by the upper years. Dan and Emma, determined to broaden their knowledge of recent wizarding events, picked up _The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts_ and _Great Wizarding Events of the Twentieth Century_.

They later found Harry standing frozen in front of a prominent rack of books in the children’s section.

“Harry, we have to go soon,” his mother said. “What is it?”

Harry just pointed to the sign above the rack: _The Harry Potter Adventures_.

“Oh, my.”

They were children’s books, written on a Year Five or Six reading level. There were nine in the series, supposedly detailing each of the years from 1982 through 1990. The cover of each book showed a boy who actually looked reasonably like the real Harry, minus the glasses, having magical adventures in a different exotic location around the world.

“ _Harry Potter in the Congo_? _Harry Potter and the Temple of Doom_? _Harry Potter on the Rio Bravo_?” Hermione read off some of the titles. “ _Modern Magical History_ _says_ he was sent to live with muggles,” she complained to their mother. “Don’t they know this has to be complete fiction?”

“Oh come on, you know that’s just a cover story,” said a little redheaded girl who came up and looked over the shelves. “Ooh, they have the new one: _Harry Potter Down Under_.”

She grabbed a copy, and Harry quickly followed suit. The cover showed a ten-year-old “Harry Potter” standing in a desert, wearing an Akubra hat, carrying a platypus on his shoulder, and leading a Tasmanian tiger on a leash.

“Okay, that doesn’t even look like me,” he said.

“Well, it kinda does,” Hermione replied.

“I’ve still never been to Australia.”

They heard the little girl suck in a breath. Harry turned to face her, and she gasped and staggered backwards, clutching the book to her chest.

“Ginny, get your book and come on. I have to start dinner at home.” A plump woman with long, frizzy red hair came up behind her, dragging an equally red-haired set of twins by their wrists.

“M-M-Mum…” Ginny stuttered, pointing at Harry.

“Oh, my,” the woman said.

“Blimey, are you—” one of the twins said.

“He is, aren’t you?” the other finished.

“Fred, George, don’t bother him,” their mother scolded. “Sorry to disturb you, Mr. Potter. I’m sure you have more interesting things to read than these things.”

“Huh? Oh, actually I was just going to get myself a set,” Harry said idly, trying to ignore the fact that random adults kept calling him “Mr. Potter.” He started taking a copy of each book from the shelf.

“Really, why?” Emma said.

“Well, I want to find out what people are saying about me.”

“Harry Potter reading about—”

“—Harry Potter,” the twins said.

“Brilliant!”

“Best prank we’ve seen all summer.”

“Boys! Come along!” their mother ordered. She dragged them away. Ginny gave Harry a lingering look over her shoulder as she followed.

“Well, I think that’s enough books for one day,” Emma said. “Let’s go find your father and pay for them so we can get back to Professor McGonagall.”

A half hour later, the muggle-born group shared a laugh at the Harry Potter books over ice cream after hearing a more subdued retelling of the true story. Even Harry laughed at how absurd the stories were that he found whilst thumbing through the books. But underneath the humour, there was an edge of concern: just what was the magical world expecting from Harry Potter? And how would they react to the real truth?


	14. Dealing with the Press

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: JK Rowling holds court at the centre of the Potterverse.
> 
> My apologies for mangling the Shakespearean-era English of Wulfric and Melania. I’m sure I’m not nearly the student of the Bard I would need to be to do it justice.

“Good evening, Minerva. I trust the orientation went well,” Albus said as Minerva sat down heavily across the desk from him.

“As well as could be expected, I suppose, Albus,” she said. “I was forced to fend off Harry Potter’s admirers on several occasions. The boy is understandably uncomfortable with his fame.”

“Better that than revelling in it, I should think,” Albus said. “I have seen far too many go down that road. I am sure he will adjust in time. Though I wonder if perhaps it would have helped to have Hagrid escort him.”

Minerva rolled her eyes. Hagrid was imposing, but he wasn’t exactly one to know when to take a firm hand. “Be that as it may, there was one thing that worries me greatly.”

“Oh? What is it?”

“When we purchased Harry’s wand, Albus. Ollivander told us that the wand that chose him was brother to You-Know-Who’s.”

The Headmaster raised an eyebrow and glanced at Fawkes, who nodded and trilled softly. Of course, something like that _would_ happen, with the prophecy and all. He knew that wand well. He had enquired with Ollivander about it personally. To his mind, though, it was the choice of wood that concerned him more than the brother core. Holly wood was volatile, impetuous, and short-tempered, traits he would have hoped to have been calmed by the boy’s life with the Grangers. Yet phoenix feather did carry the calm and detachment of its giver. Together, if they could be controlled, they made a quester’s wand, and a powerful one at that. _That_ was a trait young Harry would need.

“I do not think that is too surprising,” he said carefully. “For several reasons. We have already seen that Harry’s fate and Voldemort’s, unfortunately, are inextricably linked. That this wand chose him is only another sign of that. I see no reason for additional concern at this time; we should merely continue to keep an eye on the boy.”

Minerva gave him a stern look, but she seemed to accept this for the time being.

“What of his sister’s wand?” he asked curiously. “It will be interesting to see how the two of them fare together, magically.”

“Ah, vine wood and dragon heartstring,” she answered. “Ollivander saw the connection before she even touched it.”

“How interesting…” That was more surprising that Harry’s wand, Albus thought. Another uncommon and strong combination, if he remembered his wand lore correctly. Vine was known for movers and shakers, and when combined with such a strong connection and especially a dragon core indicated great talent. With Hermione Granger standing at her brother’s side, they would truly be a force to be reckoned with. Albus had a feeling this was going to be an eventful seven years.

* * *

The Grangers were very surprised when Cousin Andi showed up unannounced on Monday morning and even more surprised when, when asked why she was there, she held up a newspaper with an admittedly blurry moving picture on the front page that showed the four of them walking down Diagon Alley with Professor McGonagall.

“I think you’d better read this,” she said.

 

_The Daily Prophet_

_Monday, 29 July 1991_

_HARRY POTTER RETURNS!_

_By Rita Skeeter_

_Harry Potter, the Boy-Who-Lived and Savior of the Wizarding World, has not been seen in public since his stunning defeat of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named nearly ten years ago. That all changed on Saturday when young Mr. Potter made his long-awaited return to wizarding Britain, venturing out into Diagon Alley to purchase his supplies for his first year at Hogwarts._

_It appears that the Boy-Who-Lived will, indeed, be attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry this year, fulfilling the hopes of many, although the security around him remains very tight. We can deduce both of these facts from eyewitness reports that Potter was closely guarded the entire day by Hogwarts Deputy Headmistress Minerva McGonagall, who was seen hexing any admirers who dared approach him._

_Hogwarts Headmaster and Chief Warlock Albus Dumbledore has refused for the past ten years to reveal anything about Potter_ _’s whereabouts, leading many in the community including the Prophet to ask why. Death Eater activity has been virtually nonexistent since the fall of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, and Dumbledore’s continued insistence that said dark lord may not be dead is a view now shared only by a few. Potter no longer appears to be in such danger as to warrant his tight security, as Dumbledore claims. Does Dumbledore have ulterior motives for keeping the boy so isolated? Is he perhaps grooming a successor who shares in his political views or an ally to expand his already-extensive network of influence in the wizarding world? We at the Prophet demand an accounting for Dumbledore’s actions._

_Meanwhile, as to Potter_ _’s actual whereabouts, we have few clues. Inside sources at the Ministry of Magic claimed shortly after his parents’ deaths that he had been placed with a muggle family, possibly relations of his muggle-born mother, Lily Potter, née Evans. However, many others speculate that Potter has been travelling the world and learning arcane magic, and that the popular children’s book series,_ The Harry Potter Adventures _, contains more than a little truth, something that series author Wendell Somerlad has never explicitly denied._

_But a new and intriguing clue came on Saturday, as multiple witnesses claimed to have seen the Boy-Who-Lived shopping with the family of an unidentified muggle-born witch who is also starting at Hogwarts this year. (The Hogwarts muggle-born student orientation was also held on Saturday.) Unfortunately, the security around the boy meant that this family could not be approached for questions, but this reporter was able to obtain an exclusive comment from famed wandmaker Garrick Ollivander, who sold both Potter and his companion their first wands._ _“Oh, yes, she was definitely a muggle-born girl. I would have recognised her parents otherwise. And a fine young witch she was, too. I could tell she was very gifted just from the sight of her. Yes, I think we can expect great things from both of them,” Ollivander said._

_Was Harry Potter indeed raised by muggles, as the Ministry sources say? Is it merely coincidence that they appear to have a witch in their family as well? Or has the Boy-Who-Lived already succeeded in acquiring a girlfriend before his eleventh birthday, breaking the hearts of young witches everywhere? Neither Mr. Potter nor his proxy on the Wizengamot, Andromeda Tonks, who is presumed to be his point of contact with the wizarding world, could be reached at press time._

_We at the Prophet wish Mr. Potter a happy eleventh birthday this Wednesday, wherever he may be staying, and a successful first year at Hogwarts. And we would also like to extend and open invitation for an interview to Mr. Potter and Madam Tonks to tell enquiring minds of the exciting life of the Boy-Who-Lived._

“Eww! They think I’m your _girlfriend_?” Hermione exclaimed when they finished reading.

“Wait a minute, Professor McGonagall didn’t ‘hex’ anyone,” Dan observed.

“It’s Rita Skeeter,” Andi explained. “She thrives on speculation and sensationalism. We’re lucky that article was as accurate as it was, and we’re even luckier that she didn’t manage to get a hold of the rest of your names. Ollivander may be…eccentric, but he’s smarter than he looks. Unfortunately, a lot of people still believe whatever she says.”

“Well that’s just great,” Dan said. “Not only is Harry famous, but the press can just make things up about him.”

“Is there anything we can do about her?” Harry asked.

“Not much, sorry. Skeeter can be infuriating, but she’s wicked smart. She always stops just short of saying anything that’s provably defamatory, at least at the time. And she always stops just short of anything that would get her challenged to a duel.”

“Huh? You still have honour duels?” Emma said uneasily.

“The old families still do it sometimes. Although no one’s fought an honour duel to the death in decades, if that’s what you mean. Anyway, it gets worse.”

“Worse? How?” Harry said.

“Harry, they just told everyone when your birthday is, and that I’m your point of contact. I’ve got over a hundred pieces of fan mail addressed to you already.”

Harry’s eyes went wide. “I get fan mail?”

“He gets fan mail?” Hermione echoed.

Andi shook her head in annoyance. “You don’t even want to know how much fan mail. Remember, you’re famous worldwide for surviving the Killing Curse, although Britain’s got it the worst for you. There are letters praising your supposed duelling skills. People just hoping to get your autograph. People asking you to make public appearances on every continent, including Antarctica. Pleas for help in fighting petty dark lords in Rwanda, Somalia, Iraq, and Colombia. Honestly, you’re better off not seeing or thinking about them.” Harry looked genuinely shocked at these revelations and was forced to nod in agreement. If those were the kinds of letters he got, he was probably better off not knowing. “Oh, and you’ve got acceptance letters from literally every school of magic in the world except the training camp in North Korea,” Andi added. “I could show you those if you like, but…”

“We’ve already discussed our options with Professor Dumbledore,” Emma confirmed. “But why don’t the owls come here, then?”

“It all goes to my office at the Ministry. It’s standard practice for Wizengamot members. I’ll show you how to arrange direct delivery of letters from your friends and family.”

“Thank you,” Harry said.

“The important thing, though, is that we need to decide how to respond to this. The fan mail—the easiest thing would just be to donate anything that comes in that way. But for the article, my plan was to write a letter to the editor asking people to respect Harry’s privacy. The question is how much you want to reveal in that letter—My recommendation would be as little as possible.”

“Really?” Dan said.

“Not even the girlfriend part?” Hermione protested.

“No, for two reasons. One, it’ll show that we’re serious about the privacy part. And two, I know it sounds counterintuitive, but we’ll get better penetration if we let it sit for a few weeks and have the truth come out in a breaking news story rather than a letter to the editor now.”

“Hmm…” Dan considered it. “I guess we can trust your judgement on that for the time being. You know more about the wizarding press than we do. But please let us know if they write any more stories about Harry.”

“I’ll do you one better. Harry, I was going to tell you for your birthday, but I’ve bought you two subscriptions to the _Daily Prophet_ , one for school and one for your parents at home. Like it or not, you’ll need to keep up with the goings on in the magical world from now on.”

“Thanks.”

“There’s another part, too.” Andi turned to Dan and Emma. “I know it’s short notice, but Ted and I would like to invite all four of you to come to our house next Saturday and spend a week there.”

Dan and Emma were pretty well gobsmacked by that one. “A week!” Emma said. “Why…that’s very generous of you. I suppose we could rearrange things at our practice, but—what brought this on, may I ask?”

“Simple. Harry’s the head of a Noble House, and while people will generally understand about him raised by muggles, he and Hermione will both need to know how to navigate the waters. Harry, Hermione, you _will_ be going to school with children of suspected Death Eaters; they haven’t caused too much trouble in the past, but you’ll definitely need to watch out for them. You’ll also be going with children of Noble Families, and most of the students will be more familiar with the magical world than you are. So Ted and I would like you to spend a week with us so you can learn about life in a magical household and about how to interact with people in that environment. I doubt politics is much more interesting to you than it is to me, but it is something you need to know about. So what do you say?”

“I think you had Hermione from “learn,’” Harry said with a grin.

Hermione shot him an annoyed look. “Staying a magical house? Of course! Can we go, Mum and Dad, please?”

“Well, it sounds like it’s pretty important,” Dan said. “Andi, that really _is_ very generous of you, and we’d love to join you for a week.”

“Great,” Andi said, smiling for the first time that morning. She handed them a card. “Here’s our address. It’s in muggle London, so you should have no problem finding it. There’s just one other thing.”

“Yes?”

“Remember a few years ago when we discussed magical guardianship?”

They remembered. They had wanted to get Dumbledore off the paperwork from the start, by Andi had advised them not to put any activity on Harry’s file to avoid unwanted attention.

“Of course,” Emma said.

She took out some papers. “Well, now that Harry’s been revealed to the magical world, there’s no need to hide our arrangements. If you still want, I’d be happy to take over as both his and Hermione’s magical guardian, now.”

Dan and Emma smiled broadly. “We’d be honoured if you would,” Dan said. “I’m glad Harry has such a good family in your world to rely on.”

“Well, it may have been twisted a bit over the years, but family is very important in our world—in both worlds, really. It’s not just a witch and wizard thing; it’s the way things are supposed to be.”

“I quite agree.”

They quickly signed the paperwork and hammered out the arrangements for the following week. But as Andi turned to leave, though, Emma stopped her.

“What is it?”

“Something in that article,” Emma said. “I get that it’s tabloid journalism, but still…All this time, we’ve mainly been seeing Dumbledore’s view of things…Do you think it’s possible Voldemort might actually be dead?”

A shadow crossed Andi’s face, and she didn’t speak for a minute. “I think it’s better safe than sorry,” she finally said. “I know even a lot of Dumbledore’s fans don’t believe him anymore, but still, if he is gone, the worst that can happen in all of this is that Harry and Hermione will be more prepared to defend themselves than nineteen out of twenty wizards in our world…But if you’re asking if _I_ think he’s still around somewhere…then, probably yes. I’m just not ready to believe it’s over yet.” With that, she went on her way.

* * *

_The Daily Prophet_

_Wednesday, 31 July 1991_

_Letter to the Editor by Andromeda Tonks_

_The Prophet is correct in surmising that I—or rather my office at the Ministry—am Harry Potter_ _’s point of contact with the magical world. As his proxy and his nearest magical relative who is not in Azkaban, this was a natural choice, and my office serves as his standard Owl Post forwarding address for anyone not among his personal contacts._

_Mr. Potter would like to thank the wizarding world for its birthday wishes and would like to announce that he will donate all monetary and other gifts forwarded to my office to St. Jerome_ _’s Magical Orphan Trust. To all those who sent pranked, jinxed, booby-trapped, and/or cursed letters, they were, of course, intercepted, and we_ _will_ _find out who you are._

_That said, Mr. Potter and his guardians value both their privacy and their security, and we ask the wizarding world to respect their wishes. Neither he nor I will be giving any interviews at this time. Mr. Potter is very busy becoming reacquainted with wizarding Britain and preparing for his studies at Hogwarts and has no interest in speaking to the press except on his own time._

_We would also like to clarify that Professor Minerva McGonagall did not hex anyone in Mr. Potter_ _’s presence, although she did keep close to him to prevent undue disruption to his school shopping. We hope that the_ Prophet’s _reporting of Mr. Potter_ _’s affairs will be more accurate in the future, and we will be watching this matter closely._

* * *

“Happy birthday, Harry!” the children’s two best friends exclaimed.

“Thanks, guys. Come on in.”

“You changed your hair,” Tiffany observed.

“Uh, yeah…” After his incident at the Leaky Cauldron, Harry had started more carefully combing his wild hair down into bangs to cover his scar. After all, what was merely interesting in the muggle world netted him a lot of uncomfortable looks at best in the magical one. “What do you think?”

“As ridiculous as ever,” she replied. Predictably, bangs or no, it still looked like he hadn’t combed it at all.

With all the Hogwarts business going on, it had been decided to make Harry’s eleventh birthday a small affair, with only his family and his closest friends present. He led Paul and Tiffany to the kitchen, where lunch had been set out buffet-style, and they filed into the living room to talk. They mostly made small talk, but it wasn’t long before the uncomfortable subject came up.

“So, you two are really going off to boarding school all the way up in Scotland?” Paul said as he dug into his second slice of pizza.

“Uh huh,” Hermione said carefully. “Harry’s a legacy student from his birth parents, so we both got a scholarship.”

“Wow, that’s great,” Tiffany said. She had put down her plate for a moment to pet Rowena, who had taken a liking to her over the years. “And what was it called again?”

“Hogwarts School for Gifted Youngsters,” Harry repeated the cover story they had devised.

Their blond friend giggled, and Paul guffawed. “Seriously? They need a better name. That sounds like a lamer version of X-Men.”

Hermione rolled her eyes. “I know it sounds a little strange, but they’re supposed to be really good.”

“Well, that’s great for you. It’s too bad we can’t all be at the same school again, though.” They already hadn’t seen all that much of Paul over the past year, as he was a year ahead of them and had started secondary school that year. “Do you know if they take transfers?”

“No, sorry,” Hermione said. “They’re _really_ exclusive. I only got in because of Harry’s legacy status.”

“I doubt that,” Paul retorted. “Our Hermione could get into _any_ school in the world.” Hermione blushed at that. For magical schools, Harry thought it wasn’t far from the truth. “Well, good luck, up there,” Paul said. “It just won’t be the same without you, mate.”

“Yeah, the same here,” Harry admitted. “But hey, we can still write.”

“Besides, Paul, at least you still have me,” Tiffany said. She leaned playfully against his shoulder, and Harry and Hermione noted with interest that for the first time they could remember, he didn’t immediately push her away.

Once the pizza was gone, they quickly proceeded to cake and opening presents. Paul had got Harry a couple of video games, which he of course wouldn’t be able to play at Hogwarts, but he didn’t tell him that. Tiffany had got him a miniature combination chess, checkers, and backgammon set, which would be a more useful outlet for his strategic side there. Hermione’s gift was a copy of _Jurassic Park_ , which she failed to understand the boys’ interest in, but was happy to get for her brother. But his parents’ gift was the most practical: a very nice gold-plated mechanical watch (and they later revealed they had bought Hermione a similar one as an early birthday present for her) to tell time in the absence of electricity.

They hung out and talked for most of the afternoon, but the Grangers were partly glad to get the party over with. They still had a lot of preparations to make for the coming week.

* * *

“No, you fool! Stuttering like that will only raise their suspicions. Especially Snape’s.”

“My apologies, Master.”

“You’ll have to at least _appear_ to be doing your job properly for this to work. I’m _sure_ you can match the competence of the previous dupes Dumbledore has hired.”

“Yes, Master.”

* * *

The Grangers barely had time to look over the newspaper the next morning when they heard a whoosh of flames from the fireplace, and scrambled from their breakfasts to see a bearded face surrounded by emerald green flames.

“Professor Dumbledore! What’s wrong?” Emma shouted. In the past six years, the living room floo had never once been used without Dumbledore informing them beforehand.

“I apologise for calling on you so suddenly, Mr. and Mrs. Granger,” a tired looking Albus Dumbledore said. “And no, I do not believe there is cause for immediate concern.”

No one missed the Headmaster’s careful use of the word “immediate.” “What is it?” Dan said.

With a sigh, Dumbledore continued, “Some years ago, I agreed to inform you at once if there was any suspected Death Eater activity.”

The Grangers put two and two together. Harry paled a little, and Hermione grabbed her mother’s hand for support. “The Gringotts break-in,” Dan said grimly. “You think they were involved?”

“I do. Now, as the article reports, nothing was stolen. This is strictly confidential, mind, but there was already some concern about the item in the vault that was broken into, and it was moved to a more secure location earlier yesterday. I believe this foiled whatever plans the Death Eaters may have, but the fact that they were so bold as to stage an unprecedented break-in at the wizarding bank indicates a larger game may be afoot.”

“Is there anything we need to do?” Emma said.

“No, no. There is nothing to worry about on your end. I have taken steps to ensure your address in the muggle world does not become widely known, and your children will be quite safe at Hogwarts. After all, it is the oldest and strongest magical fortification in Britain. Merely be watchful, and I will keep you apprised of any updates.”

Emma pressed her mouth together rather like Professor McGonagall frequently did, but Dan said, “Very well. Thank you informing us.”

“You’re quite welcome.” With that, Dumbledore’s face vanished from the flames.

“It figures,” Emma said. “Six years of nothing, and then not a week after Harry reappears to them something happens.”

“I know, dear,” Dan said with a sigh. “But he does seem to be on top of it for now. I think all we can do is watch and wait.”

* * *

The week at the Tonkses passed quickly, despite the intensive crash course on everything from politics and etiquette among the Noble Houses to the inside scoop on the goings on at Hogwarts, mainly courtesy of Dora. Harry and Hermione weren’t too pleased that they had to worry about navigating around certain students—and professors, for that matter—but they supposed every school was a little like that.

They held a small celebration that week in honour of Dora scoring high enough on her N.E.W.T.s to get into Auror training. She had even received a special citation for successfully summoning her wand to her hand at critical point in her Defence exam, for which she thanked Harry and Hermione profusely. That had been enough for Mad-Eye Moody to select her as his personal protege, his last before he planned to retire. (“If you learn one wandless spell,” his letter had said, “that’s the one.”)

The Grangers all enjoyed being in a magical house. Even compared with modern technology, the various enchantments around the house still made cooking and cleaning easier. Harry and Hermione were fascinated by the assortment of charmed knickknacks, Dora’s old magical toys, and the magical plants in the garden. Dora was all too happy to demonstrate some magic to them and give them a sneak peak at their classes. She also led them around the property so that they could feel out the wards and compare them with their own, which she agreed would be a useful skill in a number of fields.

They mostly stuck around the house, but they did make one trip up to Diagon Alley. Hermione still wanted to take a full inventory of the items in Harry’s Gringotts vault, especially the books, and a time when the Tonkses could come and have three wands out around Harry was as good as any.

“You know, I still don’t really understand about why the Goblin Rebellions are such a big deal in the magical world,” Dan said as they walked down the Alley. “You trust the goblins to run your financial system, now, and it looks like they’re doing a decent job of it.”

“A better question would be why do the pureblood supremacists trust the goblins to run the bank?” Andi countered quietly. “The rebellions are ancient history. The last one was the one led by Urg the Unclean in 1724. The thing is, most of the purebloods still view goblins as inferior, but they’re lazy, so they push off the financial work on them, just like they push off the housework on the house elves.”

“House elves?” Hermione asked.

“Oh, you haven’t read about those? Well, that’s a whole other can of worms there. Anyway, my theory is that they think they’re so superior that they can control the goblins now, which ought to be laughable to anyone who’s actually met a goblin.”

The two families bowed politely to the guards as they entered the marble building. The place was more subdued than before, as goblin and wizard alike were still reeling from the news of last week’s break-in, and security was very tight. A significant number of goblin warriors armed with their wicked axes were guarding the entrances to the tunnels. Once inside, though, Dan found an open counter and, remembering Andi’s advice on goblin etiquette (something else few purebloods bothered with), had Harry’s vault key out already before speaking: “Excuse me, Harry Potter would like to access his vault.”

The goblin teller quickly looked over a key and passed the group on without incident, and after another harrowing ride on the mine cart, they reached the Potter Vault. Dora and Ted then went on to the Tonks Vault to make a withdrawal since Harry’s vault was cramped enough with five people inside, and Dora needed to do some shopping for her Auror training.

“So this is the Potter Family fortune,” Andi said as Hermione made a beeline for the books. “I’ve never seen it myself, although the Blacks had a lot of similar things.”

“Well, we’ve decided to make a full catalogue, in case we need to find something quickly later.”

“Of course, but do let me check some of these things over before you handle them. I wouldn’t expect the Potters to have any cursed items, but you can’t be too careful in these old vaults.”

Andi went through the box of jewelry first, since those were the ones most likely to have enchantments on them, quickly waving her wand over each piece. Many of them turned out to have some spell on them or other, mostly fire-protection charms and anti-theft jinxes. There was a pair of bracelets with an attached note saying they were charmed to protect the wearers from a few common jinxes, which interested Dan and Emma. However, Andi soon figured out that those jinxes were in fashion in the early 1800s and were no longer very common. She did find one booby-trapped Black Family heirloom from Dorea in the box: a tiara that was cursed to give blisters to any muggle who touched it. Andi set it aside, saying that the goblins could remove the curse for a fee.

Meanwhile, Hermione was writing down the title and author of each and every book, carefully copying down the runes for the languages she didn’t recognise. Harry and Dan looked over the wardrobe and the antique furniture.

“What about the portraits?” Emma said, looking at the stack of frames leaning against the remaining wall.

“Hmm, they must have been salvaged from the house,” Andi said.

The portrait on top still showed a middle-aged man sleeping in a chair. He looked like a classic early seventeenth century lord, wearing a tight-fitting doublet and breeches embroidered with a dizzying floral pattern. He had long, sandy-coloured hair down to his shoulder, worn with a wide moustache and a pointed goatee. He sat in front of a picture window that showed an idyllic country scene.

“Who is he?” Emma asked.

“I don’t know. I don’t recognise him…well, let’s wake him up and ask him.”

The Grangers hadn’t seen a talking portrait up close before (the Tonkses didn’t have any family portraits of anyone they considered worth keeping), so they all stopped what they were doing to watch. Andi knocked on the painting’s frame a couple of times, but the sleeping man didn’t respond. She knocked harder, and called to him, but there was still nothing.

“Hmm…” She drew her wand. “Sometimes when these things are inactive for so long, they don’t…” She waved her wand, and a stream of sparks hit the man in the face.

He jerked awake and flailed his arms as he nearly fell out of his gilded chair. “Ah, me! Who dost wake me?” he cried with an accent that sounded vaguely, but not quite, Scottish. “Prithee, who is there?”

The Grangers stood in amazement as the man seemed to approach them from the chair and look about the vault as if the frame were a window. Andi turned to Harry. “Well, he’s your painting.”

He uneasily stepped forward and said, “Hello, sir. I’m Harry Potter.”

“Harry?” the painting said, looking closer. “Oh, thou art the same! Thy face is thy good father’s.” He then reached out and knocked on his frame from the inside. “Awake, my friends, awake! Tis a joyous day! The prodigal son has returned!” From behind the frame, there were suddenly the grunts and moans of other people waking up. “Melania? Where is my Melania?”

“The bottom frame, husband,” a muffled voice said.

Andi sprang into action. “Dan, Emma, set them side by side. There’s only four frames. There should be enough space.” She, Dan, and Emma carefully moved the large frames off the stack as the children watched. They were, after all, large enough for a life-sized portrait to sit comfortably in. “I should warn you,” she said. “The paintings aren’t _really_ alive. They just perform a very good imitation, as you’ll notice if you talk to them for more than a few minutes, although they do retain much of the memories of their subjects.”

In the four paintings, now set beside one another, there was first the sandy-haired man with antiquated speech, then an old man whose grey hair stuck out wildly wherever he had any, which was mostly around the sides of his head. Part of his frame appeared to have been damaged by fire. Then there was an old woman with Andi’s angular cheekbones, and finally, two witches were picking themselves up off an eighteenth century sofa: a tall black woman, and another with flowing blond hair, very pale skin, and piercing blue eyes. The black woman rose to her feet and, to the Grangers’ amazement, crossed through the intervening two frames to sit on the sandy-haired man’s lap.

But through all this Andi was fixated on the older woman. “Great Aunt Dorea?” she said.

“Andromeda? Andromeda Black?” the woman said in a soothing voice. “Yes, I remember you. And this is baby Harry. I can hardly believe it.”

“It’s certainly he, my dear,” the old man said. “He has Lily’s eyes.”

“Um, I’m sorry, but who are you?” Harry said.

“Harry, these two are portraits of your grandparents, Charlus and Dorea Potter,” Andi explained. “As for the others, I don’t know.”

“Ah, Belladonna Black, madam,” the blond woman said. “Née Greengrass. You are a Black as well, then?”

“I was. It’s Andromeda Tonks, now. And you?” Andi said, turning to the other couple.

“Ah, pardon our manners, milady,” the sandy-haired man said, bowing. “Wulfric Henderson Potter, at your service. And she here is my good wife, Melania.”

“Harry, I see now thou art a fine young lad,” Melania said.

“Aye, he is a pretty lording,” Wulfric Henderson Potter said. “Prithee, Harry, what year is it, and how do you call your companions?”

“Um, it’s 1991,” Harry said. “And these are my parents.” All of the portraits gasped in surprise.

“Ah, we’re Harry’s adoptive parents,” Dan clarified. “Daniel and Emma Granger, and this is our daughter, Hermione.”

“Hermione,” Wulfric said wistfully. “A sad tale’s best for winter: I have one of sprites and goblins.”

Hermione blinked a few times. That was not the kind of greeting she was expecting, painting or no. But damned if she didn’t know _The Winter_ _’s Tale_ backwards and forwards. As soon as she came to her senses, she answered, “Let’s have that, good sir. Come on, sit down: come on, and do your best to fright me with your sprites; you’re powerful at it.”

“There was a man—”

“Nay, come, sit down; then on.”

“Dwelt by a churchyard: I will tell it softly; yond crickets shall not hear it.”

“Come on, then, and give’t me in mine ear.”

Wulfric laughed, and the other portraits laughed with him, although if one listened closely, their laughed sounded somewhat canned. “This is the prettiest low-born lass that ever ran on the green-sward,” he said. “Thou art a fine student of the great playwright.”

Hermione smiled. “Not describing my namesake on that one, but thank you, sir.”

Harry, meanwhile, was grinning ear to ear at being able to meet his ancestors—or at least something close to them. “Can we put them in our house?” he said.

“Oh, many thanks if you could,” said Belladonna Black. “’Twould be good to escape the darkness of this vault.”

“I’m…sorry. I don’t think so,” Emma said. “We live in a muggle house. We have nowhere we could put you where visitors wouldn’t see you.”

“Well, actually…” Andi said. “I think we could put them up in our house. That way you could at least see them when you visit.”

“Really?”

“Certainly. Harry can ask the goblins to deliver them—for a fee, of course. Madam Melania, where is your frame?”

“I’m afraid it was destroyed in the explosion,” Charlus said, motioning to the burnt corner of his own frame. “She escaped by hiding with her husband in his frame. Donna’s husband, Perseus Black, wasn’t so lucky, I’m afraid.” Belladonna Black sniffed a little.

“Very well, these four frames, then,” Andi said. “We have room for those.”

“Thanks, Cousin Andi—” Harry started to say, when he was cut off by a scream.

“Mum, look at this!”

“Hermione, what is it?” Emma said frantically. Her daughter had started poking through the books again. Had she found a cursed book?

But Hermione was beaming and holding up and enormous and very thick volume bound in leather. “Mum, it’s a complete First Folio!”

“What!” The book was in fair condition: the binding was worn and cracking, and the pages were yellowed, though not yet too brittle. Emma took it in hand and gingerly opened the cover. Sure enough, there was the Bard himself on the title page, and below were the words, “LONDON Printed by Isaac Iaggard and Ed. Blount. 1623.”

“Oh my god, it is!”

“Ah, thou hast found the Folio. Good lass,” Wulfric said. “Thou shouldst find the Sonnets there as well, if they have survived.”

“The Sonnets!” Hermione eagerly dove back into the box and rummaged around until she pulled out a much smaller booklet, the cover of which read, “SHAKE-SPEARES SONNETS. Neuer before Imprinted.” And at the bottom, the date, 1609. But what really caught her eye was what was on the inside of the cover.

“It’s…it’s _signed_ ,” she said in awe.

“Signed?” Emma asked.

“To Wulfric Henderson Potter and Melania Shacklebolt on the ioyous occasion of your marriage,” she read off. “Be not selfe-wild, for you are much too faire To be deaths conquests and make wormes your heire. William Shakespeare.” Then she stopped cold when she glanced at the printed dedication page. Wulfric and Melania were showing wide, though slightly fixed smiles to her as she made the connection: “Wulfric Henderson… _W.H._!”

The Potter ancestors nodded, and she went weak at the knees. Any Shakespeare scholar would have killed to hold what she held in her hands right now. The First Folio alone was easily worth twenty thousand galleons, but a far rarer copy of the Sonnets, signed to the Fair Youth and the Dark Lady themselves—that was beyond price. As the full implications hit her, for the first time in her life, Hermione Granger fainted.

* * *

Hermione was safely curled up on the sofa back at home with a fairly large book when Harry plopped down next to her.

“What’re you reading?”

She glanced at him over the top of the book. “ _Magical Drafts and Potions_.”

“I thought you already read that.”

“I did. I wanted to read it again.”

Harry pushed the book down in front of her. “Hermione, are you trying to _memorise_ your course books?” he asked. Her memory was pretty good. She only had to read something about three times to learn it by heart, but still…

“No…” she said uncomfortably. She lifted the book up to block off her face from him.

Harry pushed it down again. “Hermione…?”

“…Maybe,” she admitted. “But I just want to make sure I’m prepared enough.”

“Mione, has anyone else _ever_ memorised their course books before to prepare for Hogwarts?”

“It can’t hurt, can it,” she snapped as she lifted the book up again.

He pushed it back down. “It can if you go mad first. You need to lighten up a little, sis. We both know you’re gonna make the best grades in class already.”

“We don’t know that yet, Harry. And besides, I think we’re going to _need_ to go over _this_ book a couple more times. It’s really hard to follow.”

“I didn’t think so,” Harry teased. “It’s just like a cookbook.”

Hermione glared at him. “It’s not just a “cookbook.” It’s supposed to teach the principles behind potion making so you can adapt to changes and new situations—but it does a really bad job of explaining _why_ things work the way they do. And from what Cousin Dora said, it doesn’t sound like Professor Snape will be much help either.”

Harry let out a mock gasp. “Did you just criticise a _teacher_? Who are you, and what have you done with my sister?”

She smacked him on the arm. “Prat. And most of the other course books seem a little amateurish, too.”

“Well, you heard what Mum and Dad said. The wizarding population is so small they don’t have that many books to work with. Even the best over there is only above average by muggle standards.”

“Yeah, I know. At least we’re supposed to be going to the best school around.” Hermione finally willingly put the book down. “Maybe I have got a little uptight about it,” she admitted.

“A little?” Harry said with a grin.

“Okay, a lot.”

“As usual.”

She smacked him in the arm again.

“Okay, okay, I’m done—Hey, play me at chess?”

A wicked grin crossed his sister’s face. “Only if you’re ready to lose.”


	15. The Hogwarts Express

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I am but the learner. JK Rowling is the master.
> 
> In case it’s not clear, the longer italicised passages in this chapter are flashbacks.

Platform Nine and Three Quarters was a bustle of activity on the first of September, filled with hundreds of families sending their children off to Hogwarts. Owls hooted in their cages, cats caterwauled in their carriers or just wandered between people’s legs, and a chatter of voices filled the air. A giant scarlet engine stood at one end of the platform, followed by half a dozen old-fashioned-looking passenger cars. Along the back wall, a little row of vendors was selling magazines and charmed trinkets and breakfast sandwiches, mainly to the parents. Harry and his family were pleased to see that there was too much activity here for anyone to give him much notice.

By unspoken agreement, the Grangers headed for the less crowded part of the platform near the rear of the train. They were sure the whole train would fill up eventually, but it would be good to get on board and stake out a compartment early.

“This one looks good,” Dan said as they came to a compartment in the last car. His children nodded noncommittally. “Alright, let’s get you two loaded up. Harry, put Hedwig in first…Good, now give me a hand with the trunks.” Harry lifted Hedwig’s cage into the train and then crouched on the lip of the door and helped his father lift his trunk and then Hermione’s aboard. Books were heavy things, after all.

He hopped down to hug his parents a final time before they set off.

Emma grabbed them both in a hug and struggled to avoid breaking down in tears, and she discreetly scratched Harry behind the ears. “Good luck up there, kids. We’ll miss you. We love you both.”

“We love you too!” Hermione exclaimed, being the less composed of the two. Harry whispered his agreement.

Dan was a little more restrained than his wife, though he wrapped an arm around each of their shoulders in turn. “Harry, do your best to find some real friends who aren’t just fans,” he said.

“I will.”

“And Hermione, just because you’re not at home doesn’t mean you can go crazy with the sweets.”

“Dad!”

“And both of you remember what Cousin Andi said. Lay low with the wandless magic—at least till you see how people react.” They nodded to him.

“Be sure to write us,” Emma added. “That goes double if there’s any funny business. And I’m sure the Tonkses will want to hear from you, too.”

“We will, Mum,” Hermione said. She and Harry climbed back on onto the train.

As they stood on the threshold, Dan recited, “This above all—to thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man. Farewell. My blessing season this in thee!”

“Most humbly do I take my leave, my lord,” Harry said with a laugh.

“Goodbye, Mum. Goodbye, Dad. We’ll see you at Christmas,” Hermione called. And they went into the train, rolling their trunks into the compartment and sliding them under their seats.

“Harry, look, I think it’s the Weasleys,” Hermione said as they settled in.

“Where?”

“There, behind you.”

Harry stood and turned around, looking out the window to see a family of redheads heading toward the train. He remembered what cousin Andi had said about the Weasleys:

 _“Arthur Weasley’s been a very valuable ally to me. Granted, he’s not much for speeches, and people always underestimate him because he’s only the head of Misuse of Muggle Artifacts, but he is a stalwart supporter of muggle rights, and he is_ brilliant _at behind the scenes manoeuvring. I_ _’ve been working with him on a Muggle Protection Act that I think we actually have a chance of getting passed by spring. His family’s really great, too, from what I hear. You can’t miss them. Just look for the biggest group of redheads.”_

_The Grangers all looked at each other._ _“Do they have a set of twins?” Hermione asked._

_“Why, yes. Have you seen them?”_

_“Yes, in Flourish and Blotts. Their daughter was buying the newest Harry Potter book,” she said with a touch of annoyance._

_“Well, that’s going to happen,” Andi admitted. “Half the little girls in the country read_ The Harry Potter Adventures _. Even Dora read the first few._ _”_

 _“Hey!_ Harry Potter on the Orient Express _was pretty good,_ _” Dora had protested, to the amusement of the others._

Soon the last students climbed on board, and the train began to move. Things had been quiet so far, but only a couple of minutes later, the compartment door opened, revealing three redheaded boys, including a pair of twins, standing outside.

“D’you guys mind?” the youngest one said. “All the others ones are full.”

“Go ahead,” Harry said politely.

“Well, look who it is,” one of the twins said.

“Who?” the younger boy asked.

“Harry Potter,” the other twin said.

Harry was still wearing his hair in bangs to try to cover his scar. He had even let it grow out over the past month, even though that made it all the more unmanageable. But none of that helped with a certain pair of twins who already knew what he looked like.

“What? Really?” The youngest redhead stumbled as he sat in the opposite corner from Harry.

Harry suppressed the urge to roll his eyes. “Yep, that’s me,” he said.

“How do you do, Mr. Potter?” the first twin said with somewhat exaggerated formality.

“I don’t believe we’ve been officially introduced,” the other added. “My name is George Weasley, and this is Fred.”

“And this is ickle Ronnie,” Fred said.

“It’s just Ron,” the other boy said quickly.

“Pleasure to meet you,” Harry replied. “I’ve heard a little about you, actually. My cousin, Andromeda Tonks, is working with your father on the Muggle Protection Act.”

The twins looked at each other in surprise.

“Oh, he’s heard of us, George.”

“Only good things, I hope, Fred.”

“Wait a minute, you just said _you_ were George,” Hermione spoke up for the first time, pointing to the one who now appeared to be Fred.

“Of course not. That’s silly. I’m Gred,” he said.

“And I’m Forge,” said the other.

“And you would be…?” they said together.

“Oh, this is my sister, Hermione Granger,” Harry answered for her.

That response managed to shock even the infamous Weasley twins into silence, but Ron blurted out, “Sister? Harry Potter doesn’t have a sister.”

“He most certainly does,” Hermione said. “My parents adopted him when we were little.”

“A sister!” said Forge.

“Now _that_ _’s_ the best prank we’ve heard all summer,” Gred continued.

“It’s not a prank!” Harry protested.

“Oh, but it is.”

“You disappear for ten years and then show up with a sister—”

“That is _genius_!”

“It’s even better because it’s true.”

Harry and Hermione shared a nervous look. It was going to be an interesting year with these two around.

“So then you really _were_ raised by muggles?” Ron said. “Boy, is Ginny gonna be disappointed.”

“Well, I was,” Harry answered. “I didn’t even know about magic or what happened to my birth parents till I was five.”

“What? Didn’t anyone tell you about…You-Know-Who?” His voice dropped to a whisper.

Harry shook his head. “No, I was raised by my muggle aunt and uncle at first, but they…didn’t really want me. When I was adopted, Professor Dumbledore came and told us about Voldemort.”

All three Weasleys gasped loudly, but then, incredibly, they saw both Harry and Hermione _roll their eyes_ , at them, as if speaking the most feared name in magical Britain were completely unimportant. Hedwig hooted once from her cage in the other corner.

“You said his name!” Ron squeaked out.

“Well, sure, Dumbledore always says it.”

“But he’s _Dumbledore_. You of all people…”

“Honestly,” Hermione interrupted. “Fear of a name only increases the fear of the thing itself. I figured that out when I was six.”

The twins glanced at each other. “I think we may be out of our depth, George,” Fred—apparently—said.

“Indeed, Fred…” George answered. “Well, good luck, Ron,” he said with a grin. “We’re gonna go find Lee Jordan. He brought a giant tarantula.” Ron shuddered as they left the cabin.

Things were fairly quiet after that. Harry explained to Ron as much of his life story as he was comfortable revealing. Ron got a little confused the first few times Harry referred to his adoptive parents and Mum and Dad, but he was fine otherwise. Hermione excitedly talked about all the magic she wanted to learn at Hogwarts, which did put him off a little. Ron told them about all his brothers and his little sister, although he seemed a little bit cagey himself. Harry could understand, though—he knew the Weasleys weren’t exactly wealthy. It turned out Ron didn’t know much about his father’s Muggle Protection Act, although he said he thought it was a nice idea.

They spent part of the morning just watching the countryside pass by. Hermione had it in her head to try to figure out where Hogwarts was from the nearby landmarks, but Harry doubted that would work. Then, a clattering cart full of sweets rolled by at half past twelve, and a woman who bore more than a passing resemblance to Harry’s and Hermione’s Grandma called to them: “Honeydukes Express. Anything from the trolley, dears?”

“No thanks,” Ron muttered, his ears turning a little pink. “I’ve got sandwiches.”

“You go ahead, Hermione,” Harry said.

“You sure?” she asked. Harry nodded, and Hermione went out to look over the cart. “Oh, Harry,” she called back, “they have pumpkin pasties… _and_ liquorice wands.”

“They do?” Harry jumped up to join his sister. Pumpkin and liquorice were among the few sweets that held any interest to his feline tastes. He grabbed some of each, while Hermione bought herself some cauldron cakes and what Harry considered an excessive quantity of chocolate frogs.

Meanwhile, Ron had unwrapped a lumpy parcel. He halfheartedly dissected a sandwich as the other two sat back down. “Aw, man,” he complained, “I keep telling Mum I don’t like corned beef.”

“Ooh, I love corned beef!” Harry said. “Trade you one?”

Ron stared at him. “Are you messing with me?”

“No,” Hermione said, shaking her head. “My brother’s not exactly normal.”

“Really, have a pastie,” he said.

“Okay…” Ron handed over a sandwich in exchange, which Harry eagerly bit into. While they were eating, a fat, grey rat lazily crawled out of Ron’s jacket and started nibbling on the edge of one of his sandwiches.

“Oi, Scabbers, geroff!” Ron wasn’t actually eating the sandwich, but he still picked it up and tore off a piece of the crust for the rat rather than let him keep nibbling at it. “Sorry, this is Scabbers. I got him from Percy “cause he got an owl for becoming a _prefect_ ,” he told the others with annoyance.

Scabbers glanced over at Harry and froze stiff, possibly because Harry had also locked eyes with him and looked ready to pounce. Neither one of them moved as an uneasy silence stretched.

“Uh, you okay, Harry?” Ron asked.

Harry shook himself out of it. “Huh? Oh, yeah, sorry. I’m just…more of a cat person.”

It was only because he’d been using that joke for years that Hermione didn’t laugh. Scabbers grabbed the crust of bread in his mouth and scampered back into Ron’s jacket.

“I thought you could only have owls, cats, or toads at Hogwarts,” Hermione said.

“Nah, they mean you can only have one of those three,” said Ron. “You can have smaller pets, though.”

They finished their lunch, with Ron eating all of the extra sweets that Harry and Hermione decided they didn’t want. The countryside out the window became hillier and more forested as the train rolled north. Surprisingly few people poked their heads in that afternoon to try to meet Harry, but there was one bigger group after a while. Ron was in the middle of a long monologue about Quidditch that only Harry was really interested in when the compartment door slid open, and three boys strutted in like they owned the place.

Two of the boys were thickset and seemed to have a permanent scowl. If they were first years, they were quite large for it and looked more like bodyguards than students standing beside the boy in the middle. That boy was pale and had bleach-blond hair and an air of superiority. Harry and Hermione recognised him at once. Cousin Andi had shown them a picture of her estranged family and pointed that boy out, offering one word of advice about him: “Avoid.”

“So, everybody’s saying that Harry Potter’s in this compartment,” the pale boy said, looking at Harry. “Is it you?”

“Yes,” Harry said, trying to decide whether to be more concerned with him or his two minions.

“Oh, these are Crabbe and Goyle,” the boy said lightly. “And my name’s Malfoy, Draco Malfoy.”

Now Harry was sorry he hadn’t tried to introduce himself as “Bond, James Bond.” Ron stiffled a snigger at the introduction, and Draco Malfoy looked ready to make some disparaging remark or other to him, but Harry cut him off. Drawing on the rules of etiquette that Cousin Andi had drilled into him, he stood up and responded, “Draco Malfoy, heir to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Malfoy?”

“You’ve heard of me?” Malfoy replied with a smug expression.

“Your family’s hard to miss, Mr. Malfoy, what with as many things as your father’s got named after him.”

Ron was shocked by the apparent praise, but Malfoy didn’t fail to notice the slight condescending tone in Harry’s voice. “My father is a well-respected philanthropist,” he said, turning up his nose ever so slightly. He shot another pointed look at Ron, and said, _“You'll soon find out some wizarding families are much better than others, Mr. Potter. You don’t want to go making friends with the wrong sort. I can help you there.”_ He offered a hand to Harry.

Harry clasped his own hands firmly in front of him. “That’s very generous of you, Mr. Malfoy,” he said serenely, “but I think my sister and I can already tell the wrong sort.”

“Sister?” Malfoy glanced in confusion at the only girl in the compartment.

“Adopted,” Harry and Hermione said in unison.

Malfoy eyed the two of them suspiciously, as if something had thrown off his calculations. “Well,” he said, “I guess we’ll find out soon enough, then.”

“I guess we will,” Harry replied.

“Come on, let’s go,” Malfoy said to Crabbe and Goyle.

Harry and Hermione breathed a sigh of relief as they left, while Ron looked amazed. “Blimey, Harry, how’d you do that?” he said. “I didn’t think anyone could make a Malfoy back down like that.”

“Cousin Andi taught us how to deal with people like him. You just have to know how to talk to them. Basically, just pretend you’re better than everybody else and then act really sarcastic about it.”

They all shared a laugh at that, and Ron did a surprisingly good impression of Malfoy’s voice: “Oh, yes, I’m Draco Malfoy, and my whole family’s been in Slytherin for over nine hundred years, hasn’t yours…?” They all laughed some more. “Merlin, why’d anybody actually _want_ to be in Slytherin?”

“Merlin _was_ in Slytherin,” Hermione observed.

“Well, maybe, but they’re all just a bunch of snakes, now. Never was a dark wizard or witch in Britain who wasn’t in Slytherin.”

“They’re not that bad!” Hermione protested. “Cousin Andi was in Slytherin, and she’s really nice.”

“Yeah, and Sirius Black was in Gryffindor, and he turned evil,” Harry added.

In Ron’s pocket, unnoticed even by the boy himself, Scabbers relaxed and went back to sleep.

“Well, I guess he was,” Ron admitted. “But still, my whole family’s been in Gryffindor. I’d hate to wind up in Slytherin—do know know what houses you want?”

“I think I’d like Gryffindor,” Harry said. “Both my birth parents went there.”

“I do think it sounds like the best one,” said Hermione, “but Ravenclaw wouldn’t be too bad. Do you know how they sort us though? _Hogwarts, A History_ didn’t say.”

“No, sorry. They never tell the first years. Fred said we have to wrestle a troll, but I think he was joking.”

“Wrestle a troll!” yelled Hermione. “You don’t think—?”

“No, of course not,” said Harry. “Even Dumbledore’s not that crazy.”

They were deep into the mountains by now, and the daylight was starting to fade. Presently, though, they passed into a wide valley with some small, shimmering lochs in the distance.

“Harry—I think this is Glen More!” Hermione exclaimed. “We must be really far into the highlands.”

“Well, they did build Hogwarts far away from muggle towns,” Harry said.

“We’ll probably be arriving soon.” Hermione said firmly. She started digging into her trunk. “You two should change into your robes. I’ll go change in the loo.” She pulled her robes out and left the compartment.

Ron stared at Harry. “Is she always like that?”

Harry sniggered a little. “Yeah, mate. Better just do what she says.”

A few minutes later, the three of them were all changed. Hermione opened the compartment door again, only to jump back as she was nearly knocked over by her brother as he pounced at her.

“Whoa, watch out!” he said.

“Harry!”

But Harry stood up in front of her holding a large toad. “You nearly stepped on it,” he explained. Hermione grimaced a little as they went inside. Harry put the toad on the seat between him and Hedwig’s cage. The owl seemed to scoff at it.

A few minutes later, a nervous-looking, round-faced boy who had poked his head in earlier came back around, searching the floors of the compartments. Harry remembered him at once.

“Hey, mate, is this your toad?” he said.

“Trevor!” The round-faced boy dashed into the compartment and picked up the toad. “Thanks a lot, mate. My Gran woulda killed me if I lost him. Oh, I’m Neville, by the way. Neville Longbottom.”

Harry sprang to his feet. “Neville Longbottom, heir to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Longbottom?”

Neville stood up straighter, trying to appear properly noble, but he still looked pale and nervous. “Y-yes.”

“Pleased to meet you. I’m Harry Potter, and this is my sister, Hermione Granger.” He offered his hand to the boy.

Neville’s eyes widened, and he shook Harry’s hand vigorously. “L-Lord Potter. I am honoured to m-meet you,” he stammered.

“No titles outside the Ministry chambers, Neville. Just call me Harry,” the sometime-lord said with a chuckle.

“Wow, thanks, Ha-Ha-Harry.”

“No problem. Your Gran’s been a big help to my cousin, Madam Tonks.”

“Oh, r-right. Gran introduced me to her once.”

“Oh, and this is Ron Weasley,” Harry added. “I think he’s a cousin of yours—well, I guess we’re all cousins around here. Anyway, come on, have a seat,” Harry insisted. Neville sat down next to him, his head spinning, carefully holding his toad in his lap.

“So why’d you bring a toad, anyway?” Ron asked. “Mind, I got stuck with my brother’s rat, so I can’t talk.”

“My Great Uncle Algie gave him to me,” Neville explained. “Him and Gran are old fashioned about that kind of thing. I mean, he is useful for some things. Toads are magic-resistant, so they’re good for testing spells and potions on.”

“ _Really_?” said Hermione. “I never knew that about toads. I knew cats could _sense_ magic, and owls carry letters—”

“Yeah, I guess a lot of people had toads in my Gran’s day,” Neville said, shrugging his shoulders. “I’d rather have brought a cat, though.”

Harry had been pleased to learn that so many witches and wizards were cat lovers, even if it wouldn’t do him much good in practice. Neville certainly seemed to be a lot nicer than Draco Malfoy. Harry pondered how these two heirs of Most Ancient Houses were so different from each other…

_“The Most Ancient Houses,” Andi had explained. The original founders of the Wizards’ Council. There were twelve of them originally, but there’s only six left, and even those are dying out. It might only be two in another century.”_

_“Well, if I may be so bold,” Dan had said. “If what you’ve told us about pureblood families is true, it sounds like inbreeding is catching up with them.”_

_“Oh, you’re not the only one who thinks so. That’s what Hippocrates Smethwyck’s been saying his entire life. I doubt it’s a coincidence that the Most Ancient Houses of Smethwyck and Monroe are still doing well when they’re the only ones that aren’t ‘pureblood’ anymore. Even Dumbledore will tell you the same if you press him on it, but most of the old families still care more about purity.”_

_“More than that, even,” Ted had told them. “It’s something of a tradition for Most Ancient Houses to have children at the same time, even when they don’t like each other much. In the old days, it made it easier to arrange marriages, but they still do it today. That’s why they have three children in your year.”_

Of those three children, Harry could already tell Draco Malfoy was a smarmy git like the worst of the self-centred politicians Cousin Andi had to deal with. But Neville Longbottom, it seemed, was the exact opposite. He came from a powerful family, but he was badly lacking self-confidence. Harry was sure Neville had had learnt plenty more etiquette than he had, but he was tripping over himself in an actual conversation. He would need a lot of encouragement if he was ever going to hold his own against the likes of Malfoy, and with the political feud in which their families were locked, he would need it sooner rather than later.

It wasn’t much longer before the train slowed to a stop. Hermione declared that they were probably near the northwest corner of the Upper Highlands, but Harry suspected she was just guessing by this point. It had been too dark to see out for a while. People pushed their way out of the train onto a platform that was much smaller and more cramped than the one in Kings Cross. A fair number of people were already there—students whose families lived in Hogsmeade and who almost never took the train except for the first years in the traditional ritual of getting to know each other. The older students all seemed to be heading off in one direction, toward where Harry could just make out some black horseless carriages, but the first years were hearkened to a deep, booming voice and a lantern that bobbed high above their heads.

“Firs’ years! All the firs’ years over here, now!” Hermione grabbed Harry’s hand to try to stay together and ran up to the front of the line, but they both stopped and looked up in awe at the holder of the lantern: a giant man whose face was almost hidden in a massive, shaggy mane of black hair and a great big, bushy beard. He looked down and spotted Harry at once.

“Harry!” the huge man said. “Harry Potter! Las’ time I saw you you was just a baby. Great ter see you again. Look just like just yer dad, yeh do, but you’ve got yer mum’s eyes.”

Was _everyone_ who knew his parents going to say that? “Nice to meet you, Mister…”

“Oh, sorry.” He drew himself up, and his voice boomed out over the crowd. “My name’s Rubeus Hagrid—yeh can jus’ call me Hagrid. I’m Keeper of Keys and Grounds here at Hogwarts. I’ll be taking yeh up ter the castle. Firs’ years follow me. Mind yer step, now…”

Hagrid led them up a winding path through the trees, chatting with Harry as they walked. “Well, Dumbledore asked me to take yeh from yer parents’ house to yer relatives after…well, after that night,” he said. “Was sorry to hear they treated yeh mean, I was. If I’da known…” A dark look crossed his face.

“It’s alright,” Harry said after an awkward pause. “It worked out pretty well in the end.”

Hagrid smiled down at him through his tangled beard. “Yeah, that it did, I see. Right lucky of yeh ter get a sister outta the deal.” He looked over at Hermione. “Granger, isn’t it, Miss?”

“Yes, sir, Hermione Granger,” she replied. “Pleased to meet you.”

“Alright, just around this bend, now,” Hagrid called. Even Harry and Hermione gasped when they saw Hogwarts Castle for the first time. They had seen some muggle castles, and they didn’t hold a candle to it. It was vast, towering, and sprawling over the high mountain on which it sat overlooking a lake, and its many towers gleamed with firelight against the starry sky.

They all loaded into boats to cross the lake. Harry, Hermione, Ron, and Neville got a boat together, right behind Hagrid’s. As they crossed they could feel the wards of the castle approaching, a virtual wall of magic, ancient and singing with power. Most of the first years didn’t notice until it was right on top of them, but Harry and Hermione could feel it coming almost from the shore. When they reached the middle of the lake, they closed their eyes and let the wards wash over them like waves. They were immensely more powerful than the ones on their house—so powerful that they felt refreshing and energising to the touch—and richly layered with centuries of renewal and improvement. Not just the two of them, but all the first-years felt awakened and lively when they passed through, even after the long day.

“Wow…” Harry and Hermione said with a contented sigh, both smiling like they’d been hit with Cheering Charms.

“Whoa, what was that?” someone nearby called. Similar words echoed from the other boats.

“Those were the castle wards,” said Hermione. “I had no idea they were that powerful.”

“That’s righ,’” Hagrid called. “No safer place than Hogwarts. Not one. Pro’ly not even Gringotts after what happened this summer.”

It turned out that they needed that energy boost, too. After they rode the boats into an underground harbour, they climbed a long passageway that left the children huffing and puffing by the time it let out onto the grass in front of the castle.

“Everyone here? Good,” Hagrid said when they arrived. He walked up to a great pair of oaken doors and pounded on them three times with his gigantic fist.


	16. The Sorting Hat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Our continuing mission is to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new Harry Potters, to boldly go where no JK Rowling has gone before.
> 
> Parts of this chapter have been quoted from Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone.
> 
> And now we see the much anticipated answer to the question of Harry’s and Hermione’s house at Hogwarts. Perhaps not the most imaginative outcome, I’ll admit, but you’ll soon see that there are important reasons why the story had to go this way.

The great doors of Hogwarts Castle opened to reveal the familiar face of Professor McGonagall, albeit with a sterner expression than Harry and Hermione were used to seeing from her. She lined up the first years and briefly explained the Sorting Ceremony and the House Points System. A few people screamed as the Hogwarts ghosts made an appearance, mostly the other muggle-borns, who hadn’t been warned about them, but soon enough, McGonagall led them through another set of double doors into the Great Hall.

The Great Hall was as awe-inspiring as their first look at the castle from outside. Four long tables stretched all the way from the doors to the High Table, where the rest of the professors were sitting, and thousands upon thousands of candles floated overhead, reaching up to the ceiling, which projected the velvety black of the night sky. Yet this beautiful sight was also a deeply sobering one, all the more so as the hundreds of faces in the Great Hall watched the first years enter in profound silence.

For more than a third of the length of those long tables was empty.

There was no sound but footsteps as the first years passed seat after seat on the wooden benches that stood empty in front of bare tables with no golden plates and goblets laid out. This absence, as Harry and Hermione and many of the others knew, was a consequence of the war—not the children who were lost, though there were some, but mostly the ones who were never born.

 _“You have no idea how bad it was in those last few years,” Cousin Ted had explained. “People were dying left and right, the bad guys were winning, you had no idea who you could trust—it was a horrible world to bring a child into. By 1979, the birth rate in magical Britain had fallen by_ half _—the same thing happened in muggle France in World War I, for some perspective. The average year in Hogwarts is about eighty students, but yours will be the smallest class in centuries. If I_ _’ve read the numbers right, there’ll only be forty in your year.”_

This was the clearest sign Harry had yet seen of the damage the war had caused. The hellish years leading up to All Hallows’ Eve of 1981 had cut a wound in this country deeper than any scar or blasted-out cottage. It was here, touching the very heart of this joyous occasion, and everywhere else there were seats still standing empty, even a decade after the war—haunted by the unborn who were perhaps as numerous as the dead. For the first time in his life, he began to truly understand why the wizarding world was so eager to embrace him as a saviour, and why Voldemort’s name was still so feared.

The thought terrified him. He was only eleven. What kind of a saviour was he?

Harry looked over at his sister and could tell from her frown that she was rapidly reaching the same conclusions. He had a feeling that Justin, who was in front of him, and the other muggle-borns were also putting the pieces together, but the rest, who already knew about all of this, didn’t seem to think much of it.

They passed the more numerous older students and then quickly passed the younger ones. Near the front of the Hall, there were a number of empty seats for the new students to sit once they were sorted. Harry could feel all the eyes on him, trying to get a glimpse of the Boy-Who-Lived.

They reached the front of the Hall, and Professor McGonagall brought forth a stool on which she placed a tattered old hat.

A _singing_ hat.

In Harry’s opinion, a _badly_ singing hat.

A badly singing hat that read your mind and decided which house your personality was best suited for. Harry and Hermione exchanged a look and silently agreed that this was _exactly_ the kind of thing that wizards would come up with.

_Professor McGonagall now stepped forward holding a long roll of parchment._

_“When I call your name, you will put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted,” she said. “Abbott, Hannah!”_

_A pink faced girl with blond pigtails stumbled out of line, put on the hat, which fell right down over her eyes, and sat down. A moment's pause—_

_“HUFFLEPUFF!” shouted the hat._

_The second table from the right cheered and clapped as Hannah went to sit down at the Hufflepuff table. Harry saw the ghost of the Fat Friar waving merrily at her._

_“Bones, Susan!”_

_“HUFFLEPUFF!” shouted the hat again, and Susan scuttled off to sit next to Hannah._

_“Boot, Terry!”_

_“RAVENCLAW!”_

Harry and Hermione applauded as the first muggle-born in the group took his seat at the second table from the left.

“Brocklehurst, Amanda!” McGonagall called.

A girl with blond hair in a ponytail stepped forward and put the hat on her head. She was the great-granddaughter of Lord Ethelred Brocklehurst, the number one patron of the Diagonal Theatre, Harry remembered. Amanda Brocklehurst followed Terry to Ravenclaw.

_“Brown, Lavender” became the first new Gryffindor, and the table on the far left exploded with cheers; Harry could see Ron’s twin brothers catcalling._

_“Bulstrode, Millicent” then became a Slytherin_ , eliciting equally loud, competitive-sounding cheers from the table at the far right.

Malfoy’s lackey, Crabbe, Harry and Hermione noted, was very quickly sorted into Slytherin, while the hat spent quite a bit longer on some of the other students. Soon after, the next muggle-born, Kevin, went to Ravenclaw, while Justin was sorted into Hufflepuff. Malfoy’s other bodyguard, Goyle, was another easy sort for Slytherin, and then…

“Granger, Hermione!”

Hermione darted forward eagerly. She didn’t notice, though her brother did, the intense stares that were directed at her and the whispers that filled the Hall: “I heard she’s Potter’s sister.” “He doesn’t have a sister.” “She’s adopted.” “No, _he_ _’s_ adopted.” “Wonder where she’ll go.”

She pulled the Sorting Hat down over her eyes, not quite knowing what to expect, but she gave a start when she heard a small voice speak in her ear: “Hmm, difficult. A mind that would excel even in Ravenclaw, and a talent for wandless magic, even—that’s rare—and yet enough Gryffindor courage to adopt a brother who was hunted by dark wizards. You would do well in either house…”

 _I_ _’m sure Harry will be in Gryffindor,_ she thought. _I_ _’d rather go there_.

“Oh, we’ll see about him in a moment,” the hat said knowingly, “but if you’re sure, better be…GRYFFINDOR!”

Hermione was applauded more loudly than anyone else so far as she stepped down with a broad smile to take her seat at the Gryffindor table. Harry waved to her in congratulations, a gesture than was not lost on those watching. A red-haired prefect who turned out to be the other Weasley brother shook Hermione’s hand enthusiastically when she reached the table.

“Greengrass, Daphne!”

A girl with long, flowing hair as bleach-blond as Malfoy’s walked forward with a stately posture: the _other_ scion of a Most Ancient House in their year. Harry leaned over and nudged Ron. “Watch this one,” he whispered. “Her grandfather’s the leader of the moderates on the Wizengamot.”

Harry was dismayed, though, when the hat didn’t need very long to sort her into Slytherin. He was hoping she would be the more tractable sort, but the circle of people around her would not make it easy now.

_When Neville Longbottom was called, he fell over on his way to the stool. The hat took a long time to decide with Neville. When it finally shouted,_ _“GRYFFINDOR,” Neville ran off still wearing it, and had to jog back amid gales of laughter to give it to “MacDougal, Morag.”_

_Malfoy swaggered forward when his name was called and got his wish at once: the hat had barely touched his head when it screamed,_ _“SLYTHERIN!”_

After him, Lily Moon was sorted into Gryffindor, and Theodore Nott also went to Slytherin. “Watch out for him,” Harry whispered to Ron. “His father’s a suspected Death Eater.” Ron nodded his agreement.

But just a few names after that, it was Harry’s own turn. When Professor McGonagall called his name, the whispers returned with a vengeance: “ _The_ Harry Potter?” “Three sickles on Gryffindor.” “It’s really him!” “Did you see the scar?”

Harry locked eyes with Hermione to avoid all the other stares as he sat and dropped the hat onto his head so that it covered his eyes. He waited.

“How _interesting_ ,” the hat whispered in his ear. “An animagus at your age.”

Harry’s heart leapt into his throat. _You can_ _’t—!_

“Oh, no, I won’t tell anyone, don’t worry. But it’s a very rare skill. I’ve only seen it twice before in all my centuries.”

_You_ _’ve seen it before! Who? How?_

“I cannot tell you. I must respect all students’ privacy, even after their deaths, though the clues may still be out there for you to find. Ah, but where to put you? Plenty of courage, I see, and not a bad mind either. There’s talent and cunning, oh yes—but not quite the temperament for Slytherin. Perhaps if things had gone differently—oh, but you could still be great in Ravenclaw, you know.”

 _Are you kidding?_ thought Harry. _Me in Ravenclaw and Hermione in Gryffindor? I_ _’d never hear the end of it._

He was sure the hat was laughing at him. “Well, then, as amusing as that would be, we’ll go with GRYFFINDOR!”

There was a sound of thunder. All of Gryffindor House rose to its feet as one in wild cheering. A few scattered students rose at the Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff tables, and it quickly turned it into a standing ovation from three houses. The Slytherins, he saw, sat and applauded politely. Fred and George Weasley shouted over the din, “We got Potter! We got Potter!”

The Hall didn’t calm down until Albus Dumbledore stood from his golden chair at the High Table and raised his hands, still smiling, his silver hair shining in the candlelight. The Great Hall was silent again in seconds, and he sat down again without a word to allow the sorting to complete. Harry was both impressed and relieved to see that the old man had an even greater influence in the Hall than he did.

Harry fought his way through the line of admirers wanting to shake his hand as Professor McGonagall called the next name. He took the open seat next to Hermione. His sister hugged him and whispered “Congratulations, Harry.”

“You too, Hermione,” he whispered back.

Sally and Zacharias Smith both went to Hufflepuff. They were from different families, Harry remembered, which was sure to cause some confusion. Zacharias was from the Noble House of Smith, the first and largest of the families descended from Helga Hufflepuff, while Sally, it was believed, traced her family to a muggle-born Smith a few generations back. Soon after them, the Sorting wrapped up with a very relieved looking Ron Weasley joining Harry and Hermione at the Gryffindor table and Blaise Zabini going to Slytherin.

No sooner had Ron got past his brothers and sat down on the other side of Harry then Albus Dumbledore again rose to his feet, looking positively joyful.

_“Welcome,” he said. “Welcome to a new year at Hogwarts! Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words. And here they are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak! Thank you!”_

Harry and Hermione exchanged a nervous glance while everyone else cheered. Hermione turned to Percy the prefect and said, “Um, is he alright? That was strange, even for him.”

“Oh, he’s always been a bit mad,” Percy said nonchalantly. “But he is a genius.”

Harry and Hermione felt a soft wave of magic unlike any they had felt before as the tables in front of them magically filled with food, delivered up by the house elves from directly below them in the kitchen. Cousin Andi had explained to them about house elves. All the Grangers had been quite unhappy to learn about the existence of an actual slave caste in the magical world (not to mention the fact that their existence was barely acknowledged in the history books), but Andi had convinced them, with difficulty, that this was one aspect of the status quo that would not be productive to fight.

_“The records are sketchy, but it’s believed that house elves were bred in Germany from wild elves starting under Clovis I. The wild elves were more intelligent and docile relatives of the erkling, but they died out in the 1600s. I know it sounds awful today—believe me, it was questioned even in the Founders’ time—but they really are bred for service. Given the choice, they almost always prefer it to freedom, so long as they’re treated well. I’ve never had one since I left home, nor did the Potters, as far as I know, but trying to push that stance widely would not be the best way to help them.”_

“Awesome!” Harry exclaimed, far more focused on the food than on where it came from. He couldn’t remember ever seeing so many kinds of meat on one table before: roast beef and steak, pork chops, bacon, and sausage, roast chicken, and lamb chops. He started loading up on everything.

“Oh, boy, now they’ve got him going,” Hermione groaned. Everyone was tucking in, but the only person who looked more enthusiastic than Harry was Ron, though the redhead was a good deal less discriminating. “You should get some vegetables, Harry,” she told him without thinking, prompting snickers from those sitting around them as she spooned some peas, carrots, and potatoes onto each of their plates. Their parents had recruited Hermione to their cause of getting Harry to eat normal human fare almost from day one. She supposed she should be glad he was at least using the tableware and hadn’t grabbed a lamb chop by the rib and bit right in.

Harry took a swig from his goblet, and his eyes lit up. “Hermione, it’s pumpkin juice!”

“Pumpkin juice?” she said sceptically. She cautiously took a sip herself. It was pumpkin juice alright—two things that shouldn’t go together in her opinion, though she supposed she could get used to it. Of course, her brother loved it. Thankfully he toned things down after his over-excited start.

“You know, that hat tried to put me in Ravenclaw,” Harry told her when he had calmed down a bit.

“It did?” Hermione squeaked slightly.

“Yeah, but I told it it’d be ridiculous for me to be in Ravenclaw while you were in Gryffindor.”

Her mouth dropped open. “Harry, I only asked it for Gryffindor because I thought _you_ _’d_ wind up here.”

“What, so you mean we _both_ could have been in Ravenclaw?” Harry said, laughing.

“I—I guess so—but I still think Gryffindor is the best,” she said. “I like Professor McGonagall. And Dumbledore may be a little…barmy, but he’s still pretty smart.” Harry had to agree with that.

The rest of dinner went well, except for when “Nearly-Headless Nick” flipping his head off in front of the first years and put them all off their appetites for a few minutes. Hermione briefly wondered how the ghost could control his body with his spinal cord severed, but quickly dismissed this as a ridiculous question. Obviously, the magic of spirits didn’t require such things. Although…

“Excuse me…Sir Nicholas?” she asked.

“Yes, my dear?” the ghost said, obviously pleased to have someone call him by his proper name.

“If you don’t mind my asking, sir, how can you speak if you’re intangible?”

“What?” Sir Nicholas said in confusion.

“Well, it’s just that you have to have _some_ kind of physical influence on the world around in order to vibrate the air to make sounds.”

She became aware that everyone was staring at her, including Sir Nicholas, who looked thoughtful, as if no one had ever thought to ask him that in the past five centuries.

“Well, I suppose I must,” he said tentatively. “Though I’ve never felt it. Myrtle is the only ghost in the castle who’s had any success at haunting _things_.”

“Who’s Myrtle?” Hermione asked. She was sure there was no ghost by that name mentioned in _Hogwarts, A History_.

“Oh, she haunts the second floor girls’ loo,” Percy said quickly, “but she’s not much for conversation.”

No one had a satisfactory explanation for why a ghost should haunt a bathroom, so Hermione let the matter drop. She talked to Percy about lessons, and she and Harry had to explain more than once how they had come to be siblings, but by the time dessert came around, they started to learn about other people’s families.

_“I’m half-and-half,” said Seamus. “Me dad’s a Muggle. Mum didn’t tell him she was a witch ’til after they were married. Bit of a nasty shock for him.”_

_The others laughed._

“That doesn’t sound very nice,” Hermione protested.

Seamus looked a little annoyed at her, but he explained, “Well, it’s the Statute of Secrecy—yeh have to do it that way.” The purebloods at the table nodded like it was perfectly reasonable.

_“What about you, Neville?” said Ron._

_“Well, my Gran brought me up and she’s a witch,” said Neville, “but the family thought I was a squib for ages. My Great Uncle Algie kept trying to catch me off my guard and force some magic out of me—he pushed me off the end of Blackpool pier once, I nearly drowned—but nothing happened until I was eight. Great Uncle Algie came round for dinner, and he was hanging me out of an upstairs window by the ankles when my Great Auntie Enid offered him a meringue and he accidentally let go. But I bounced—all the way down the garden and into the road. They were all really pleased, Gran was crying, she was so happy. And you should have seen their faces when I got in here—they thought I might not be magic enough to come, you see. Great Uncle Algie was so pleased he bought me my toad.”_

The round-faced boy’s story elicited some laughter, but he became nervous when several people looked appropriately appalled by it, especially the muggle-raised ones.

“What…?”

“Neville…” Harry tried to broach it tactfully. “Your family was more happy that you could do magic than that you weren’t hurt getting dropped out an upstairs window?” _And your grandmother is supposed to be the head of the liberals on the Wizengamot?_ he mentally added.

“Well, um…” Neville stammered nervously. “It’s not about _that_ so much, but it’s just that…with my parents…” He stopped and swallowed hard. “I—I m-might as well be the last of the Longbottoms, see? If I weren’t magical, the line would die out.”

“Ugh, do they really…?” Hermione started, then stopped, trying not to offend the boy. It sounded like the politics of the old royal families of Europe. Neville shrugged his shoulders apologetically.

Dessert was soon winding down, and Harry surveyed the High Table, wondering when how they would be dismissed. He didn’t know most of the professors by sight, although the tiny Professor Flitwick was easy to spot from Cousin Dora’s description, as was the bored, sleepy-looking Professor Binns, the only one at the table who was see-through. Presently, though, his eyes ran over a pair of teachers he hadn’t paid much attention before—one with long, black, greasy hair and a hooked nose who was listening to the mutterings of a pale young man in a purple turban.

_It happened very suddenly. The hook nosed teacher looked past the turban straight into Harry_ _’s eyes—and a sharp, hot pain shot across the scar on Harry’s forehead._

“Ouch!” Harry suddenly clapped his hand to his forehead, just above his right eye.

“Harry? What is it?” Hermione said.

“N-nothing.”

She wasn’t buying it. Seeing him glance around at the others at the table, she leaned in to whisper to him. “Harry, that wasn’t nothing,” she said.

“No, really, it’s gone now,” he whispered back.

“It still wasn’t normal. Has that ever happened before?” She doubted it had. She’d never seen Harry slap his hand to his scar like that in the six years she’d known him, and scars weren’t supposed to be painful—not old ones, anyway. When Harry seemed reluctant to answer, she asked, “What happened—what were you doing?”

“Nothing. I was just looking at those two.” He pointed up at the High Table.

Hermione’s eyes narrowed in suspicion as she appraised the two teachers he was indicating. “Percy, who are those two on the end, there?” she asked.

“Oh, that’s Professor Quirrell in the turban—he teaches Defence Against the Dark Arts,” Percy explained formally. “And that’s Professor Snape in the black. He teaches Potions, but everyone knows he wants Quirrell’s job.”

Well, _that_ was suspicious, indeed. “Harry, which one of them—”

“I don’t know. It was probably just a coincidence,” he protested.

“I think we should tell someone.”

“Mione, I’m fine, really—look, if it happens again, I’ll ask the nurse, okay?”

Hermione grumbled and let it go, but she resolved to keep an eye on both Snape and Quirrell when Harry was around them. Neither one sounded like someone to get too close to, from what they had heard—especially Snape.

_“Snape was Dumbledore’s spy during the war,” Andi told them. “It’s not something they like to advertise, but it’s public record. He’s an admitted Death Eater who switched sides near the end, and Dumbledore vouched for him personally to keep him out of Azkaban. The thing is, Snape remains a close personal friend of the Malfoy Family and is notorious for showing favouritism to Slytherin students, especially children of suspected Death Eaters.”_

_“Yeah, that’s putting it mildly,” Dora had said. “He’s a greasy git who’ll take points just for looking at him funny, and Merlin help you if you get on his bad side. I saw him actually sabotage people’s potions, but no one could prove it after.”_

_“My daughter may be a bit…overzealous in her characterisation,” Andi had cut in, “but, unfortunately, I know at least some of it’s true. People file complaints against him every year, but it seems like the_ only _thing Albus Dumbledore and Lucius Malfoy can agree upon is that they both want Snape teaching potions._

 _“_ You _need to be especially careful around him, Harry. He was in school at the same time as your parents, and I_ _’ve heard he and your father got on pretty badly.”_

Yes, if someone had a motive to hold a grudge against Harry Potter, Hermione decided, it was probably Professor Snape.

Harry himself, on the other hand, though he would rather have just forgotten about the whole thing, had a different concern on his mind.

_“Oh, and the Defence Professor,” Dora said. “Be really careful around him, whoever it is.”_

_“Why?” said Harry._

_“The Defence Professorship is cursed,” Andi said._

_“Cursed?”_

_“Yeah, or at least everyone thinks it is,” Dora answered._

_“It was even when we went there,” Andi added. “No Defence professor has taught for more than one year since 1958.”_

_“They say You-Know—” Dora started, but her mother shot her a look. “—I mean Voldemort did it because Dumbledore turned him down for the job. Ever since, something bad always happens with the Defence Professor every year. There’s been ones who got sacked for teaching blatant lies, accidentally injuring students, deliberately injuring students—”_

_“Dora,” her mother warned._

_“Sleeping with students—”_

_“Dora!”_

_“What? It’s true!”_

_Andi opened her mouth to speak, but Dora tacked on,_ _“Both genders.”_

_“It’s Professor Quirrell this term,” Andi huffed. “He taught Muggle Studies for years. He won’t be doing anything like that.” She turned back to the Grangers. “The bigger worry is the ones who meet with an unfortunate accident—lost a limb to a carnivorous plant, mauled by a kelpie, caught in an explosion that also injured several students…”_

_“We had one just fall out his office window,” Dora added helpfully. “And the worst part is most of them are no good at it “cause no one who is is crazy enough to take the job.”_

_“The point_ is _,_ _” Andi said in annoyance, “the Defence Professor’s bad luck, no matter who it is. From what I hear, Quirrell’s very nice, but be very alert if he does anything potentially dangerous. It might not be his fault, but it could still backfire horribly.”_

Harry hadn’t been sure before, but right now, that seemed like very good advice.

Eventually, the desserts disappeared, and Dumbledore stood up to make his start of term announcements, which all sounded quite reasonable except for the “very painful death” awaiting anyone who dared to intrude on the right-hand corridor on the third floor. And then the Headmaster proved his madness again by having the school sing a song with no melody before sending everyone off to bed.

“Percy?” Hermione said, pulling Harry up to the front of the line to the dorms. “Dumbledore wasn’t serious about the third floor, was he?” Knowing Dumbledore, she thought he probably was, but she still felt she had to check.

“He must be,” Percy replied. “Dumbledore may be a little off his rocker, but he never pulls pranks. It is odd, though. You’d think he’d at least tell us prefects why.”

“But why would he tell us like that at all? I bet it won’t be twenty-four hours before someone goes up there.”

“Oh, don’t worry, Miss Granger,” he said. “We prefects will keep everyone in line.”

They made it up to Gryffindor Tower, and Percy pointed them up to their bedrooms, which Harry thought was now an excellent place to go. He wasn’t used to eating that much or that late. “Well, I’m beat,” he said. “Good night, Hermione.”

He could tell from the look on his sister’s face that she was still concerned about him, but he was glad when she didn’t mention it. Stifling a yawn, she said, “Good night, Harry,” and headed up the girl’s staircase.

Harry was annoyed to find he had to climb another seven floors to get to his room. He hoped he could get to bed quickly, but his new roommates looked like they had plenty of questions. He started unpacking his trunk with what he would need for the night.

“What the—!” he exclaimed, dropping something to the floor with a clatter.

“What is it?” said Ron Weasley. The other boys crowded round to see.

Harry picked up his picture frame off the floor, the one containing the photograph of the Potters on his first birthday.

It was moving.

James and Lily Potter were smiling and waving at him from the picture frame, while baby Harry wriggled in their arms. They didn’t speak, and their behaviour seemed to repeat—or nearly repeat—after ten seconds or so, but it was incredible seeing them in motion. “How is it doing that?” he wondered.

“What do you mean?” Ron said. “They all do that.”

“No, I’ve had this on my nightstand for six years, and it’s never moved before,” Harry replied.

“Well, that’s weird. Where’d you get it from?”

“From Dumbledore— _oh_ , he must’ve frozen it so it didn’t move in a muggle house.”

“Well, that Dumbledore _is_ pretty smart.”

“Yeah,” Harry said equivocally, and mentally added, _most of the time._

* * *

One of the few people who didn’t go straight to bed that night was Draco Malfoy. He got out his parchment and quill so that he could post a letter home the first thing in the morning and inform his parents of some unexpected developments.

 

_Dear Father and Mother,_

_I have, of course, been sorted into Slytherin, as have Nott and Greengrass, though Greengrass has been keeping her distance from most of us except for her friend, Tracey Davis._

_I approached Harry Potter on the train, as you requested. Predictably, he rejected my offer, but he was more polite than I expected about it, and he knew who I was, at least by name. He had already met the Weasleys by the time I found him, and there are rumours that he was palling around with Longbottom, too._

_However, you_ _’ve probably heard or will soon hear that Potter showed up with an adoptive sister. His sister’s name is Granger, and I’m almost positive she’s muggle-born. The rumours say Potter himself was raised by muggles, but he’s clearly had some kind of training, too, and I bet it was from Aunt Andromeda. How else would he know who his allies are so fast? Unfortunately, it looks like the chance to turn Potter to a more favourable attitude has passed. With muggle connections, his support of Auntie’s Muggle Rights Act is already assured._

_Potter and his sister both went to Gryffindor, although the Hat didn_ _’t decide right away for either of them. Longbottom went there too, though I don’t know why when he was such an obvious Hufflepuff._

_Your loving son,_

_Draco_


	17. Risk Assessment

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: All your base are belong to JK Rowling.
> 
> I am indebted to Myst Shadow’s Forging the Sword for the idea of the Defence curriculum presented in this chapter.

Harry and Hermione woke tired the next morning. Both of their roommates had kept them up late with questions, although Ron Weasley hadn’t been too bad after already having spent the whole day on the train with them. It wasn’t the best way to start the school year, but they _had_ slept quite well in what time they had. There was something about being surrounded by the magic of the castle that felt warm and comforting—almost like being home after a long holiday.

They met up in the Common Room to go down to breakfast together, relying on strength in numbers. This proved to be wise, since they already had to politely parry away some overeager admirers in the Common Room who hadn’t got a chance to meet Harry the previous night. Then, as they walked through the corridors, they were sure they saw some of the passing faces twice, or even three times, doubling back to get another look. They allowed Ron and Neville Longbottom to walk close by them, though, since those two were somewhat less starstruck than everyone else.

One of the more impressive sights at Hogwarts was the morning post delivery, when well over a hundred owls came winging their way into the Great Hall dropping off letters and parcels to the students. Hedwig flew down and dropped off a copy of _The Daily Prophet_ , and Hermione fed her some bacon.

“Huh,” Harry said, looking over the paper. “We’re not all over the front page.”

“Hmm, the Sorting was pretty late. I guess not even magic could help Rita Skeeter get a story to press that fast,” Hermione mused. “But I’m sure we’ll be in there tomorrow—or at least _you_ will.”

“Oh, you’ll be in, too, Mione. Remember how Cousin Andi said everyone would go nuts over the “Boy-Who-Lived Raised by Muggles!” story?”

She remembered. The timing was certainly unfortunate. The sharks would be circling from all sides to tie the story to their position on the Muggle Protection Act. It was tempting to think one heartfelt speech from Harry Potter would be enough to put it over the top, but then there would also be those who lamented that the Saviour of the Wizarding World didn’t even grow up in their world and all sorts of things like that.

“Well, at least we have _one_ day to just worry about classes,” Hermione said.

“Excuse me, Mr. Potter.”

They both turned to see a smug-looking blond boy with an upturned nose—one in yellow trimmed robes.

“Allow me to introduce myself,” the boy said. “My name is Zacharias Smith.”

Harry rose to his feet and forced a smile. “Ah, that would be Zacharias Smith, scion of the Noble House of Smith?” he asked.

“And direct descendant of Lady Helga Hufflepuff,” Smith added. “A pleasure to meet you, Mr. Potter.” He grabbed Harry’s hand and squeezed it tightly.

“Likewise. My sister, Hermione Granger.” Harry motioned to her.

“Miss Granger.” Smith shook her hand, too, which she returned limply. “Sometime, Mr. Potter I _would_ like to hear the story of how and why you managed to slip the watch of all of magical Britain to live out in the muggle world,” he continued.

 _And what_ _’s wrong with the muggle world?_ “Well, that was mostly Dumbledore’s doing,” Harry said.

Harry and Hermione were relieved when Percy Weasley came around, saying, “First years, I have your timetables here—You’ll need to be getting yours, too, Mr. Smith.”

“Of course. I’ll see you in class, Mr. Potter,” he said with a smile before walking off.

Harry suspected that the Hufflepuff blood was the only thing that had landed the arrogant boy in his ancestor’s house. And he wasn’t exactly highly-ranked, either. After all, he was what, tenth in line for the Smith Seat? But he _did_ seem to know the etiquette, so that would probably count for something.

After the timetables were passed out, all the students left breakfast early to go back to their dorms for their books. Harry and Hermione dashed up the fourteen flights to their rooms, surprising a number of other students, who weren’t in such good shape from years of karate, by passing them in the other direction on the way down.

Led mostly by Hermione’s eagerness, they were the first ones to make it to their first class, Transfiguration. That was lucky of them, as they later learnt firsthand how uncooperative the castle’s moving stairs and trick doors could be. And the Transfiguration classroom was, indeed, empty, save for a grey tabby cat with black rectangles around its eyes sitting on the teacher’s desk.

“Good morning, Professor,” Harry said with a smile.

The cat meowed at him.

“Are you planning on surprising the class?” he continued.

The cat caterwauled briefly.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t quite catch that.”

The cat repeated the message with a slightly harsher tone.

“Oh, of course.” He turned to Hermione. “She said it’s a good way to spot troublemakers—like me,” he said with a chuckle.

They heard the sound of footsteps outside, and the cat twitched an ear toward the door and then hissed at Harry.

“Alright, we’re sitting down, Professor,” he said.

They took the two seats in the front corner as the other students started filing in, a few of them looking curiously at the cat. Hermione leaned toward him and whispered, “I still don’t get how you can do that.”

“Just practice,” Harry said smugly. Of course, the truth was that he probably could never have learnt to interpret meows without doing it with a cat’s sense of hearing first. Human ears were just barely up to the task. But it was always good to find something he was better at than his sister.

The classroom, like the Great Hall, stood half-empty, making it hard to tell if everyone had arrived. It seemed like a bleak way to go through school for seven years, but that was the way of things. The final bell rang, but no one did anything until nearly a minute later, when Ron Weasley ran into the classroom, looking around nervously.

“Oh good, Professor McGonagall’s not here yet,” he said with relief.

Harry caught the cat’s eye and turned to Ron. “Uh, sorry, mate,” he said, pointing to it.

With that, the grey tabby leapt off the desk and in a blink was replaced by the tall, stern form of Minerva McGonagall. The rest of the class gasped and applauded, while Ron let out an astonished “Wicked!”

“Thank you for that assessment, Mr. Weasley,” McGonagall said. “Do please take your seat, and try to be on time in the future.”

Harry and Hermione were eager to get started on transfiguration, since the wandless magic they had learnt was pretty much all charms, but the class was less hands-on than they had hoped. Professor McGonagall made them take a lot of complicated notes before handing out matchsticks to turn into needles. By the end of the lesson, though, Harry had managed to turn his matchstick silver and pointy. It wasn’t easy to feel for his magic and shape it through his wand in such a different way than he was used to, but he was still well ahead of _almost_ everyone else in the class. Predictably, Hermione had him beat: she’d nearly completed the transformation to a needle, producing a piece of metal the right size and shape and only failing to make the eye. McGonagall smiled as she showed their work to the class and award the pair five points to Gryffindor.

But it was the second class of the day, a double Defence Against the Dark Arts period, that they were most looking forward to. After five years of karate, both of them, though especially Harry, were ready to start learning magical self-defence.

It was nothing like they had expected.

* * *

The Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs sat down scattered around the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom. This was one of the larger classrooms, with the teacher’s desk sitting in the back and a large open space in the front, presumably for practical demonstrations. A muggle archery target stood against the far wall.

Professor Quirrell was a pale, quiet young man with sharp, penetrating blue eyes. He wore close-fitting robes that still admitted quite a bit of movement, and a purple turban, the tail of which was draped around his shoulders. As soon as the bell rang, he rose from his seat and walked in silence to the head of the class. He stood straight, but stiff. Most of the class thought he was understandably nervous about starting his first day as the Defence Professor.

“Welcome,” he said in a soft voice that, surprisingly, sounded more confident than he looked. “Welcome to your first Defence Against the Dark Arts class. I am Quirinus Quirrell, formerly professor of Muggle Studies. For the past year I have travelled the world to gain practical experience for my new posting. You will no doubt be wondering what horrible fate will befall me this year. However, as I am on a one-year contract, you may rest assured that I am keeping my options open.” A few people giggled.

“I’ll just take attendance before we get started…” He called the role from a small scroll that he drew from his pocket. He stuttered when he came to Harry’s name, and an almost frightened look flickered across his face for a moment, but he kept on going as if nothing had happened and put the scroll away.

“The world,” Professor Quirrell said dramatically in that soft voice of his, “both magical and mundane, is a dangerous place. The Dark Arts are first and foremost among these dangers. Most of you will already know this well.” His eyes passed across Harry’s. “The fact that classroom after classroom of this school stands half-empty shows that clearly. The fact that the Ministry is still reeling, that the Auror department is still short-staffed after ten years, the fact that this nation is littered from one end to the other with widows and orphans, with broken families, and with the gravestones of ones that were wiped out entirely is testament to the danger of the Dark Arts.”

A Hufflepuff girl with a round face and auburn hair whimpered softly. Neville Longbottom was shaking. Harry glared openly at Professor Quirrell and started contemplating whether he could use his influence to get him sacked right away.

“ _However_ ,” and this one word was the first time Quirrell had raised his voice in his entire speech, “we are currently in peacetime.” He let the words hang in the air, and the tension seemed to lessen. He started up again, and the harshness his voice had taken on vanished. “The Dark Arts are a danger, yes, but hardly the only one. Especially not now, when there has been no _proven_ Death Eater activity for over nine years. In peacetime, there are more common, mundane, you might even say trivial dangers to worry about, but they should not be ignored. Does anyone know what is the most common _peacetime_ threat to witches and wizards…at least to the eighty percent of you who do _not_ live in Hogsmeade?”

A couple of hands were raised. Harry glanced at his sister and saw her frowning. He knew as well as she did that this had not been in the course book.

“Yes, Mr. Smith?” Quirrell said.

“Attacks by muggles, sir,” Zacharias Smith answered confidently.

“Correct.”

Harry gave a start, as did the other muggle-raised students. _This_ was the former Muggle Studies professor? Well, they could see how it _could_ be true, but still, if he of all people was going to start in with blood prejudice, there would be trouble. Hermione’s eyes narrowed as if she were calculating something.

“Three quarters of the witches and wizards in Britain live in muggle cities and villages,” Professor Quirrell explained. “As much as we pride ourselves on our separateness and secrecy, we live and work with muggles every day. And it is because of this very separateness and secrecy that muggles are prone to seeing us as ‘loners’, ‘eccentrics’, or even…‘freaks’.” Harry was _sure_ Quirrell looked directly at him at that point. “People like that make for easy targets for troublemakers and bullies. That’s true in the muggle world _and_ the magical world—it is not a muggle condition, but a _human_ condition. But whatever the reason, it means that attacks by muggles remain the most common peacetime threat to witches and wizards to this day.”

Harry’s mind was reeling. Cousin Andi had taught him the rhetoric. He was sure Quirrell was gearing up for an anti-muggle rant, and then he just cut it down, almost like he was trying to play two parts at once. And the way he kept glancing at him was putting him on edge.

“The name of this class is Defence Against the Dark Arts,” Quirrell continued, “but perhaps a more apt title would be Magical Defence and Survival because it is concerned with all threats, not just those of the Dark Arts. With so many witches and wizards living on the outskirts of society, it is important to know how to take care of oneself, and that is what this class is intended to teach.

“By the standard curriculum set forth by the Board of Governors, which is, in fact, largely unchanged since the school’s founding, all students returning home after their first year at Hogwarts should be able to defend themselves in the muggle world—that is, against both muggles and non-magical animals. The first year Defence curriculum includes simple jinxes and hexes and their counters, and methods of escape and calling for help, which are usually all that is needed to defend oneself in the muggle world, and which provide a foundation for more advanced magical defence in later years. We will also cover basic survival skills and an overview of magical creatures this year—you may have wondered why _Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them_ was on the book list.

“The second year curriculum continues the instruction in proper defence against the Dark Arts techniques, but also includes detailed units on wilderness survival and Class Two-X and Three-X magical creatures—something which carries the added benefit of being a good introduction for those of you who choose to take Care of Magical Creatures in third year. The third year curriculum includes Class Three-X and Four-X magical creatures and a closer overview of curses in preparation for fourth year, which is when the Dark Arts begin to be addressed full-time—yes, Miss Granger?”

Harry had been so busy taking detailed notes on what the Defence Professor was saying that he hadn’t even noticed Hermione raise her hand. “Excuse me, Professor,” she said, “but I think the most common danger in the muggle world is auto accidents, not assaults.”

Quirrell stared off into space, looking as if something had short-circuited his brain. With a sudden jerk, he looked back at Hermione. “That _might_ be true for muggle-born students like yourself,” he said sharply, “but as most witches and wizards drive very little, if at all, it’s quite rare for them to get in an auto accident.” Ron Weasley chuckled softly. Hermione looked downcast, but Quirrell continued, “However, that _is_ the kind of thinking that will be very useful in this class. Defence is about more than just skill with magic. It requires a significant bit of problem solving, and a skill that I consider to be seriously under-emphasised by most instructors, which is threat _assessment_.

“For example: would anyone care to hazard a guess as to what the most dangerous _non-magical_ animal in Britain is?”

Everyone looked at each other. This wasn’t the kind of thing most of them had ever thought about. Slowly, a couple of tentative hands rose in the air.

“Mr. Weasley?”

“Is it snakes?” Ron said.

“No. Miss Abbott?”

Hannah Abbott froze for a brief moment before saying, “Is it wild boars, Professor?”

“No.”

Suddenly, Justin Finch-Fletchley’s face brightened and he raised his hand.

“Mr. Finch-Fletchley?” Quirrell said.

“Dogs, sir.”

“Correct.”

Now, it was the purebloods’ turn to be shocked. It was clear from their faces that none of them had even considered the possibility.

“It may surprise you to learn,” Quirrell said dryly, “that dogs attack more people and _kill_ more people than any other animal in Britain, with the exception of bees, to which some muggles can have a fatal allergic reaction. After dogs are cows and horses, which are occasionally known to trample the careless or intoxicated who venture too close. To be sure, should you come face to face with a wild boar, it would be far more dangerous than any dog—but how many boars versus how many dogs do you encounter in day-to-day life?”

A couple of people laughed, albeit nervously.

“It’s easy to only pay attention to the big, but rare dangers and miss the small, but still very real ones that you encounter more frequently. As a result, you can be taken by surprise, and that is the most dangerous thing of all. Threat assessment means figuring out just how dangerous things are and how to respond to them.

“Another example: you might not expect the Defence curriculum to include household charms, but it does.” A number of people started at that.

“Doxies…are three inches high and can be killed with a rolled-up newspaper,” Quirrell said emphatically, “but they’re also Class Three-X creatures. They breed rapidly, fly in swarms, and have a bite that will fester badly if left untreated. Like most magical creatures, they are attracted to magic, and they like to infest magical households that are not adequately cleaned. Including houses in the city. Including _muggle-born_ households,” he said with an odd grin, “although to a lesser extent because there is less magic there.”

That was news to Harry and Hermione, and they could tell it was to the other muggle-borns, too. Their very presence at home would attract magical pests? Why didn’t anyone tell them these things?

As if sensing their questions, Quirrell gave a slight jerk and seemed to switch gears again: “As Muggle Studies Professor, I repeatedly suggested a seminar for muggle-born students to learn important aspects of the magical world like that, which they might not hear elsewhere. The Board could never seem to justify the seminars given the low number of students who would be involved, but I think you can imagine how useful they could be.

“Of course, I would contend that pureblood students could use a bit of a primer on the muggle world, as well—something else that the Board refused to implement. First and foremost, can anyone name the most common—peacetime—reasons for violations of the Statute of Secrecy?”

Now, Professor Quirrell was going really far afield, but some of the class thought this was getting fun in an odd sort of way. Between them, they correctly guessed fights between wizards and muggles, careless use of magic around muggles, and magical creatures getting loose, but they were stumped when Quirrell claimed there was another major cause of such violations.

“Surely you know, Miss Bones?” he asked.

The round-faced, auburn-haired girl whom Harry now recognised as the niece of the new Director of Magical Law Enforcement, looked very nervous at being put on the spot, but she thought about it and stammered, “I-i-is it theft of magical artifacts, Professor?”

“Precisely. Muggle thieves will take anything that looks valuable—a racing broom that might look like an art piece to them, a magical or enchanted appliance that looks like anything electric, magical toys for the children—if you’re particularly careless, even your wand.

“Theft of magical artifacts happens more often than fights and nearly as often as reported careless uses of magic. And yet, most wizards leave their homes unprotected by so much as a _Colloportus_. Even for those who can’t afford professional wards, or perhaps live in apartments where they can’t be applied could do that. A _Colloportus_ will foil a muggle lock-pick and will even resist efforts at breaking and entering, but it’s very rarely used properly, for the simple, foolish reason that it has to be reapplied every time the door is opened—leaving their property and their secrets unprotected because of sheer laziness. Defence of property is still defence, and we will spend a little time on that as well this year.”

“Now, unfortunately, muggle-born students do not have the option of using a _Colloportus_ …That is why a charmed trunk is so helpful—something else that isn’t advertised to muggle-borns.”

Harry was starting to wonder what Professor Quirrell’s game was. He seemed to be trying to ingratiate himself with the muggle-born students, and, in fact, he was telling them things his family should have been told years ago—that not even his muggle-born Cousin Ted had thought to tell them, it was so mundane in this world. But at the same time, Quirrell’s attitude toward muggles seemed more than a little condescending. Harry didn’t know much about the Muggle Studies curriculum, though. Maybe that was how they did things. It certainly wouldn’t surprise him.

“Above all,” Quirrell said, “I expect each of you in my class not only to learn the required material, but also to understand _why_ you are learning it. It is only by reaching that deeper level of understanding that you will be able to react to new threats and new situations. After all, one of the greatest mistakes you can make…is to be always fighting the last war.” He was staring at Harry again.

* * *

They got out of Defence at the end of the hour after a rather more normal lecture about the technical details of magical theory that Professor Quirrell assured them would be essential to learning defensive spells later.

“Hey, where’d she go…ah there she is,” Harry whispered to Hermione as they made their way to lunch. He led her over to the little auburn-haired witch. “Excuse me, Susan Bones?” he asked.

She turned to face him. “Eep! Mr. P-P-Potter!” she said.

 _Why am I always_ _“Mister” around here?_ “It’s just Harry, Susan. At least if you’re not a Slytherin. And this is my sister, Hermione.” He offered a hand to her.

Susan laughed nervously as she shook his hand. “Pleased to meet you. Sorry…it’s just…Auntie Amelia talks about you a lot—you’re a legend in Auror Department.”

Harry and Hermione both rolled their eyes. “Of course I am,” he said.

“Well, it’s not like that…” Susan said. “Auntie says you prove that…you shouldn’t let your guard down because anyone can still get lucky.” She said this very fast, and she flinched back, as if she expected an angry response.

Harry and Hermione exchanged a glance with raised eyebrows. “That may be the most sensible thing we’ve heard all week,” Harry said.

“It is?” Susan said.

Hermione smiled. “Susan, our Cousin, Andromeda Tonks, has had nothing but good things to say about your aunt, and I think if she can see past the Boy-Who-Lived legend, that’s a good sign already.”

Susan’s eyes widened. She looked back at Harry, but saw him nod in agreement with his adoptive sister. She broke into a wide smile. “Thank you. I thought…” But she suddenly realised she didn’t know _what_ she thought. She’d _known_ on some level that the storybooks had to be completely made up, and that Harry’s victory over You-Know-Who had to have been just luck, but it was still shocking to see the Boy-Who-Lived dismissing the legend.

“It’s fine,” Harry said. “Are you okay? I know Professor Quirrell was being kind of rough.”

 _Was_ she okay? Well, aside from being about faint, probably. “Y-yeah,” she stammered. “I’ve—I’ve heard a lot worse.”

“Well, I admit it wasn’t the nicest way to make the point, but I didn’t think he was too bad,” Hermione said.

“Really?” Harry turned to her. “Didn’t you see how he kept staring at me?”

“Harry, _everyone_ _’s_ staring at you,” she said dryly.

“No, really, it was almost like he was _mocking_ me every time he did it.”

“But why would he do that? I think you’re just imagining things. I like him. He seems really knowledgeable.”

“You _like_ him? Didn’t you hear what he was saying about muggles?”

“I think he was just trying to make a point. He never said anything really against them, and he _did_ teach Muggle Studies, after all.”

“Hermione, you remember what the Tonkses said. The Defence Professor is _always_ bad news.”

“Well, he _does_ sound better than most of them, according to Auntie,” Susan admitted unhappily. “If he’s a little unfriendly, it’s probably still better than being incompetent.”

“Besides, maybe he’ll be okay because of his one-year contract,” Hermione. “It’s only the first day. You need to give him a chance.”

“Fine,” Harry grumbled. Then he stopped short. “Oh! Hermione, I forgot tell you something.”

“What?”

“Not here. Come on—Sorry, Susan, private business.” He grabbed her by the wrist and dragged her down a side corridor and then a second one. Only when he was sure no one else was around did he tell his story.

“Harry, what’s so important?”

“Last night—” he whispered. “The Sorting Hat told me it had seen child animagi twice before.”

Hermione’s jaw dropped open. “It did?” she whispered excitedly. “There are others? Did it say who?”

“No, it didn’t say who, but it implied they’re both dead now—and it said ‘the clues may still be out there to find.’”

“We should try to find out—did you tell McGonagall?”

“Not yet. I didn’t have time.”

“Well, I think we should tell her on Wednesday. And we should find out who they were. We might learn something useful.”

Harry smiled at his sister. He’d figured she’d make that her first research project of the year.

In the Great Hall, Susan Bones sat down to lunch a little unsettled, but not that much. Children of Noble Houses had to deal with important private business fairly often. And if the Boy-Who-Lived really was just a boy, it _probably_ wasn’t anything dark wizard-related. Nothing to write home about…for now.

* * *

Draco Malfoy’s reply from his parents came at dinner that very night. Sparing a few moments to gloat over his classmates that _he_ received special evening delivery (a privilege allowed only to only children of Noble Houses who might need to receive “urgent political correspondence”), he unwrapped the package of chocolate frogs and opened the attached envelope. A simple bit of sleight of hand his mother had taught him allowed him to pocket the smaller, charmed envelope he knew would be inside without anyone noticing. The main letter was a generic, though heartfelt congratulation for being sorted into Slytherin and an encouragement to do well in the coming year—nothing suspicious, except perhaps in that it was so ordinary.

Unfortunately, he was interrupted from his thoughts when, of all people, Harry Potter himself approached the Slytherin Table.

Harry was a little nervous about going all the way around the Hall toward the end of dinner. He wasn’t the only one to move around, but they were few and far between, usually siblings who were in different houses. The Patil Twins might have done, but as the Gryffindor and Ravenclaw Tables were next to each other, they usually just sat back to back.

Harry could feel all eyes on him as he made his way to the first year Slytherins. That would be an unusual enough move for any Gryffindor, let alone him, but most people would understand what he was doing when they saw it.

“What do you want, Potter?” said Pansy Parkinson, a hard-faced girl who seemed to be clinging around Malfoy.

“Excuses me, Miss Parkinson,” Harry said. “I merely wanted to introduce myself to the scion of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Greengrass and the heir to the Noble House of Nott.”

Theodore Nott tensed up as if he were about to strike, but Daphne Greengrass rose to her feet and snapped to attention, extending a hand to Harry. “On behalf of the House of Greengrass, I am honoured to meet you, Lord Potter.”

Harry shook her hand. “No titles necessary here, Miss Greengrass, but I am likewise honoured to meet you.”

Draco briefly wondered why Potter was moving so quickly, until he remembered the uproar the morning paper was likely to cause tomorrow, whatever was actually in it. His parents had taught him plenty about first impressions.

Theo glanced over at Draco, who nodded to him, something that Harry did not fail to notice. “Pleased to meet you, Mr. Potter,” he mumbled. Neither of them extended a hand.

It wasn’t much, Harry knew, but if he could get his foot in the proverbial door early with Daphne, it could be a big help later. Like it or not, he was stuck in the politics of the magical world, and Cousin Andi would almost certainly need Adrian Greengrass Sr.”s vote for the Muggle Protection Act. And then there was the _other_ purpose of this exercise: to give his sister a bit of cover for a more personal matter.

With Harry distracting the Hall, few people noticed Hermione slipping around to the Hufflepuff Table and approaching the group she guessed were the second year boys.

“Excuse me,” she said timidly. They turned to face in surprise. “I’m looking for Sullivan Fawley.”

A boy with curly brown hair not too different from her own spoke up: “That’s me.”

“Hello, I’m Hermione Granger,” she said, a bit awkwardly. “I…I believe we’re related to each other.”

“Are we?” Sullivan Fawley said. “I thought you were muggle-born—or that’s what everyone’s saying.”

“Well, I am…but my grandmother was a squib.” Hermione wasn’t sure how that would play, but the Hufflepuffs didn’t make anything of it. “Her name was Emilie Fawley.”

“Great Aunt Emilie?” Sullivan said in surprise. “Really? Dad never really talked about her. Is she still around?”

“No, I’m afraid not. She died in the war.”

“Oh, I’m sorry to hear that. But still, we should talk sometime. I’m sure you want to know more about your family.”

“Sure. How about in the library some day after classes?”

“Um…yeah, sure,” Sullivan said sceptically.

“Oh, I’d better go,” Hermione said, seeing Harry break off from his conversation. “It was good to meet you, Sullivan.”

“You too,” he nodded to her.

As she walked away and fell in ahead of Harry, she heard excited whispers break out behind her: “You’re related to Harry Potter’s sister?” Hermione sighed softly. Was it always going to be like this?

* * *

Draco waited until he was safely alone in his own dorm before opening the _other_ envelope, the one charmed for his eyes only, preferably to burn after reading. His parents didn’t need an excuse to spoil him, but it was a very convenient way to slip in the _real_ message:

 

_Our beloved son,_

_Be assured that Lord Potter_ _’s rejection of your advances is no great loss. It was to be expected given his family background and the contact he has no doubt had with Dumbledore over the years. However, that Potter arrived at Hogwarts with a muggle-born sister was_ _ not _ _expected and therefore merits careful attention. The fact that both of them were not instant sorts to Gryffindor also begs investigation. If they have any Ravenclaw or Slytherin tendencies, they will soon be apparent and will have to be considered in any plans. Proceed with great care around both Potter and his sister. Watch, listen, and learn before making any moves._

_Pay particular attention to any interaction that Potter may have with Dumbledore. Based on our own sources, we agree that Andromeda Tonks was closely involved with Potter_ _’s training. However, the old meddler plays his cards very close to the vest, and it is surprising that he would permit your aunt’s personal involvement. If there is any sort of friction between Potter and Dumbledore that can be exploited, that would be a valuable weapon indeed against the current machinations of the liberals._

_You should not be too quick to overlook Longbottom, either. The Hat sees traits that are hidden from everyone else, and while it may offer a choice, it cannot be bought. The Notts report that he also took the longest to be sorted, which is considered a sign of a powerful wizard. Longbottom should also be observed closely._

_We know you will not let us down, son._

_Father and Mother_

 

Draco read the letter over three times to be sure he would remember it before tossing it in the fire. He had a feeling things had just got a lot more complicated.


	18. Classes and Katas

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: One JK Rowling to rule them all, one JK Rowling to find them. One JK Rowling to bring them all and in the darkness bind them.
> 
> Parts of this chapter have been quoted from Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone.
> 
> Credit goes to Sarah1281 for pointing out the Language of Flowers connection in Snape’s question in Oh God Not Again! Harry’s response will come soon.

_The Daily Prophet_

_Tuesday, 3 September 1991_

_BOY-WHO-LIVED RAISED BY MUGGLES!_

_By Rita Skeeter_

_After weeks of speculation, the_ Daily Prophet _can confirm that Harry Potter, the Boy-Who-Lived and defeated of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, was, in fact, raised by a muggle family. This was confirmed on Sunday when, according to a number of letters received by parents of Hogwarts students, Potter arrived at Hogwarts in the company of an adoptive sister in his year, a muggle-born witch named Hermione Granger. This sister is believed to be the same girl seen accompanying Potter on his two trips to Diagon Alley over the summer. Both Potter and Granger were sorted into Gryffindor, the same house as both of Potter_ _’s birth parents._

_But this is not the full story. According to the reports, Potter himself claimed to have been raised by relatives of his muggle-born mother for several years before being adopted by his current family. Why Chief Warlock Albus Dumbledore, who appointed himself as the boy_ _’s magical guardian, would remove him from the closest family he had left and place him with the parents of the first available muggle-born child his age is unclear and only adds to the concerns over his control of Potter._

_Speaking to some of Potter_ _’s connections, either magical or muggle, might shed much needed light on this situation. However, the adults standing around the Boy-Who-Lived continue to keep the wizarding world in the dark about its saviour. Both Ministry officials and Dumbledore refused to answer any questions about Potter, and the office of his proxy, Andromeda Tonks, also declined to comment._

_Several enquiries into the muggle legal system also failed to produce results, as Potter_ _’s records are sealed under the Children and Young Persons Act, which protects muggle children’s identities in legal proceedings. Under current law, the Ministry honours this and other muggle statutes._

_Mary Macdonald, a roommate of Harry Potter_ _’s mother, Lily Potter, née Evans, at Hogwarts claims that the late Mrs. Potter had a muggle sister named Petunia, but did not remember anything else about her. Searches for muggle records of a Petunia Evans or any Grangers matching the description of Potter’s adoptive family have so far come up empty._

_Reactions to the news have been mixed. Liberal Wizengamot member and longtime friend of Albus Dumbledore Elphias Doge had this to say:_ _“No, I don’t know where the boy’s been, but what’s wrong with him being raised by muggles? Plenty of muggle-borns have done pretty well for themselves in this country.” However, others are not so sanguine. Conservative Wizengamot member Robert Jugson II said, “Well, it’s certainly a concern if the Savior of the Wizarding World wasn’t even raised_ in _the wizarding world. In my opinion, there is a cultural divide that muggle-borns are never fully able to cross, and that may cause trouble should Mr. Potter choose to take his family seat in the Wizengamot. But sadly, this is just another of Dumbledore_ _’s many mistakes in his tenure as Chief Warlock.”_

 _We at the_ Daily Prophet _continue to demand accountability from Mr. Potter_ _’s handlers. How did he wind up in his current situation? Why is he still being kept so isolated? What schemes are Albus Dumbledore furthering through Mr. Potter? Our own investigation of these issues is ongoing._

“Seriously?” Harry complained. “She’s making it out like I _wanted_ to stay with my relatives?”

“Well, why should she know any better,” Hermione said, taking a bite out of her toast. “We haven’t told anyone the real story.”

“Maybe I should write them a response, though.”

“No, Harry. You remember what Cousin Andi said. Just let her handle it. She’ll write us if she needs help.”

“Fine,” he grumbled.

* * *

Harry did get quite a few questions about the article that day, to which he answered (truthfully) that his adoption was approved by everyone involved, including himself, and that he was very happy with his current family. And that he was unaware of any schemes Dumbledore was using him for. And, no, he was most certainly _not_ going to tell them where he lived.

They had Charms that morning with the Ravenclaws. From Cousin Dora’s description, they had heard that Professor Flitwick was an excitable little man with a flair for the dramatic, and he didn’t disappoint. When he reached Harry’s name on the roll call, he gave an excited squeak and toppled over behind his desk.

“Please excuse me, Mr. Potter,” he said shakily as he hopped back onto his stack of books. “I thought I saw your father sitting there for a moment. Now, then, where was I…? Ah, yes, Dean Thomas?”

“Present…”

Flitwick began with a lecture on the overall theory of Charms and why each element of the casting—words, rhythm, inflection, and wand motion—was important. Toward the end of the lesson, he taught them the Wand-Lighting Charm, which was probably the simplest known charm (depending on whether one counted its counter-charm separately). The wand motion was a simple flick, and the incantation was only two syllables: “ _Lumos_.”

Just like in transfiguration, much of the class who weren’t used to trying to feel or control their magic had trouble producing results. A couple of the Ravenclaws got it right on the first try, but some, like Neville, couldn’t produce any light at all. Others would produce light for a couple of seconds before it blinked out, or it would be the wrong colour, or in Ron Weasley’s case, it was accompanied by an annoying humming sound. Harry and Hermione, however, seemed to have the opposite problem.

Harry gave his wand a flick and said, “ _Lumos_.” There was a bright, but brief flash of light and a pop, like a light bulb burning out.

“Huh, that was strange,” he said.

“I wonder why it did that,” Hermione said.

“I don’t know. Why don’t you try it?”

“Okay.” Hermione flicked her own wand. “ _Lumos_.” There was a loud crack, like a whip, and an even brighter flash, like a camera flashbulb, which dazzled the room.

“Oh, my,” squeaked Professor Flitwick.

“Too much power, maybe?” Harry suggested.

“Maybe.” Hermione tried again, giving her wand a light flick and trying to send less power through it. She created a smaller flash, like Harry’s, but it was still a flash.

They both tried a couple more times, with similar results, and finally, Professor Flitwick said, “Mr. Potter, Miss Granger, please stay after class. I’d like to speak with you privately.”

“Yes, Professor,” Harry said. Hermione looked downcast. How could they fall behind like this when it was only the second day?

A majority of the other students got the spell to work by the end of class, but Harry and Hermione couldn’t seem to manage it. They waited until everyone else had filed out and approached the front desk.

To their surprise, Flitwick hopped down off his stack books and sat on the front edge of his desk, swinging his feet slightly. “So, how long have you two been practising wandless magic?” he asked conversationally.

Harry and Hermione looked at each other nervously. “H-how did you know, Professor?” Harry asked.

“Professor McGonagall informed me, of course,” he said. “But it was also obvious from your reactions to the Wand-Lighting Charm. You aren’t the first students to arrive in my class with a talent for wandless magic. Why, your mother, Mr. Potter, was quite adept at it. So, then, how long?”

“We started trying about four years ago, Professor,” Hermione said.

Flitwick’s bushy eyebrows rose at that. “Really? What spells have you tried?”

“Well, we’re best at levitation,” Harry said.

“Ah, and may I see that, then?”

“I guess.” They looked around, and Hermione nudged Harry and pointed to a stack of fairly small books. They each wave a hand toward the stack, and the top two books levitated off the pile.

“Oh, well done!” Flitwick cried, clapping his little hands. “Splendid! I’ve haven’t seen anyone do that in ages without formal training.” Then he seemed to remember something. “Did you, by any chance, help a certain Nymphadora Tonks with her N.E.W.T. Charms project?”

Harry grinned. “We may have given her a few pointers.”

Flitwick grinned back, which was a little intimidating, considering he was part-Goblin and a former duelling champion, to boot. “Well, then,” he said, getting back to business, “the trouble you are having with your _Lumos_ Charms is the same problem I have seen from every student I’ve ever had who was adept at wandless magic.”

“It is?” Harry said. “I thought we were using too much power, but—”

“No, that’s not quite right. The difficulty is that you have become accustomed to controlling your magic without a wand, which is a very good skill, but I have found that most people do not have the patience to learn it. We use wands because they focus our magic and allow it to flow more freely, making it easier to learn new spells. The problem you are having is not that you are using too much energy, but that, with the freer flow allowed by a wand, you are releasing it too quickly.”

“Like a short circuit?” Hermione said.

Flitwick paused. “I’m not familiar with the term.”

“Oh…well, it’s the same sort of thing with electricity…Actually, Professor, we did explode quite a few electric light bulbs trying to light them up when we were first starting out,” she said sheepishly.

“Of course,” Flitwick said. “That’s the same principle. You would have needed to learn enough control to tone down the release of energy from accidental magic to controlled wandless magic. Most people simply never learn to call forth that much power at will, but _you_ will need to refine that control further to cast with a wand. It takes only a trickle of magic to cast _Lumos_. Why don’t you try the spell again, and this time, concentrate on releasing the energy more slowly than usual.”

“Okay, Professor,” Harry said. He drew his wand, but kept his arm as relaxed as possible, focusing on letting the warm feeling of magic flow out naturally into the magically-conductive phoenix feather core instead of trying to force it out. He gave it a small flick and whispered, “ _Lumos_.”

The tip of his wand glowed with a soft, yellowish light that remained steady even as he waved it around. He laughed when he saw the charm finally work.

Seeing her brother’s success, Hermione screwed up her face in concentration and repeated his feat successfully casting a steady _Lumos_ of her own.

“Excellent!” cried Professor Flitwick. “Five points to Gryffindor.”

Harry and Hermione beamed at the praise, but as they became distracted, they both quickly lost control. Within a moment of each other, their lights brightened and then popped out with a flash.

“Oh…well, of course, you will need some more practice with that,” Flitwick said. “Now, you probably won’t have this problem in Transfiguration, since you are learning to _mold_ your magic there. But in Charms, where you must _cast_ your magic, you will need to learn to maintain control and to switch quickly between one style and the other. You already know the principles of how to do it, so just keep practising like that, and come see me if you have any further trouble. I’m sure you’ll catch up in no time.”

“Yes, Professor,” the children said in unison.

“Now, I think you two had better run along to lunch. Ta ta.”

They nodded to him and left the classroom. Filius Flitwick smiled wistfully as he remembered how he had helped a certain Lily Evans with the same difficulty, and how she had gone on to become one of his best students. Yes, he thought, these two would be a pleasure to have in his class.

* * *

“Two other child animagi?” Professor McGonagall said in shock. “Are you quite certain, Mr. Potter?”

Harry and Hermione had arrived to Transfiguration Class early on Wednesday morning to catch their professor alone. Now that they had been to all of their classes once except Astronomy and Potions, they had a little more time to think about other issues. However, Professor McGonagall thought that it was entirely _too_ early for this kind of news.

“That’s what the Hat said,” Harry replied. “Do you know anything about them?”

“No, I’m afraid not. I thought it was completely impossible until I met you. Did the Sorting Hat tell you anything else?”

“Only that “the clues may still be out there for you to find.” We were hoping you could help us find them, Professor.”

Hermione jumped in: “We thought we could try to look up known animagi from history and look for clues in their lives, but…”

“But the records are quite incomplete from before the Ministry was founded,” McGonagall finished for her. “And that’s not counting the ones who never registered at all.” And she knew two of those who were very close to Harry Potter. “It would still be a good place to start, though…and you _may_ also wish to look at relatives of known animagi,” she said carefully. “It is thought by some that an aptitude for the skill may run in families.”

“Really…?” Hermione said, her mind clearly already running with the possibilities. “That could be very helpful. Thank you, Professor.”

“You’re quite welcome, Miss Granger. Was there anything else?”

“Well…” Hermione glanced at Harry and then stepped closer to McGonagall’s desk. Lowering her voice to a whisper, she said, “If I may, Professor, you _did_ say once that you might be willing to consider teaching a student the animagus transformation if they had a very good reason…”

McGonagall opened her mouth and shut it again, wracking her brain for any memory of when she might have said such a thing. It vaguely came back to her—her very first meeting with Harry, who now seemed to be hiding a snicker. Trust Hermione Granger to remember a conversation she’d had six years ago, she thought.

“It’s just that our parents want us to be well-prepared,” Hermione added.

McGonagall doubted Dan and Emma had been consulted about any such “preparation,” but while Hermione wasn’t entirely wrong about her opinion on the matter, now was _not_ the time. “Miss Granger,” she said, trying to speak calmly, “this is only your second transfiguration lesson. When we get to the transfiguration of living subjects in the lessons, you will begin to appreciate the difficulty of what you ask.”

“Yes, ma’am,” she said, clearly disappointed, but then, they heard the footsteps of the other students approaching and quickly took their seats.

Professor McGonagall rose from her desk and sighed inwardly, trying to carry on like everything was normal and focus on the fact that she still had to _teach_ today. But then, when were things _ever_ normal around Harry Potter? Or, she was starting to think, around Hermione Granger?

* * *

Lunch was the most spottily attended meal at Hogwarts, with many people just popping into the Great Hall for a quick bite, rather than staying the whole hour. That made it an ideal time to discuss further matters that, while not secret, were somewhat personal, and something Harry and Hermione didn’t want publicised too widely just yet.

“We really do need to find someplace to practice karate,” Hermione said over their sandwiches. “We need to stay in form.”

“I guess,” her brother said, “but we’re not taking lessons anymore, and we already have a lot of homework.”

She rolled her eyes. Maybe _he_ thought it was a lot. “Maybe just a half-hour before dinner each day to run through the forms,” she said.

“Well, okay, but we need to find someplace out of the way. We don’t want to attract _too_ much attention.”

“I know. That corridor off toward the North Tower doesn’t look like it gets used much, and it’s close to the dorms. We could check it out after Herbology.”

“Fine,” Harry acquiesced. He should have known his sister would already have a plan.

After classes ended that afternoon, two young Gryffindors wandered around the seventh floor near their dorms to make sure they weren’t missing any hidden doors or corridors. The corridor between Gryffindor Tower and the North Tower was dusty and clearly disused. The closest thing around was the staircase headed down to the Hospital Wing. It seemed like the most obscure area they would find without going to the far end of the castle, to the unused corridors out past the library.

It was there that the two children, still wearing their school robes, started practising fighting moves that were rarely seen in the wizarding world except in the Far East. The school robes weren’t as convenient for this as their karate gis, but they were less conspicuous, and they were closer to a real-world scenario—though, granted, a real-world scenario would probably involve wands.

Of course, practising karate wasn’t exactly quiet, even though they were keeping the noise down to a lower level than usual, and they were bound to attract _some_ attention. Sure enough, as they practised, a woman with a mane of frizzy brown hair even wilder than Hermione’s and thick glasses that made her look like a giant insect walked down the corridor from the North Tower, obliviously shuffling some cards. “Hmm…” she muttered with a wavering voice, “Deuce of Swords, Strength, Ace of Swords, Knight of Swords, The Moon, The Tower, and…Death reversed? Two mighty warriors who will bring victory, one with a great secret, who will escape from certain doom? Now, that’s just ridiculous.”

It was then that she heard the noise: the rhythmic stomping of feet and synchronised kiai shouts. And she looked up and saw the strangest thing she had seen in quite some time: two eleven-year-old children, one of them famous for the defeat of the most feared dark wizard of the age, viciously striking and kicking at unseen opponents in near-perfect unison.

Before they had time to notice her, Sybill Trelawney turned on her heel and headed back to her tower. “Too much sherry,” she muttered.

Just a few minutes later, a young black boy with a sketch book in his hand also heard the noise as he was wandering by from the other direction.

Harry saw him round the corner and stopped at once to face him.

“Hi-yah!” his sister yelled as she kept going.

“Hermione!”

She stopped and turned around. “Oh, hello, Dean,” she said when she saw the newcomer.

Dean Thomas, being mostly muggle-raised, wasn’t all that dazzled by the Boy-Who-Lived, but he certainly knew some impressive skills when he saw them. “Wow, you guys know karate?”

Harry and Hermione exchanged a look. Hermione shrugged her shoulders. It was going to get out eventually.

“Uh, yeah,” Harry said. “Professor Dumbledore said it would be good preparation for duelling later.”

“Cool. Hey, you guys mind if I draw you? I was just looking for stuff to draw around the castle.”

“Um…I guess not. Hermione?”

“Er, sure go ahead.”

They went back to their katas while Dean leaned against the wall and started sketching, though he was a little distracted to see just how much the pair knew. It was twenty minutes later when, sweating and out of breath, but in good spirits, they broke it off to see his own handiwork.

“Dean, this is really good,” Hermione said. He had captured them in an action pose, in the middle of a powerful, lunging strike, with a victorious expression on their faces. They were sure the sketch was larger-than-life, but in Dean’s own opinion, it wasn’t by much.

“Thanks,” he said. “You gave me a lot to work with. Are you two, like, actual black belts or something?”

“Uh-huh,” Harry said casually.

“Well, technically, they’re junior ranks,” Hermione corrected. “We probably couldn’t fight a trained adult yet, but we did have to learn all the same skills for them.”

“Wicked! You two want this?” he asked, tearing off the sketch. “I can always draw more.”

“Sure, thanks,” Harry said. Mum and Dad would like to see it, he thought, and probably better that than finding its way into the newspaper just now.

* * *

By Friday morning, the whispers were starting to circulate around the school about the pair’s “muggle duelling practice” in the afternoons, but they were surprised and relieved to find they were only catching slowly. A quick word to Seamus Finnigan, whom Dean had tipped off about it, explained why.

“Well, you’re Harry Potter,” the Irish boy said. “Of course you’re doing special training.”

Harry was little unsettled by that. Apparently, what was a surprising skill at age six—or even nine for that matter, though Cousin Dora had been more impressed with the board breaking—became more or less expected by age eleven, at least if you were the Boy-Who-Lived.

In any case, that morning, Harry and Hermione were surprised for a different reason when Hedwig brought them a letter along with their morning paper. Hermione opened the envelope and, with difficulty, read off the scrawled note:

 

_Dear Harry and Hermione,_

_Sorry I didn_ _’t get a chance to talk to you more at the Welcome Feast. I thought you might want to hear more about Harry’s parents, and I want to hear all about your first week. I know you get most of Friday afternoons off, so why don’t you come by for a cup of tea around three? Send an answer back with Hedwig._

_Hagrid_

“Well that’s nice of him,” Hermione said. “We should really go see him.”

“Yeah, _and_ he’s okay with calling me “Harry,’” her brother replied. He took the note and scribbled on the back, _Thank you for the offer. We_ _’ll see you at three.—Harry and Hermione._ “Go take this back to Hagrid, please,” he told Hedwig, handing her the note. She took off and flew out of the Hall.

But unfortunately for them, before they got to see Hagrid, they had to survive double Potions with the Slytherins. Both Hermione and Harry, and all the Gryffindors, for that matter, were on high alert as they entered the dungeon. If Professor Snape was going for an intimidating atmosphere, he had certainly succeeded. It was cold and musty. The walls were dark stone unadorned by the sculpted shapes of rest of the castle, but lined all around with pickled animals and parts of animals floating in jars.

Severus Snape, former Death Eater, expert in the Dark Arts, and renowned potions master, swept into the classroom like a black-clad ghost at precisely ten o’clock and leaned over his over-sized desk to call the role. He paused when he got to Harry’s name.

_“Ah, Yes. Harry Potter. Our new—celebrity.”_

That probably wasn’t a good sign.

 _Draco Malfoy and his friends, Crabbe and Goyle, sniggered behind their hands._ They knew better than to antagonise Harry Potter too much themselves, but if the rumours were true, they were about to see some real fireworks from someone who _could_ get away with it.

Snape stared out at the class with his piercing dark eyes, and began to speak in a soft, but eerily menacing voice:

_“You are here to learn the subtle science and exact art of potionmaking,” he began. He spoke in barely more than a whisper, but they caught every word—like Professor McGonagall, Snape had the gift of keeping a class silent without effort. “As there is little foolish wand waving here, many of you will hardly believe this is magic. I don’t expect you will really understand the beauty of the softly simmering cauldron with its shimmering fumes, the delicate power of liquids that creep through human veins, bewitching the mind, ensnaring the senses… I can teach you how to bottle fame, brew glory, even stopper death—if you aren’t as big a bunch of dunderheads as I usually have to teach.”_

The class remained silent after he finished. Harry and Hermione exchanged a knowing look. That sounded pretty much how Cousin Dora had described him.

Snape was staring at him, now. He instinctively stared back intensely.

_“Potter!” said Snape suddenly. “What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?”_

Harry had a vague idea of those plants _were_ , having only skimmed _One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi_. He had read _Magical Drafts and Potions_ more carefully, but didn’t remember seeing that combination. Maybe it was in there, though, since Hermione’s hand shot into the air.

Harry shot his sister a sceptical glance. Across the room, he happened to notice that Draco Malfoy now wore a surprised look on his face. He pushed this from his mind and looked Snape in the eye. Trying to answer calmly, he said, “I don’t know sir.”

Snape kept staring at him in a contest that would rival any with an angry cat, and his lips curled into a sneer.

_“Tut, tut—fame clearly isn’t everything.”_

_He ignored Hermione_ _’s hand._

_“Let’s try again. Potter, where would you look if I told you to find me a bezoar?”_

Hermione stretched her hand higher, but Harry knew this one. Cousin Andi had given him and Hermione each a bezoar and requested that they carry them with them, “just in case”—apparently something that many members of Noble Families did. “In the stomach of a goat, sir,” he said, “although in the event of an actual poisoning, I think it would be quicker to check the cabinets.”

The other Gryffindors giggled at this, but Snape was not amused.

“A point from Gryffindor for your cheek, Potter,” he said, “and perhaps you can also tell me the difference between nectar and honeywater.”

Hermione started to raise her hand again, but Harry reached over and forced it down. “I…think they’re the same, sir,” he said.

“Hmm…correct,” Snape grumbled, finally looking away to mask a slight hint of surprise. “That is, _if_ the honey is diluted properly. Well, I suppose your knowledge is…adequate…for a beginner, Potter. And _for your information, asphodel and wormwood make a sleeping potion so powerful it is known as the Draught of Living Death. Well? Why aren_ _’t you all copying that down?”_

 _There was a sudden rummaging for quills and parchment._ Harry blinked and glanced back toward the Slytherins and saw that Malfoy and his two minions now looked quite annoyed.

The Potions lesson actually went better than they had hoped, probably because they knew what to expect. Snape wasn’t much of a lecturer, preferring to just wander around and watch as they all worked on brewing the Boil-Curing Potion, of course, criticising the Gryffindors every chance he got. With, Harry and Hermione working together, though, there wasn’t much he could fault them on, although he certainly didn’t praise them, nor anyone, really, except Malfoy.

Still, there wasn’t much trouble at all until—

“Hey, wait, does it say to add porcupine quills there—?”

_CRACK!_

Behind Harry and Hermione, Neville’s and Ron’s cauldron melted down, drenching Neville with the unfinished potion and causing him to break out into painful boils. Snape took a point from Ron for not catching the mistake sooner and sent them off to the Hospital Wing.

Luckily, that was the worst thing that happened during the lesson. When Harry and Hermione turned in their sample at the end of class, Snape examined it and informed them, if unenthusiastically, that they would receive an E for it.

* * *

Classes ended at two on Friday, so Harry suggested that they go check on Neville in the Hospital Wing before going out to see Hagrid. As it happened, he was just about to be released.

“Yeah, uh, I guess it wasn’t too bad because it was a low-level potion,” he told them. “The more complicated ones can be really bad if they get on you when they’re not finished.”

“It’s too bad no one ever does anything about Professor Snape,” Hermione complained. “He was being really unfair to both of you.” Neville nodded in agreement.

“I didn’t think he was that unfair to me,” Harry said.

“What? What about all of those questions he asked you,” Hermione said.

“Well, yeah, but he only took one point from me. I was worried it would be a lot worse.”

“Harry, I looked it up. Draught of the Living Death is a N.E.W.T.-level potion. There’s no way he expected you to know that.”

“You did,” Harry said with a grin.

His sister folded her arms in a huff.

“But that’s the weird part…” he continued. “Mione, do you remember the flowers at Cousin Andi’s house?”

She remembered. The Grangers had spotted them as soon as they walked in the door.

 

_The sitting room at the Tonks house was more richly decorated than the Grangers_ _’ living room, with delicate little tables and potted plants and fancier furniture. The Grangers had the money to match it if they wanted, but with younger children in the house, it wasn’t worth it. In one corner, they beheld a particularly elaborate arrangement with yellow, purple, and white flowers in a vase._

_“Those are lovely flowers,” Emma remarked._

_“Thank you,” Andi said. “It was actually my boss, Hippocrates Smethwyck, who sent them. They’re a compliment for my letter responding to Rita Skeeter in the Prophet.”_

_“They are?”_

_“Yes, it’s the Language of Flowers.”_

_“I’m sorry, I never learnt it.”_

_“No, even in the wizarding world, few do anymore outside the old families, but friends in the Wizengamot still use them to send messages to each other. See here?” she pointed out some of the blossoms. “Sunflower and willowherb: “I admire your bravery.” Goldenrain and marjoram: “for dissenting against delusion.” Double aster: “I share your sentiments,” and wolfsbane is misanthropy—together, they’re basically, “I don’t like her either.” And then sage and loosestrife is our little signature back and forth—it’s health plus pretencion because we’re both healers and politicians at the same time.” Emma chuckled at that._

_“Wow, you can say all that just with flowers?” Hermione said._

_“Mm-hmm. There’s a book about it around here somewhere. Very popular in the Victorian Era.”_

 

“Yes,” Hermione said, snapping out of her reminiscing. “But what does that have to do with anything?”

“Well…I saw Malfoy’s face when Snape asked me that first question. He looked surprised, like Snape did something he hadn’t expected. I think there might have been some kind of hidden message in the question.”

“But why would he do that? I think he was just asking you a hard question so you’d trip up,” she insisted.

“I don’t know—Neville, do you know the Language of Flowers?”

“A little,” the round-faced boy said. “I should probably learn it better—I do a lot of gardening.”

“Do you know what asphodel and wormwood mean?”

“No, sorry. Your cousin would probably know.”

“Yeah. Mione, did you ever read that book of Cousin Andi’s?”

“N-no,” she said, embarrassed. “I didn’t have time with all the other books…but I think wormwood means “bitterness.” I’m pretty sure that’s in the Bible…Harry, that could’ve even been an insult if that’s right.”

“Hmm, maybe,” Harry admitted. “I guess I’ll have to write Cousin Andi and ask her.” He switched gears. “Hey, Neville. We’re going out to have tea with Hagrid in a little while. You wanna come? I hear he likes having company.”

“Wow, uh, sure, Harry,” Neville said. “Thanks.”

At five till three, the three of made their way out of the castle through the Clock Tower (“Isn’t it a bit dangerous having that big pendulum swinging in the middle of the hall?” Hermione said. Neville just shrugged.)

Hagrid lived in a little (for him) one-room hut down the hill to the northwest, near the edge of the Forbidden Forest. It didn’t look like much, but they supposed that for a really outdoorsy sort of person like Hagrid, it was just right.

Harry knocked on the door, but immediately flinched back when he heard a loud barking emanating from inside.

“Back, Fang! Back!” Hagrid’s own booming voice sounded. The door opened to reveal the huge man, who was struggling to hold onto the collar of the largest dog Harry had ever seen.

“Back, Fang!” Hagrid yelled again, but the dog kept barking, straining against its collar to make a run at Harry. Fang was a boarhound, and a big one—all black and nearly as tall as Harry, even on all fours. Harry took a defensive stance and hissed loudly, to Neville’s and Hagrid’s surprise, which seemed to egg the dog on more.

“Fang! What’s got into you?” Hagrid said.

Harry started to inch away, keeping his eyes on the dog, but Hermione grabbed him around the shoulders to stop him from taking off running, or worse, transforming. “Sorry,” she said, “my brother’s never been good with dogs.”

“Sit _down_!” Hagrid pushed the dog down to its knees. “Sorry ‘bout that. Fang’s a big softie when he’s not too excited. Go on then, let him sniff your hand.”

Harry positively blanched at the suggestion. For one thing, he barely knew anything about _dogs_ _’_ body language. But Hermione took him by the arm and slowly pulled him forward. “Hello, Fang,” she said sweetly, “I’m Hermione, and this is Harry—just a couple of normal kids.” She extended his hand to Fang’s nose, but he sniffed once and barked again.

“Fang!”

Harry flinched back, but she tried again. This time, Fang licked Harry’s hand halfheartedly, and Harry finally relaxed.

“There, that’s alright, then. Come on in,” Hagrid said happily.

The hut was a cosy place for someone Hagrid’s size, if a little odd, what with the hams and pheasants hanging from the ceiling. But it had a bed and something like a kitchenette, and enough space to work. The three children came inside and sat down in two very large chairs. Fang bounded into the extra space in Neville’s chair.

“This is Neville Longbottom,” Harry said and Hagrid was pouring some tea.

“Longbottom,” he said. “Good ter meet yeh. I knew yer parents too, back in the day.”

“You—you did?” Neville squeaked as he nervously petted Fang’s back.

“Yeah, I worked with both yeh boys’ parents in the, er, well, back in the war. Can’t tell yeh too much ‘bout that. Lot of it still secret, Dumbledore says, but they was good folks, all o’ them.”

The details of what had happened to the Longbottoms were one of the few things that Cousin Andi had outright refused to tell Harry and Hermione, only saying, with shame, that her elder sister had put them in the permanent care ward at St. Mungo’s. They had decided not to ask Neville about it.

Hagrid passed them each a cup of tea and set out a plate of rock cakes. The children thought he either needed a cooking lesson or three or was taking the concept of rock cakes far too literally, but they politely gnawed on them around the edges as they talked.

“Well, I knew yer mum and dad almost soon as they started here,” Hagrid told Harry. “Yer dad and his friends were always gettin’ into trouble. Worse than those Weasley Twins, even. Seemed like I had to chase ‘em away from the forest at least once a month. And yer mum, she liked to take a walk around the grounds, and she’d stop by ter say hello. And of course yer dad, he would follow her. He was sure he was gonna marry her from his first year, but she always thought he was just annoying.” Hagrid chuckled at that, and the children joined in.

“Ah, but yer mum, she was a good soul,” Hagrid said wistfully. “Always lookin’ for the best in people. Even tried gettin’ along with yer Professor Snape—”

“What?” Hermione exclaimed. “Harry’s mum was friends with Professor Snape?” Neville paled a shade or two at the mention of the Potions Master.

“Well, fer a while,” he said slowly. “They moved apart—bein’ in different houses and all, and with the war going on. Dark times, that.”

“Cousin Andi—that’s Andromeda Tonks—she said Professor Snape and Harry’s dad didn’t get along,” she continued.

“Well, no, I s’pose not…but that’s in the past,” he said, not quite meeting their eyes. “I don’t think Snape’ll give yeh any trouble—or any more than anybody else, anyway.”

“I don’t know…” She told Hagrid about their lesson with Professor Snape that morning, with Neville uncomfortably filling in his own part, but Hagrid told them not to worry about it—that Snape generally disliked almost everybody. (“Then why did he become a teacher?” Hermione asked. Hagrid didn’t answer.)

Neville in particular looked relieved when they changed the subject to something else. Harry and Hermione told Hagrid of their life in the muggle world, interspersed with him and Neville trading a few stories about Neville’s family.

It was around when Hagrid entreated Harry to take a second rock cake for the second or third time that Harry noticed a newspaper clipping on the table and idly looked it over.

 

_GRINGOTTS BREAK-IN LATEST_

_Investigations continue into the break in at Gringotts on 31 July, widely believed to be the work of Dark wizards or witches unknown._

_Gringotts goblins today insisted that nothing had been taken. The vault that was searched had in fact been emptied the same day._

_“But we’re not telling you what was in there, so keep your noses out if you know what’s good for you,” said a Gringotts spokesgoblin this afternoon._

 

“You’re following the Gringotts story?” Harry said.

“Oh, that, yeah.” Hagrid sounded a bit cagey. “Gotta keep an eye on things when there’s dark wizards about.”

“Has Professor Dumbledore said anything else about it?” Hermione asked. “He told us he was looking into it.”

Harry passed the clipping to Neville.

“Dumbledore? Ah, no. Nope, says everything’s been quiet.”

“Hagrid, I think I saw you in the Leaky Cauldron that day,” Neville said. “It was the day after my birthday. Didn’t you say you were going up to Gringotts on Hogwarts business?”

“Huh? Well, I, uh, might a done,” Hagrid said nervously.

“Really?” Harry asked. “Did you see anything suspicious?”

“Nope, nope. Didn’t see nothin,’” Hagrid said quickly. “And no need ter worry ‘bout that here. Ain’t no safer place “n Hogwarts. No dark wizards’ll get in _here_ while Dumbledore’s around.”

“Yeah. Right,” Harry said with a nervous laugh.

But despite this, Hermione and Harry were starting to make a connection between two things Dumbledore had said to them—two things that at the time had seemed unrelated.

Hogwarts was “the oldest and strongest magical fortification in Britain.”

The item in the vault was “moved to a more secure location.”


	19. Letters

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The deeper magic from before the dawn of Harry Potter is JK Rowling’s.

_Dear Mum and Dad,_ Hermione wrote. She and her brother were seated at one of the back tables in the library, taking advantage of the spare time on the weekend to compose a letter home. They had spent quite a bit of time in the library this week, since the bookworm of the Granger Family wanted to get a really good look at the school’s massive (by the standards of the magical world) collection of books. She was disappointed to find that all the rare and valuable books were hidden away in the Restricted Section, but there were still more than enough to keep her occupied.

_We_ _’re sure you’ve heard all over the Daily Prophet that we’ve both been sorted into Gryffindor, but since the Daily Prophet also says Harry was forcibly taken from his muggle relatives at age three, is a pawn in Professor Dumbledore’s evil schemes of world domination, and is a Chudley Cannons fan, we thought we should confirm it for you._

Harry chuckled as he read her neat, looping letters upside-down. “Hang on, let me explain that,” he said. Hermione slide the parchment across, and he added a line in his easily-distinguished blocky scribble: _(It_ _’s my roommate, Ron, who’s the Chudley Cannons fan.)_

 _It turns out they sort you by having a magical hat read your personality and decide which house best suits you,_ Hermione continued. _But maybe Cousin Andi told you that by now. It told both of us we_ _’d do well in Ravenclaw, too, but it put us in Gryffindor because we told it we both wanted to go there._

_We learnt a couple other important things that we can_ _’t tell you in a letter. Harry’s going to ask Cousin Andi about more secure communications._

_We like most of our classes so far, except for History and Potions._

“I didn’t think Potions was so bad,” Harry protested.

“Harry, you can’t deny Professor Snape isn’t a fair teacher, no matter what else you think about him.”

“Well, no, but I thought the rest of the class was interesting.”

“He barely even taught.”

“Well, it _was_ a pretty simple potion.”

“Neville didn’t think so.” She dropped the matter and kept writing: _Professor Binns is just as boring as Cousin Dora said. I think I was the only one who stayed awake the entire time. I even had to keep elbowing Harry._

“Well, it wasn’t like I missed anything. We’ve both read _A History of Magic_ cover to cover. Plus, Professor Binns didn’t even notice.”

“It’s still poor form.” _And Professor Snape was really unfair, especially to Harry._

“Alright, give me that.” Harry snatched the letter away and wrote, _Professor Snape wasn_ _’t very nice, like Dora said, but I didn’t think he was any worse with me than everyone else. Hermione does, though._

“Hmpf.” Hermione grabbed the parchment back and added, _He quizzed Harry on advanced level questions for no reason._

Harry grabbed it again. _I think it might have been some kind of message, but we_ _’re not sure yet._

“I _told_ you, _if_ there was a message in that question, it was probably an insult or something.”

“We should wait till we know for sure, Mione. Just think of it like doing research,” he said with a grin.

His sister rolled her eyes.

 _Professor Quirrell seemed really creepy_ , he kept writing.

“Oh, come on!” she took the letter back. _I think Professor Quirrell is a really good teacher. The only odd thing is he always stutters when he says Harry_ _’s name. But he seems really knowledgeable, and he’s been teaching us to think outside the box._

Harry dragged the parchment away from her again. _He_ _’s always giving me this creepy stare, though. And he made Susan Bones cry in the first ten minutes of class—she’s the Director of Magical Law Enforcement’s niece._

_He was making a point._

_He wasn_ _’t very nice about it._

They were practically writing past each other by now, and, predictably, it didn’t end well. Under the shuffling between their quills, the letter suddenly went spinning across the table with two large, black ink blots streaked across it.

“Harry!” Hermione hissed.

“What? You were doing it, too.” Harry waved his hand and levitated the letter back to them.

“Harry!” Hermione said more loudly.

“Shush!” Madam Pince warned from the front desk.

“We’re not supposed to be doing wandless magic in public,” she whispered.

“It’s okay. There’s hardly anyone in here today.”

“But what about the letter?”

“Hey, there’s a Smudge-Removing Spell in the Charms book, isn’t there?” Harry drew his wand.

“No! Not with that. You’ll probably set it on fire or something…Here, let me try it…” She ran her fingers over the smeared parchment.

“What are you—?”

“Shh, don’t distract me.” She closed her eyes and furrowed her brow in concentration. If a few moments, the ink smears had vanished, leaving the words intact.

“Cool,” Harry said.

“There, that takes care of that,” Hermione said with a small smile and kept writing: _Professor Quirrell said some interesting things about magical households. Did you know that it_ _’s important to keep magical households clean so they don’t attract magical pests? Or that magical artifacts should be kept locked up so they don’t get stolen by muggle burglars? Apparently those are serious problems here._

“I don’t think they’re as big of problems for us,” Harry said.

“It wouldn’t hurt though.”

“I think we should mention about Charms class.”

“In a moment. I was getting to that.”

“And the third floor.”

“Hold on. One thing at a time.”

“Why don’t you just let me write it?”

“Fine,” Hermione huffed. She pushed the parchment back to her brother and crossed her arms.

Harry began to write his piece. _Anyway, the other professors all seem nice. A lot of them said they liked my birth parents—or at least my mum—they say my dad was a troublemaker until later on._

_Charms class is harder than we expected. Professor Flitwick says wandless magic short-circuits or something when you use a wand, so our spells are going kind of crazy. He says my mum had the same problem, and he_ _’s been teaching us to control our wands better._

Hermione grabbed the letter and added, _Privately_ , then continued, _We_ _’re both doing well in Transfiguration, though, because that’s a different kind of magic._

_We each have four roommates here. They all had a lot of questions at first, but they_ _’ve been pretty good about it since. I have Parvati Patil and Lavender Brown—they’re nice enough, but they’re both real chatterboxes. Both of them are good at charms, and they’ve been helping us a little. And then there’s Lily Moon and Sally-Anne Perks, but they mostly keep to themselves._

_My roommates are Neville Longbottom, Ron Weasley, Dean Thomas, and Seamus Finnigan,_ Harry wrote. _Neville_ _’s really nice, but he’s not very confident. We had tea with him and Hagrid yesterday, and he told us about his family. I guess his grandmother has really high expectations for him. Ron kind of has a chip on his shoulder, but he okay most of the time. Dean drew the sketch we sent you. He saw us practising karate and drew it for us. So far, only a couple of people have come to see us practise. Hermione thinks it hasn’t reached the rumour mill yet, or else people don’t understand it without seeing it. I haven’t talked to Seamus much, but he keeps setting things on fire on accident._

_Oh, and Draco Malfoy came up to me on the train and tried to introduce me to the_ _“right sort” of wizards, but I politely turned him down. I guess there’s a big Gryffindor-Slytherin rivalry, but so far, none of the Slytherins have made any trouble._

_It_ _’s really eerie seeing the Great Hall and all the classrooms half-empty. I know we’ve heard all about the war, but it’s different to actually see it like this. It’s like it follows you around. I still think the other wizards are overreacting around me and all that, but it’s like it’s a little harder to blame them, now._ Harry looked over what he wrote and considered whether to add more, but he just nodded and laid down his quill.

Hermione took over again. _You should probably know that Professor Dumbledore says the school_ _’s keeping something really dangerous on the third floor, but he didn’t explain why. It’s strange—the upper years say they don’t normally do that. Don’t worry, we haven’t gone anywhere near it._

She paused for a moment and looked the letter over herself before signing it, _Love from Hermione_.

Harry added, _and Harry._

“There, that should do it,” Hermione said. She folded the letter in two and stowed it her notebook for when they went up to the owlery later. “So how far have you got on the Charms homework,” she said, pulling out _The Standard Book of Spells_.

“Not far,” Harry admitted. “It’s hard when we’re doing it different from everybody else.”

“Well, we’ve got to keep at it. It’s the only way we’re going to catch up.” Hermione was, predictably, throwing herself into Charms with even more than her usual enthusiasm, and was more or less dragging Harry along for the ride by now. They both worked on their essays for a while, until Harry saw something in the corner of his eye.

“What is it?” Hermione asked when she saw him staring over her shoulder.

“Hermione, that’s her!” Harry whispered.

She looked in that direction and saw a blond girl with a ponytail in blue-trimmed robes. “Her?”

But Harry was already up and moving. “I’ve been trying to catch her all week,” he whispered. He walked over, with Hermione following, to the table where the last child of a Noble House in their year was sitting alone, also studying Charms. “Excuse me,” he said.

The girl looked up and let out a squeak when she saw who was talking to her.

“Amanda Brocklehurst, scion of the Noble House of Brocklehurst?”

“Yes, Mr. Potter, sir. Pleased to meet you, sir,” she said, leaping to her feet and shaking his hand excitedly.

“Thank you, Miss Brocklehurst. Just Harry will do. This is my sister, Hermione.” He tried to politely extricate himself from her grasp.

The Ravenclaw squeaked again as she shook Hermione’s hand. “Hi…uh, everyone calls me Mandy,” she said before turning back to the boy. “Is this about the Muggle Protection Act, Mr. P—I mean, Harry? I know my Great-Granddad doesn’t really voice his opinions much, but—”

Harry held up a hand. They might have seen some of it in class, but it was quite clear now that this girl was even more overeager than his sister. “Calm down, Mandy,” he said. “We just wanted to introduce ourselves.”

“Oh…right…well…my Great-Granddad is Lord Ethelred Brocklehurst—but you probably already knew that,” Mandy started, trying to do what she though was a proper political introduction. “He’s the head of the Culture, Media, and Sport Committee. And, of course, he practically owns the Diagonal Theatre—have you ever been?”

“No, sorry—raised by muggles,” Harry said.

“Oh…well, you really should come sometime. I…I think you’ll like this year’s Christmas production.” She leaned in close and lowered her voice to a whisper. “I’m not really supposed to tell anyone this, but for their Christmas production, the Diagonal Theatre is doing a revival of the original version of _The Wizard and the Hopping Pot_.”

Hermione and Harry shared a confused look. It had been a while since they’d read _The Tales of Beedle the Bard_ , but…“The one where the hopping pot saves the wizard from a mob of muggles by eating them?” Hermione asked.

“No, Great-Granddad says that’s the anti-muggle version that they started telling in the Renaissance. In the original, the wizard refuses to help the poor and sick muggles in his village, and the hopping pot annoys him until he does.”

“That…that actually sounds like a pretty good story,” Hermione said. “Is that like the magical version of _A Christmas Carol_?”

“Of what?”

“Never mind.”

“I’m a little surprised, though,” Harry said. “Cousin Andi said the Diagonal Theatre usually sticks to safer and more neutral plays, and this one sounds really pro-muggle.”

“They _have_ done that for a long time,” Mandy confirmed. “Play to the middle to sell more tickets. But this one is part of Great-Granddad’s revival project.”

“What project?”

“What? Oh, I guess you wouldn’t know about that, would you. You see, the war destroyed so much—a lot of historic buildings were burnt, and a lot priceless books in family libraries were lost or damaged. So after the war ended, Great-Granddad started a project to ‘recover our lost cultural heritage.’” She imitated a creaky old man’s voice. “He’s been doing this kind of thing for a while, now—reprinting original versions of books that have been changed, and so forth. Lately he’s been talking a lot about how close wizards and muggles were in the old days, before the Inquisition. The play is part of that whole thing.”

“Harry, we should check that out,” Hermione said. “We can write Mum and Dad when it’s made public.”

“Sure,” her brother replied. “Thanks for the tip, Mandy.”

“Mm-hmm,” she squeaked, nodding quickly.

“So, Mandy,” Hermione said, “what do you like to do around here? We haven’t had time to check out many of the clubs or anything.” Of course, both she and Harry had discussed them with their roommates, but she had a feeling a Ravenclaw’s opinion would be more useful to her.

“Well, there’s clubs for some of the classes,” Mandy replied, “but Charms Club is the only really popular one. I was thinking I might join Professor Flitwick’s choir. And I want to join Flying Club, but I can’t till second year—Madam Hooch lives near my home. And of course there Gobstones and Exploding Snap and stuff—oh, but do you know those?”

“Only a little.”

“I want to try out for Quidditch, but I can’t do that until next year, either,” Harry said.

“What position? I don’t really play myself, I just fly, but you look like you’d make a good Seeker.”

“Probably Seeker, but I guess my dad played Chaser—I’ll play whatever I’m good at.”

Mandy nodded in agreement. When no one said anything for a few moments, Hermione spoke up: “It’s good to meet you, Mandy. We have to go post our letters, but we’ll see you later.”

“Sure—later,” Mandy said, her own mind now racing over what she was going to write home to her little brothers—and Great-Granddad.

Hermione and Harry made their way out to the owlery to send their notes. Hermione had made sure that she held onto their letter to their parents the whole time from when they wrote it, since, when Harry wasn’t looking, she had scribbled off a short extra note on a small scrap of parchment, which she slipped into the envelope just before she sealed it and handed it to Hedwig:

 

_Dear Mum and Dad,_

_Harry didn_ _’t want me to tell you, but at the Welcome feast, something strange happened—he got a sharp pain in his_ _ scar _ _—it was definitely right on top of his scar, not just his head. He said he was fine right afterwards, and I don_ _’t think it’s happened again, but I thought you should know. I’ll keep watching in case anything else happens._

_Hermione_

 

Meanwhile, Harry had a second letter of his own to post, though for a very different reason. He gave it to one of the school owls that was said by the older students to be especially reliable and sent it off to his proxy:

 

_Dear Cousin Andi,_

_Something Professor Snape said in class confused me. He asked me a question about asphodel and wormwood, and Draco Malfoy looked surprised about it. I know it sounds strange, but I think he might have been sending a message in the Language of Flowers. Do those two flowers mean anything that would make sense? Hermione thinks wormwood means bitterness, but she_ _’s not sure. And if it is a message, can you tell me how I can respond to it? Like, what’s the flower for thanks if it’s a good message and the flower for anger or something if it’s a bad one?_

_Thanks,_

_Harry_

_P.S. I introduced myself to all the children of Noble Houses in our year. Their reactions were about how you said, but I did learn that Lord Brocklehurst may be a more valuable ally than we thought. Ask around about the Diagonal Theatre_ _’s Christmas production this year—confidentially. Mandy privately told us it’s going to be a pro-muggle play._

_P.P.S. This letter isn_ _’t really sensitive, but we have some other things to talk about that are. Do you have any way of arranging more secure communications? Hermione is sure the Wizengamot must have something._

* * *

The castle was very still on Sunday night. With the weekend fun winding down, the students were tired out, getting ready for bed, or scrambling to finish their homework. Even before curfew, there weren’t many out in the halls, and the prefects and even the staff could be forgiven for being a little lax with the monitoring after curfew.

But there were two students out in the halls that night who were not winding down for class the next day. They were on a mission. They snuck through the corridors, evading the patrols with preternatural skill, thanks to their frequent consultation of a large, elaborate, charmed piece of parchment.

“Where are they now?” one of the redheaded boys said.

His double checked the map. “Still up on the fifth floor. We’re good to go.”

“It’s about time,” the first twin said. “Filch and Mrs. Norris have really got this place locked down tight.”

“Maybe we should’ve paid off Peeves to distract them. Oh, well.”

They approached a closed door—a large, heavy, solid door like many in the castle. It looked unremarkable by itself, but this door guarded a dark secret. This was the door to the forbidden third floor corridor, and Albus Dumbledore had claimed this corridor housed a “very painful death.”

But in the admittedly limited time Fred and George Weasley had been able to observe the Marauder’s Map over the past week, they had always seen exactly one name behind that door, one that didn’t _look_ all that painful-deathy.

“Now who—or _what_ —is Fluffy?” George said.

“Only one way to find out,” Fred replied. He tried the handle. “Locked.”

“Ah, but how well?”

They drew their wands. “ _Alohomora_.”

The door came unlocked with an unfortunately loud click.

“Well, well, well, looks like they’re not _too_ worried about security,” said George.

“Let’s see what we’ve got, then.”

The opened the door slowly, carefully. The Weasley Twins may have been troublemakers, but they weren’t stupid. They poked their heads around the door, one above the other, and there, in the corridor, they saw three very large dogs sleeping.

No, not sleeping. The creak of the door had woken them. Six large, dark, rolling eyes blinked open and fixed on the two intruders’ faces, and three big, drooling mouths started growling at them as the three dogs staggered to their feet.

Scratch that. One dog with three _heads_ staggered to its feet.

Fred and George leapt back and slammed the door shut.

“Fluffy!” the both said at once.

“Must be one of Hagrid’s,” George observed shakily. “Only he’d call that thing Fluffy.”

“Boy, when Dumbledore says “very painful death,” he’s not kidding,” said Fred. “What’s it bloody doing up here?”

“What? Didn’t you see what it was standing on?”

Fred stopped. He opened the door and looked inside just for a second before slamming it again. The dog barked three times.

“A trap door. It’s guarding something.”

“Yeah, and it must be important to have this whole setup.”

“Huh, I wonder what—”

“I’m not sure even _we_ want to know, brother.”

“Well, this is fairly useless,” Fred concluded. “The only half-decent prank we could possibly pull off with this is daring Marcus Flint to go in there.” They both stopped and sniggered at the thought. “No, it’s no good,” he admitted. “Getting someone killed is a little much even for us.”

“Yeah, no good—and really legitimately scary…Let’s just pretend this didn’t happen.”

“Right.”

* * *

Emma Granger heard a tapping at the window and looked up from making breakfast. “Oh, Dan, it’s Hedwig,” she said happily. Both Grangers were glad of getting a letter from their children so soon. After having two of them in the house for so long, the empty nest syndrome had hit them hard and fast. She opened the window and took the envelope, patting the snowy owl on the head and giving her a strip of bacon.

“Well, looks like they had an interesting time writing it,” she said, holding up the patchwork of their children’s writing styles. “Hang on—” She spotted the second note in the envelope, but as she read it over, her husband saw her frown deeply and turn a shade or two paler.

“What is it?” he said nervously.

“Something’s going on with Harry,” she said grimly, handing him the note.

“Oh…” Dan said as he read it. “That’s never happened before, has it?”

“No, not in the past six years, that I’ve seen. I smell magic.”

“Yeah, me too. Do you think we should tell Dumbledore?”

“I don’t know,” she said with a sigh. “I’m not sure I’m comfortable with him on this. Harry won’t like us going behind his back. Maybe we should write McGonagall first. If she thinks it’s worth investigating, she can approach him.”

“Yeah, that sounds like a good idea…So what does the other letter say?”

“Oh, right…” She held up the main letter and imitated Hermione’s voice. “Dear Mum and Dad…”

* * *

_Dear Mum, Dad, and Ginny,_

_Percy_ _’s bugging me to write you, so here you go. Guess what—I’m in Gryffindor! Yeah, that’s kinda obvious, but it also means I’m Harry Potter’s roommate! Harry’s a pretty nice guy, but he’s also kinda strange. Like, he actually traded me a pumpkin pasty for a corned beef sandwich. Who does that? And he says he was raised by muggles—sorry Ginny—but he already knows a lot of stuff, like that political stuff or whatever Dad works on. He’d heard of Dad before. And now, he’s been making friends with all the other rich kids, but he still doesn’t like it when everyone stares at him._

_He and his sister were nice to me on the train though—his sister_ _’s okay, too, but she’s just annoyingly smart, like Percy. And it was really great the way he told off Malfoy._

_Anyway, classes are okay, I guess. We_ _’ve got a lot of homework already though, and Snape already took a point from me because me and Neville messed up our potion. I can’t wait for next week when we start flying lessons, though._

_Love,_

_Ron_

* * *

_Dear Harry,_

_Thank you for the tip on Lord Brocklehurst. I haven_ _’t heard anything back from the Theatre yet, but I will keep you informed._

_The issue of secure communications is complicated. The most common way is to send a letter by owl that is charmed for the recipient_ _’s eyes only. It will appear blank to anyone else who tries to read it, and the charms are almost impossible to break. However, these charms must be placed in person. Wizengamot members keep supplies of pre-prepared stationary for this purpose. I’ve sent a few pages of mine so you can send the information to me, but I won’t be able to reply. We can have some made for you and Hermione at Christmas. That’s how most people do secure messages. A few people send messages with house elves. There are also ways to do it by floo, but they’re not strictly legal, and magic mirrors are the best, but they’re very rare and expensive—at least the ones with permanent charms on them._

_As for Professor Snape, I urge you not to antagonise him. I don_ _’t know why he would be sending you a message, but if Draco Malfoy really did react to it, then I guess it might mean something. I can tell you that asphodel is a strong expression of regret. Wormwood_ _ can _ _mean bitterness, but in the Language of Flowers, it more properly means absence. If you have a guess as to what_ _“I regret absence” means, it’s as good as mine. An appropriate expression of gratitude to reply to it would be agrimony. But if you really feel that his message deserves a negative response, I would recommend scentless mock-orange, which signifies disappointment. Good luck._

_Sincerely,_

_Cousin Andi_

* * *

Minerva McGonagall made her way on a rather uncommon trip to the Restricted Section of the Hogwarts Library, wondering just how many more surprises Harry Potter had in store.

The letter from the boy’s parents had certainly been unexpected. With any other child, a sudden, sharp pain, having never happened before nor being repeated, would have been nothing to worry about, maybe even if there was some other dark curse involved. It might have been anything—a spasm, a twitch, a misfired nerve. Harry himself seemed unconcerned. But Minerva’s instincts were screaming that nothing was ever that simple around Harry Potter.

And so, she was headed for the library. She wasn’t sure how Albus would react, but she _was_ sure that she wouldn’t be able to dissuade him from his decision, whatever it was. By Morgana, she couldn’t even get him to take that bloody stone out of the school. If the Headmaster tried to confront Harry directly over this, she knew the boy would not react well. It was time she took matters into her own hands.

She knew Albus had travelled far and wide in his youth and no doubt picked up a few things, but he was never an expert in the Dark Arts by trade. Not like Grindelwald. Almost anything he might know of the subject, he had probably read _somewhere_ , and the Restricted Section seemed like as a good a place to start as any.

Minerva found one of the darker and dustier volumes on the shelves and started leafing through for information about curse injuries.


	20. Quidditch Tryouts

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: My God, it’s full of JK Rowling!

Word of Harry’s and Hermione’s karate skills spread slowly through the castle. For the first couple of days, only a few Gryffindors came to see, then there were a few Ravenclaws as well—scattered across all seven years. The caretaker, Argus Filch, had swung by and grumbled at them at one point, but Hermione pointed out that their practising there wasn’t technically against the rules (though that was probably because no one had ever thought to make a rule against it). It wasn’t until a week after they first started practising that some interested Hufflepuffs came up from the basement to see them in action.

“Hey guys,” a familiar voice called. Harry and Hermione both spun on their heels to see a tall, dark-haired boy coming up the corridor toward them.

“Oh, hi, Justin,” Hermione said.

“Hi, Susan, Sophie,” Harry added as two Hufflepuff girls followed Justin Finch-Fletchley into the disused corridor.

“So this is where you practice karate?” Justin asked.

“Uh huh,” Harry said. “You can watch if you want.” Indeed, there were already a couple of Gryffindors and Ravenclaws there to do just that.

“Sure, thanks.”

“So, um, what is…karate, exactly?” Susan Bones asked curiously.

“It’s a way muggles use to defend themselves,” Harry said.

“Most of the time, muggles will only attack with their fists,” Hermione explained. “Or maybe a knife. Karate is basically a way of fighting back that’s better than most muggles know how to do.”

“Okay…” Susan said sceptically.

“Here, we’ll show you.”

They ran through a kata, stepping across the corridor with lightning-fast strikes. It was clear that Harry was the faster of the two, but Hermione was no slouch either. The muggle-borns, Justin and Sophie were duly impressed.

“Wow, you guys are good,” Justin said.

“Thanks,” Hermione replied.

Susan, however, was more confused than impressed. Sure they were fast and strong, but it was only muggle fighting, not duelling or fencing or anything that was common in the magical world. “I still don’t quite get it,” she said. “I mean, it looks cool, but what is it really good for?”

“Well, you remember what Professor Quirrell said about attacks by muggles, right?” Harry said. “Even at our age, the average muggle would think twice about going against that if they weren’t trained themselves and didn’t have a weapon—mostly because they don’t know much about it, but still…”

Susan nodded slowly.

“But it’s more than that,” Hermione added. “It’s really about building up speed and reflexes so we can learn duelling better later. Professor Dumbledore recommended it to us.”

“Yeah, we were hoping there’d be a Defence Club or a Duelling Club here or something, but there’s not,” said Harry. “Maybe Professor Quirrell will let us start one.”

“Harry, do you…do you really think…You-Know-Who might come back?” Susan whispered.

“Well, Professor Dumbledore does, and that’s good enough for us. After all, if he _does_ come back, Voldemort’s—”

“Ahh!” Susan jumped about a foot in the air and clutched a hand to her chest. Justin and Sophie flinched at her reaction.

“Sorry, force of habit. I was just saying if he does come back, he’ll be coming for me.”

“Okay, do either of you two get the hair on the back of your neck standing up whenever somebody says “You-Know-Who’?” Hermione asked.

“ _Oh_ , yes,” Justin said, with Sophie nodding in agreement. “I think you two are the only ones I’ve heard call him Voldemort—sorry, Susan,” he added as the redhead stifled another scream.

“It’s kinda creepy,” Sophie said. “Nothing like that happens in our world—or the muggle world—or whatever we’re supposed to call it.”

“Yeah, there’s definitely a culture gap,” Hermione said. “They had what might as well have been a civil war in the wizarding world ten years ago while _our_ parents all thought things were perfectly fine. It takes some getting used to.”

“You’re lucky you’ve known about it for so long,” Justin said. “It’s so weird how we just found out about it, and suddenly everyone’s talking about the war and how destructive it was, and how small our year is because of it, and…” He glanced at Susan and then at Harry. “And all the family they lost. It’s just…I have trouble even thinking that way. Is it like that for you?”

“It was at first. We’ve been reading about it for years, so we understand most of it, but it _is_ different seeing it for real.”

“I wish they would have told us all this the first time we did—what, accidental magic, is it? It would’ve made things a lot easier. My parents seriously thought I was possessed for a while. They called in priests and all kinds of doctors and stuff. And we’d get what’s going on here better if we knew sooner, too.”

“Yeah, that’s pretty close to when we found out,” Harry agreed. “We think it helped a lot.”

Susan Bones had been silently watching the conversation with interest—once she recovered from hearing the Dark Lord’s name spoken twice. Intellectually, she knew that the muggle-borns were coming into the wizarding world with no knowledge of the war, but it was still disturbing to her to see it in person. They really _didn_ _’t know_. What must it be like out there with no dark lords and no war orphans and no murderers infiltrating the government? And the world she grew up in must be just as alien to them.

But the strangest part was what Justin said—his parents thought he was possessed? She had a hard time imagining how people who didn’t know about magic reacted to it when they were thrust into a world where things that might as well be as impossible as…as…as surviving the Killing Curse went and happened all the time! What must it _really_ be like to them?

And then, a thought that many purebloods probably never had in their lives: why _didn_ _’t_ they contact muggle-borns at the first sign of accidental magic? The increased ease of maintaining secrecy alone would—she needed to write Auntie.

“You okay, Susan?” Sophie asked.

“Uh, yeah,” she said. “Just thinking.”

* * *

“So this thing that looks like a big sail just drops out of the sky from nowhere, and there’s a _person_ hanging from it. I had to swerve so hard I thought I was gonna spin out the broom. I think he might have seen me, but he sure didn’t believe it. Dad told me later he thought it was something called a “hang glider.” Mum grounded me for a month, though. I mean _grounded_ grounded—no broom riding.”

Ron Weasley, like many at the Gryffindor Table, was swapping stories of his supposed exploits on a broomstick as they excitedly awaited their first flying lesson that afternoon. Everyone who grew up in the wizarding world had flown before except Neville, whose grandmother had never let him on account of his having so many mishaps at ground level. Harry was beside himself with anticipation. Flying was perhaps the thing he had most wanted to learn in the wizarding world ever since he first learnt that magic broomsticks were a real thing. Even Hermione was eager to try it out, even though she couldn’t claim to be as coordinated as her brother. Neville, on the other hand looked on the verge of panicking at the very thought.

“Don’t worry, Neville,” Hermione offered. “According to _Quidditch Through the Ages_ , riding a modern broom doesn’t sound all that much different from riding a bicycle.”

“But I never learnt how to do that either!” Neville whined.

The conversation was cut short but the screeches of the owls as they swooped into the Great Hall to deliver the mail. Harry picked up the newspaper from where Hedwig dropped it beside his plate, while Neville unwrapped a small parcel delivered to him by his grandmother’s barn owl.

“Oh, Gran sent me a Remembrall,” Neville said excitedly. The others looked up to see. It looked like a large, cloudy marble, or perhaps a miniature crystal ball with swirling smoke inside.

“A Remembrall? I haven’t heard of those,” Hermione said, surprisingly.

“They’re really handy to have,” Neville said. “See, you hold it, and it turns red if you’ve forgotten to do something—oh…” He trailed off as the glass sphere began to glow a harsh red. “Except…now I can’t remember what I’ve forgotten.”

Neville frowned in concentration, trying to remember, but Harry was suddenly on high alert, as he had noticed that Draco Malfoy, along with Crabbe and Goyle, had ignored the mail and left the Slytherin Table, and were now heading toward them. Professor McGonagall looked like she was on guard, too, since he saw from the corner of his eye that she had left her place at the High Table and was on her way down.

“What do you want, Malfoy?” Ron demanded, but Harry waved him back.

“Good morning, Mr. Malfoy,” he said, very stiffly. “You have some business here?”

“I’ve been hearing some interesting rumours about you, Mr. Potter,” Malfoy said casually.

“Really?” Harry replied. “So have I. About nine books’ worth, and a few _Prophet_ articles, too.”

“I think you know what I mean, Potter,” Malfoy said, dropping the pretence.

“I really don’t. Is it the one where I’ve been training in Defence for years in Japan, the one where I’m so bad at Charms that I need remedial lessons, or the one where I’m concocting a vast and impractically convoluted plan to take over the wizarding world with muggle science?” Ron and Seamus laughed.

Hermione stared at him in confusion. “I haven’t heard that last one.”

“I know. I just made it up. But the others are all just as ridiculous. You shouldn’t believe everything you hear, Mr. Malfoy.”

Hermione rolled her eyes and turned to her roommate on her other side. “Lavender, none of those are true, okay?”

“Aw, what about the one about declaring a blood feud with Professor Snape?” Lavender Brown said, disappointed.

Malfoy sneered at the mere suggestion and said, “I’ve _heard_ that you’ve been training _somewhere_ , Potter, and that this training is definitely considered “non-standard.” Are you planning on doing something with it?”

“Not if I don’t have to. And why should it matter? I’ve heard similar things about you.” The Gryffindors sniggered.

At that, there was little choice but to change the subject. “Well, I _hope_ you’re all set for flying lessons,” he said impatiently. “The Slytherins be joining you this afternoon, and I don’t want any of you holding us back—have either of you two ever actually been _on_ a broom?” he said to Harry and Hermione.

“No…” Harry said, trying to exaggerate Malfoy’s haughty attitude. “We’ve dabbled in muggle sports a bit—it’s not the same, but you take what get out there.” Now, Hermione and Ron both stifled a laugh.

Malfoy started grumbling, but McGonagall was closing in. He couldn’t say anything _too_ out of line, now, so he turned his attention to the easier target of Neville: “Your Gran sent you a Remembrall, did she, Longbottom? You should really get an elf to remind you of things, like a respectable family.”

“Well, G-Gran has her own ideas about how to do things respectably, M-Mr. M-Malfoy,” Neville stammered. Most of those watching thought he probably wouldn’t have talked back even that much if McGonagall weren’t hovering over his shoulder now.

“Clearly,” Malfoy said, and he and his goons walked off. Neville breathed a sigh of relief.

“Jeez, I can’t believe I’m related to that git,” Harry muttered.

“Yeah, me either,” Neville said softly. “It’s—it’s kinda crazy how that works around here. You know…the funny thing is…there was a time when we actually got along.”

“What?” Ron yelled. “You and _Malfoy_?”

“Yeah, see, our families always drag us to Wizengamot meetings and stuff, and all the kids would be in the play area. And when we were really little, we didn’t understand how much our families hated each other. But after a while, Malfoy started making fun of me because I’d never done any magic. I think he’s still hoping I’ll flunk out,” Neville said glumly.

“Hey, don’t worry about Malfoy, mate,” Harry said. “You’re worth twelve of him.”

“Yeah, Gryffindor beats Slytherin any day,” Ron chimed in.

“Thanks…” Neville looked back at the Remembrall in his hand, which was still glowing red. “But what have I forgotten?” He shook the ball in frustration.

* * *

Unfortunately, Neville’s luck didn’t improve that day. The flying lesson went wrong for him twice in the first five minutes.

“Stick your right hand over your broom, and say, ‘Up!’.”

“Up!”

Harry and Hermione could both feel the magic emanating from their brooms easily. They hadn’t tried the exact “spell” of calling a broom before, but the brooms reacted strongly to the magical contact, and they both leapt into their hands. Neville’s broom didn’t even twitch.

“Come on, mate, it’s easy!” Ron said, as he also got his broom to respond quickly.

“Try to feel for it like your wand,” Hermione suggested.

Neville tried, but he could only get the broom to roll over. Things just got worse from there, as he kicked off too early on the first exercise, lost his balance, and fell thirty feet, breaking his wrist.

“All of you are to keep both feet firmly on the ground while I take Mr. Longbottom to the Hospital Wing,” Madam Hooch warned, glaring equally at the Gryffindors and Slytherins alike. “If I see anyone in the air, you’ll be out of Hogwarts before you can say ‘Quidditch’.”

“ _What_ an idiot,” said Theodore Nott as soon as the pair were out of earshot. Most of the other Slytherins started laughing. Pansy Parkinson was obviously overdoing it as she stood by Malfoy’s side.

“I know, did you see his face?” Malfoy said. He made a passable imitation of Neville’s expression.

A tall, dark-haired girl named Elizabeth Runcorn gave her own version: “No it was more like this…”

Daphne Greengrass was the only Slytherin who wasn’t laughing now, standing off to the side, looking on with a disapproving look.

“Oh, shut up, guys,” Parvati Patil snapped. “He’s lucky he wasn’t hurt worse.”

“Ooh, you’re sticking up for Longbottom?” Pansy said. “Didn’t have you pegged for the fat crybaby type.”

Parvati fumed, but didn’t say anything more.

“Hey look, Longbottom dropped this,” Theo Nott said, snatching something small and crystalline from the grass.

“Let me see,” Malfoy said. Nott tossed the ball to him. “Oh, it’s that stupid Remembrall his Gran sent him.”

“Sheesh, who uses those anymore?” Pansy said.

“Maybe he _should_ _’ve_ used it,” said Elizabeth Runcorn. “He might’ve remembered to fall on his fat arse.”

“Probably better off without it,” Malfoy said, tossing and catching the Remembrall in his hand. “He’d probably just lose it like that dumb toad of his.”

“Give that here, Malfoy,” Harry said quietly, stepping forward and staring the boy down.

The Slytherins’ laughter went dead silent. They all knew better than to get between two Noble Houses, no matter which side they were on.

Malfoy flashed a wicked smile. “You’re sticking up for Longbottom, too, are you Potter? Are you declaring an alliance?”

Hermione went very stiff and prayed that her brother remembered Cousin Andi’s lessons. The question was clearly a trap. A “yes,” even an informal one like this, would have political consequences that they really didn’t want to get into. But a “no” would appear disrespectful given the past association between Harry’s and Neville’s parents.

Thankfully, Harry didn’t miss a beat: “I’m _declaring_ that you shouldn’t take things that don’t belong to you.”

Malfoy made that little gesture of slightly turning up his nose that he used whenever he was trying to get the upper hand in a conversation. Then he swung his broomstick around from where it rested on his shoulder—it might have been a casual move, but it swung into a stance where he was ready to leap onto it.

Harry didn’t quite go that far, but he did take his broom off his shoulder with tense hands. He hadn’t taken his eyes off Malfoy’s the entire time, but Malfoy seemed to be all but ignoring that.

“Harry, no, you can’t!” Hermione hissed.

Malfoy’s eyebrows rose almost imperceptibly, and then he smiled a smile that was probably supposed to look pleasant and gave a small, calculated chuckle. “There’s no need to cause _trouble_ , Mr. Potter,” he said, as if Harry had started it. “Here, catch.”

He threw the Remembrall in Harry’s general direction. An average person would have had to jump or scramble to make that catch, but Harry, with his cat-like reflexes honed by years of karate, reached out lightning-quick and snatched the glass sphere from the air one-handed, his eyes barely leaving Malfoy’s face and wiping the smirk right off it.

Several of his classmates gasped, and Ron exclaimed, “Wicked! Can you do that on a broom, mate?” Harry shrugged his shoulders.

“I might ask you the same question, Mr. Potter.”

The entire class whirled around to see Professor McGonagall stepping out from the shadows by the doors. Both Harry and Draco broke into cold sweats, though they’d never admit it. Just how long had she been standing there?

“And five points to Gryffindor for looking out for your fellow student.” Well, that answered that.

“What’s going on, Professor?” Hermione asked.

“Well, as it happens, no one has tried out for Seeker this year on the Gryffindor House Quidditch Team,” McGonagall explained. “Normally, when a house is unable to field a full team after tryouts, we open up recruitment to first years.” There were gasps from both houses on the Training Grounds. “I have come to see if any of my lions are interested in playing. And Mr. Potter, if you are anywhere near as coordinated in the air, and I have every reason to believe you are,” she said with a small smile, “I think you would make a fine Seeker, even as a first year, with your parents’ permission, of course.”

There were still a few titters whenever some mentioned Harry having living parents, but he ignored them. If he’d known a little more wandless magic, has face would have literally lit up at the prospect of being able to play Quidditch this year. Hermione looked at him nervously, hoping he wouldn’t do anything rash in his excitement.

“I think I can persuade them, Professor,” he said with a grin.

“Potter?” Malfoy said sceptically. “He’s never even been on a broom.”

“Hey, if he can catch like that, he’ll be a _great_ Seeker in no time, right Harry?” Ron said, clapping Harry on the shoulder. “You’ve seen a Quidditch game, at least, right?”

“No, but I’ve read _Quidditch Through the Ages_ , so I know basically how it works—And I can do fine on a bike, Mr. Malfoy. That’s probably a good start.”

Malfoy glared at Harry for a few moments, obviously weighing his options. He’d been complaining loudly all week about first years never getting on the house teams and boasting about his training at home. But he turned from Harry to McGonagall and put on an innocent look. “Professor,” he said, “it doesn’t seem fair for one house to have a larger recruitment pool than the others. I think the first years from the other houses should at least have the chance to try out for Seeker.” Then he smiled. “If there are any problems, I’m sure my father can move for some extra exemptions on the Board.” Of course, Malfoy had followed all of the tryouts and knew full well that Slytherin’s Terrence Higgs was the only Seeker whose position could possibly be threatened. Hufflepuff’s Cedric Diggory was miles ahead of the competition, and Ravenclaw had a regular plus their new reserve, Cho Chang in second year.

McGonagall knew all this, too, but she also knew Lucius Malfoy tended to get his way. “That is a reasonable concern, Mr. Malfoy,” she said, making an effort to keep the sarcasm out of her voice. “Any Slytherin students who wish to try the drills this afternoon may do so, and I will speak to Professor Snape about arranging a re-tryout.”

Malfoy grinned smugly at Harry, as did several of the other Slytherins. Harry might be the best Gryffindor had to offer, but by any objective standard, Malfoy would be the favourite to dominate those drills.

“Any trouble out here, Professor?” Madam Hooch had returned from the Hospital Wing.

“Not at all, Madam Hooch,” McGonagall told here. “As you know, Gryffindor is in need of a Seeker. I was wondering if, at the end of the lesson, we could run some Seeker drills.”

Madam Hooch looked out sceptically over the first years. “Well, I suppose if any of them are good enough on a broom to begin with, we can. I already had to take Longbottom in with a broken wrist—well, nothing for it. Everyone mount your brooms again, we’ll get started. And _do_ try to follow _after_ the whistle. You remember your instructions? Kick off from the ground, hard. Rise a few feet, than lean forward slightly to come back down. Ready? Three—two—one—”

Madam Hooch blew her whistle, and nineteen pairs of feet kicked off the ground. Fifteen brooms rose about ten feet in the air and then held still, but four, those ridden by the muggle-raised students, didn’t behave as nicely. Dean Thomas and Sally-Anne Perks only got about five feet off the ground. Sally-Anne was wobbling and in danger of falling off, but her friend, Lily Moon, grabbed her hand from above to steady her. Meanwhile, for Harry and Hermione, who were better trained, both physically and magically, the brooms responded more strongly to a hard kick off the ground, and they both shot up over twenty feet like a cork from a champagne bottle.

Hermione’s stomach gave a lurch, but she remained steady. Harry, on the other hand, was already wearing a manic grin. This was easy. This was _wonderful_. He felt like he could just give the broom a little nudge and sail clear around the castle. But McGonagall was watching, and he heard Madam Hooch yelling at them to come back down with the others. They both leaned forward slightly and drifted back down to the ground.

“Well, _that_ was interesting,” Hermione muttered.

But Madam Hooch looked happy about the performance. “Good,” she said. “We need to do a few of these basic exercises so you can all get a good feel for proper broom handling. Most of you have got off to a good start, but you can always use a refresher. Mr. Thomas and Miss Perks, a little sharper on that kick, and be sure to keep a firm grip. Mr. Potter and Miss Granger, I think you’re going to need a little bit of a _lighter_ touch. Now, everyone line back up…Again…”

They ran the exercise several more times until everyone could kick off to the same level. Then they started adding other movements: first pulling up to go higher, then swivelling left and right. The tricky part was learning the difference between going higher and slowing down and, more dangerously, between speeding up and going lower. You had to lean forward to go down, but to gain speed, you had to sort of stretch out along the broom a little bit. That was the closest one could get to “pushing forward” on a broomstick that was already lined up forwards and backwards. And there was a similar confusion pulling up to go higher and pulling back to slow down. Even some of the purebloods needed some brushing up on that, although Malfoy ran all of the exercises easily, looking visibly bored.

Dean and Sally-Anne needed quite a bit of work to get the basic manoeuvres down, and they had several close calls along the way. Hermione was a little unsteady, but she was, as always, a quick study.

“Push your body down closer to the shaft,” Ron Weasley said. “It lowers air resistance.” Harry and Hermione followed his advice and found themselves gliding forward much more smoothly. Ron may have been a lot of talk, but he _did_ know how to fly. Then, both of their brooms swerved, and they nearly collided. Harry pulled back quickly and let Hermione get in front of him.

“Whoa, watch out!” Ron warned them. “Gotta be careful on the school brooms. Fred and George said a lot of them pull to one side.”

“Very good, Mr. Potter, but keep the speed down for now,” Madam Hooch said when they’d all returned to the starting line. “I’d like you to run that one again, but arrange yourselves into two rows, above and below. That will give you more room to turn. You’ll need that when we add more turns in a few minutes. Everyone ready?”

They kicked off again and drifted into a semblance of a formation, but they hadn’t practised arranging formations very much, so it was an awkward prospect

“No, you don’t need to turn, just lean straight to the side, like this,” Ron suggested. His body tilted to the right, and his broom said directly sideways.

“What?” Hermione said in disbelief. That looked like a good way to fall off.

“It takes some getting used to, but if you keep a good grip, it’s fine if you’re not going too fast.”

Harry didn’t need to be told twice. He leaned left and slid effortlessly into his spot in the formation, and Hermione cautiously did the same.

With Ron’s and Harry’s help, Hermione was getting the hang of flying. By the end of the lesson, she was flying the slow, lazy circles around the training grounds just as well as several of the purebloods in the group. Hovering in the autumn air was really relaxing when she wasn’t doing any too intense, she found. But Harry—he was in his element like she had never imagined. He got every manoeuvre on the first or second try, and when he messed up, it was usually for not using a light enough touch. When they got to the free flying period toward the end of the lesson—restricted to low speeds and altitudes and staying within the training grounds—he was literally flying circles around her. Thankfully, the Slytherins and Gryffindors were each keeping to themselves for the moment.

“Isn’t this great, Hermione?” Harry yelled.

“It’s nice…” she said, trying to turn her head and follow him with her eyes. “Flying up with the birds and all…You look like you’re having a little too much fun with it, though.” Harry laughed and swooped over and under her. “Okay, seriously, did you sneak Cousin Dora’s broom out when we were at her house? No one should be that good their first time flying.”

“Nope, just lucky, I guess.”

Madam Hooch blew her whistle, and the students rushed back down to the starting line. Professor McGonagall was standing nearby, transfiguring some small stones into what looked like yellow golf balls. “Alright, I think you’re ready to try some Seeker Drills,” Madam Hooch said, to some excited murmurs. “Be warned, I will not hesitate to ground anyone I see flying recklessly. These will not be easy. There’s a reason we don’t normally open the teams to first years. Now, everyone who is interested in trying out for the House Teams please step up to the starting line.”

Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy immediately stepped forward. So did Ron Weasley, saying, “Eh, I usually play Keeper, but I’ll give it a try.” Seamus and Lily also stepped forward, as did Blaise Zabini and Elizabeth Runcorn for Slytherin. Harry looked back at his sister and said, “Come on.”

Hermione just shook her head.

“Come on, Mione, you should at least try it.”

“Well, okay,” she conceded, “but I know you can beat me.”

“Anyone else?” McGonagall asked as she faced the eight students on the starting line. “Okay, one at a time, then. This will be a very simple drill to begin. I will send these three balls down the training grounds. You objective will be to catch as many as you can before they touch the ground, from a hovering start. And I want to make this a fair contest, so no magic should be used in retrieving them. Understood?” Her eyes lingered on Harry and Hermione with that statement. The students all nodded. “Good. Beginning alphabetically, Mr. Finnigan, mount your broom, please.”

Seamus hopped on his broom and kicked off to hover over McGonagall’s head.

“Ready, Mr. Finnigan—three—two—one— _Depulso_.”

With her carefully aimed Banishing Charms, McGonagall lobbed the three practice snitches down the Training Grounds one by one. They flew in simple parabolic arcs, not being charmed to actually fly around and evade, like real snitches. Seamus took off like a rocket, faster than anyone had flown during the lesson. The ancient school broom wobbled and protested at the speed, but he kept going. The bright yellow ball was sailing ahead of him, and he lunged and plucked it out of the air. Then he swerved hard to the right and, with a bit of a scramble, grabbed the second one, but the third eluded him. He swooped low for it, but it hit the ground before he could get close enough. Still, the other Gryffindors applauded when he came back to the starting line.

Hermione’s turn was next. She looked very nervous when she kicked off the ground. She was pretty well coordinate from karate, but she didn’t feel like it would carry over all that well to flying. When McGonagall banished the first practice snitch, she raced toward it, gripping her broom handle as tight as she could, and surprised herself by reaching out and snatching it almost before she knew what was happening. She took a different strategy from Seamus and ignored the second ball, not expecting to be able to be able to get it that fast, and instead focused on the third, which was racing toward her. She flew toward it and caught it so fast that it stung her hand. The Slytherins looked annoyed at a muggle-born flying so well her first time as she returned to the starting line, but Harry was applauding loudly and shouting, “Way to go, Hermione!” When she landed, she was quickly mobbed by Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil, who insisted on asking what her “secret” was.

Malfoy was up, and from the moment his feet left the ground, it was clear that he hadn’t been lying. He really _was_ that good. He swooped back and forth across the Training Grounds and caught all three practice snitches with ease. The Slytherins all cheered, and upon seeing that performance, Blaise Zabini just shook his head and put his broom down.

Lily Moon was a surprise breakout and also managed to catch all three balls, though not without difficulty, and then it was Harry’s turn.

“Come on, go and beat Malfoy,” Ron encouraged him, but Harry was just worried about doing better than Lily and making the team. But either way, he was ready to see what these school brooms could really do. When McGonagall let the first ball fly, Harry raced after it, compensating for the broom’s pull to the left without even thinking about it. The yellow ball grew larger in his glasses and then, in an instant, it was in his hand. He pocketed it as he swung around looking for the second one. He spotted it at once and made a beeline for it, and nabbed the third just a moment later. He certainly wasn’t gracefully swooping, like Malfoy, though. Harry was a hunter, and he was charging straight at his prey at top speed.

That was too easy, he thought. As he raced back to the starting line, some of the Gryffindors were cheering, but others were standing open-mouthed, amazed that he could move so fast. McGonagall shot him a feral grin that he was sure only he could spot, and, just as Blaise had done, Ron shook his head and put his broom down. So did Hermione. So did Seamus. Lily was still in, but Harry could tell she knew she was outclassed.

“Potter, you liar!” Malfoy stepped forward, coming nose-to-nose with him. “How long have you really been flying?”

“Really, Malfoy, this is my first day,” Harry said calmly. “I’m sure there’s plenty in the upper years who are better than me.”

“Uh-uh. _No one_ _’s_ that good their first day.”

But Harry just smiled. “You’d be surprised what you can learn from muggle sports, Mr. Malfoy.”

“Ahem,” McGonagall interrupted before Malfoy could respond. “I believe Miss Runcorn still has to fly.”

Elizabeth Runcorn also managed to catch all three balls, making it four of them to continue to the next drill.

For the second drill, McGonagall made things quite a bit harder, standing in the middle of the Training Grounds and banishing no fewer than ten balls into the air, still one at a time, but in every direction. Malfoy again dazzled the class with his acrobatics and caught nine of them. Harry was sure McGonagall was starting to get a little annoyed herself at the Slytherin’s prowess by the end. Lily tried her best and caught seven.

Harry knew he would probably make the House Team if he caught eight, but it _would_ be nice to beat Malfoy, too. McGonagall didn’t go easy on him, though. He was darting back and forth across the Training Grounds in full hunting mode, remembering his experience chasing after mice and birds in his younger days. Three! Four! Five! He did a back-flip and rolled over when one ball went into a far corner to get back to the middle as fast as possible. Seven! Eight! Nine! He was sure he’d won the tryouts, but he wanted that perfect score. He saw McGonagall’s last ball soar high into the air at the far corner of the Training Grounds. It was too far! But he had to try. He leaned forward hard _and_ stretched himself out along the broom, launching into a steep dive, determined to make the catch in time. He heard several voices scream out, “Harry!,” and he was sure one of them was McGonagall’s. He stretched out a hand and caught the ball what seemed like a foot from the ground, just in time—barely—to pull his broom straight. With his momentum, he tumbled off the side and onto the grass, but he thrust his fist triumphantly into the air.

“HARRY POTTER!”

Harry sat up quickly at Professor McGonagall’s shouting over the cheers of his classmates. He was sure he heard her _hiss_ at him as she approached. But before he could react, he was blinded by a mass of bushy brown hair as his sister nearly bowled him over in a frantic hug.

“Oh, thank God you’re alright,” Hermione whimpered. Harry smiled at her as she pulled away, but then she whacked him in the side of the head, hard. “Harry James Potter, don’t you ever scare me like that again!” she yelled. “What was I supposed to tell Mum and Dad if you broke your neck up there?”

A few of the Slytherins sniggered at the Boy-Who-Lived getting smacked by the one person in the school who _could_ smack him and get away with it, and a few others sniggered at the trouble they were sure he was about to get into—but those weren’t the smart ones.

“Harry Potter, _never_ in all my time at Hogwarts—” McGonagall started, but words seemed to fail her.

“You’re lucky the lesson’s over, Mr. Potter, because that _definitely_ counts as reckless,” Madam Hooch scolded.

“Eh, sorry, Professors,” Harry said nervously. “I guess I got a little carried away.”

“A little?” It was Ron speaking. “Bloody hell, Harry, I don’t think my brother Charlie could have made that catch.”

“Really?” Harry said sceptically. “But wasn’t he Captain or something?”

But McGonagall confirmed it: “Mr. Weasley may well be right, Mr. Potter. I believe Gryffindor has found its new Seeker.”

“Uh—uh, thank you, ma’am?” Harry stammered.

McGonagall ran Elizabeth Runcorn through the drill, but she only caught eight balls and graciously conceded defeat to Malfoy.

“If you would come with me, I would like to introduce you to Oliver Wood, the Gryffindor Team Captain,” McGonagall told Harry. “Miss Granger, you may come along too, if you like. Mr. Malfoy…” she turned to face the blond boy. “Excellent performance,” she said halfheartedly. “I will inform Professor Snape and Captain Flint.”

“Thank you Professor,” Malfoy replied, with a smile that would have been a lot more smug if he hadn’t just been beat out by Harry Potter.

“By the way, Miss Granger, you’re not a bad flier yourself,” McGonagall said as she led them away. “I think you might wish to consider trying out for Chaser next year.”

Hermione blinked in disbelief. “Really, Professor?”

“Your brother’s performance notwithstanding, that really was a good showing for your first time on a broom, and the strategic thinking you showed would be excellent for the Chaser position.”

“Hermione, that would be great if we could be on the team together,” Harry said.

“Wow, thank you, Professor. Um, I’ll think about that.”


	21. The Language of Flowers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I offer JK Rowling virtual agrimony for opening her work to fan fiction.

“A Seeker, you say, Minerva?” said Albus Dumbledore, raising his bushy white eyebrows.

“I’ve never seen anything like it, Albus,” Minerva replied with a rare air of excitement. “The boy’s a natural. His first day on a broom, and he caught a practice snitch in a fifty-foot dive. Charlie Weasley couldn’t have done it, or at least not at his age.”

“Hmm, very impressive,” Albus said thoughtfully.

“If his guardians approve of him joining the team, I think we’ll have a decent chance at the Cup this year,” Minerva continued. “And heaven knows we need it. Severus was gloating for weeks after last year’s match.”

“Of course,” Albus said with a smile. “And as the boy’s magical guardian, I will happily grant my approval—”

“But you’re not.”

“Excuse me?”

“Didn’t you know? Andromeda Tonks took over as both Harry’s and Hermione’s magical guardian over a month ago. Surely you were informed. I think you may be slipping, Albus.”

The Headmaster seemed uncomfortable as he looked over to one corner of his office where he kept a large stack of government paperwork. He drew his wand and muttered a complex summoning spell. Two documents flew out of the middle of the stack and settled on his desk. He looked them over. There it was, just as Minerva had said. It was a minor point in the grand scheme of things and probably better for the children, to be honest, but he was a bit unsettled that it had managed to slip by him. “I must have missed it on the first pass,” he said with a weak smile. “I trust that you will contact Madam Tonks and the Grangers?”

“Of course. I will keep you informed.” She turned to leave, but looked back for a moment. “Oh, and I suspect that Draco Malfoy will be the Slytherin Team’s Seeker by Monday,” she added. She walked out down the spiral staircase.

Albus sighed. _Why am I not surprised?_

* * *

“Do you think we have time for karate practice before dinner?” Harry asked after McGonagall had dismissed them.

“After all that, you _still_ want to practice karate?” Hermione said.

“Hey, _you_ _’re_ the one who said we should practice every day.”

“Hmm…” she checked her watch. “I guess we have time to run a few if we hurry up to the seventh floor.”

They went on to the Grand Staircase and climbed up the four flights from their meeting with Wood to the seventh floor corridor. But they didn’t particularly notice that someone was following them—someone who had been following them all the way from the Training Grounds.

 _Something_ about Harry Potter didn’t make sense, thought Draco Malfoy. Maybe more than one something, and he was going to get to the bottom of it. Could it be that these muggle sports of his really made the difference? He had heard the rumours filtering through the castle about Potter’s and his sister’s supposed “training.” It was time he saw it for himself.

So he followed at a distance, planning to watch from the shadows to see what they were really up to. He motioned behind him for his friend to follow—not Crabbe or Goyle: they didn’t have a clue about being discreet. He’d brought Theo Nott along with him. Ultimately, this _was_ a matter for the Noble Houses, after all. Theo had an impatient look about him at the moment, but he reluctantly accepted the importance of intelligence gathering. Draco and Theo were all set to spy on the two without being seen, but they needn’t have worried. As soon as they got close to the corridor, they heard quite a few more than two voices. He peered around the corner and saw that a group of half a dozen Hufflepuffs, led by Susan Bones, no less, had come to watch, and Potter and Granger were _openly explaining_ to them what they were doing. Draco made a snap decision and just walked toward the group to see what would happen.

Then Potter and Granger started moving. They were fast—both of them. Draco wouldn’t want to connect with one of those fists. (Of course, the thing to do would be to not let them get close enough.) That would explain their speed and precision on a broom, perhaps, but not Potter’s intuitive flying skills. Could he really be just that good?

When they stopped moving after a couple of minutes, Draco noticed more than a few eyes falling questioningly on him and Theo.

“So what is this, your dance class?” Theo said; then he laughed at his own joke, but no one else did.

Potter stopped where he was and stared Theo down. It was a wary, almost predatory stare—or that’s how it seemed after seeing him fly. “Is there a problem, Mr. Nott?” he asked politely.

Draco nudged Theo with an elbow. Fortunately, they were standing close enough that the action would be hard to spot.

“Just watching, Mr. Potter,” Theo said. Draco nodded his agreement. And he watched them _very_ carefully. He may have been a pureblood, but he was well-read, and this wasn’t just a muggle skill. He had seen magical photographs of Japanese wizards from families two thousand years old practising these kinds of moves, though usually with a wand or staff. But, being (allegedly) raised by muggles, he wondered if Potter even knew that.

And, more pressingly, what did he and his sister think they were doing? Not flaunting their skill to intimidate, nor hiding it to keep it in reserve. If Potter was so politically savvy, what had Aunt Andromeda told him about this?

Something about Harry Potter _definitely_ didn’t make sense.

Potter and Granger broke it off to go down to dinner. And Draco and Theo again followed at a distance, discussing what they had seen in hushed whispers. Theo thought that Potter and Granger were just being careless, which _was_ admittedly a possibility. But the thought crossed Draco’s mind (though he did his best to dismiss it) that the martial arts could be a distraction. If they weren’t hiding that, were they hiding something else?

He started formulating a plan, deciding on the safest way to give Potter another small prod. He considered the possible outcomes as he walked, just like his father always told him. The worst that could happen—if he was careful—would be that Snape would have to bail him out and dock a couple of points. The best case scenario…well, he could really nail Potter if he was lucky, but it would be a long shot. Yes, he thought it would be a good chance to take.

When he got to the Great Hall, he waved off Theo and quickly retrieved Crabbe and Goyle from the Slytherin Table and filled them in on what he had seen. Then, he walked around, for the second time that day, to the Gryffindor Table.

“So, Potter, you learnt to fight like a muggle?” he said with a practised sneer as he approached the scar-faced boy. “Sounds like a waste of time to me. Why would you bother?” He saw Granger turn pink at his words, and Weasley bristled across the table. Potter slowly stood up to face him.

Harry knew he should really tread carefully around Draco Malfoy, but anytime someone started talking about muggles like that around him, it was really starting to tick him off. “Why shouldn’t I, Mr. Malfoy?” he said, stepping up the sarcasm. “You keep a pair of bodyguards like a muggle.”

“I could take you anytime with a wand, Potter,” Malfoy snapped. “I’ll do it tonight if you want—wands at midnight—that is, if you’re _brave_ enough to have a proper wizard’s duel—that’s wands _only_ , no contact. I assume you know about duelling, Potter?”

“Of course he does,” Ron said, springing to his feet. “I can be your second if Hermione doesn’t want to. I know a few good spells.”

Harry, Hermione, and Malfoy all gave him a brief, confused look, and Harry held up a hand. “It’s cool, Ron. Hermione, you know the school rules better than I do,” he said rhetorically, “Is that actually allowed?”

“Well, since there’s supposed to be no magic in the halls and no going out after curfew—no. The school’s required to allow honour duels, but they have to be supervised by a professor.”

“Right, and since there was no formal grievance issued, unless you care to name one, Mr. Malfoy, I think this would qualify as either an exhibition duel or an informal duel, which I’m guessing would both fall under Professor Quirrell’s discretion.”

“Correct, Mr. P-Potter.” They all jumped as Quirrell himself appeared seemingly out of nowhere beside them. He still hadn’t shaken that stutter when he said Harry’s name. “And I am highly inclined to permit only public exhibition duels. There’s not much point to having a duel in a school setting if others can’t learn from it. Perhaps in the Great Hall in the free period after dinner, Mr. Malfoy?”

This wasn’t one of the possibilities Draco had thought of. How in Merlin’s name had Quirrell got here from the High Table so fast? But he could think on his feet. He recalculated the odds and went for it. “Fine by me, Professor. So what’ll it be, Mr. Potter? I still say I could take you with a wand.”

“Oh, I suspect you could, Mr. Malfoy. In fact, I’d be surprised if you _hadn_ _’t_ had some special training in the subject. However, you do realise, don’t you, that since you issued the challenge, I would be within my rights to call “no wands,” which would give me the advantage with my muggle training? Either way, it doesn’t really sound like a fair fight.”

Draco turned up his nose a hair, doing his best to mask his astonishment that Potter had just _admitted_ to having inferior magic skills. A muggle duel, though? Could he shame Potter out of—? No, Potter had proved more than once today that he was smarter than that. “ _Well_ , I wouldn’t want to be unfair,” he said with a slightly mocking grin. “I guess we’ll just have to settle this on the Quidditch Pitch, instead.”

“I guess we will,” Harry said with a grin.

“Sorry to bother you, Professor. I don’t believe we have a dispute at the moment,” Malfoy added.

As Malfoy and Quirrell both walked away, Hermione let out an exasperated sigh. “Really, Harry, that’s three times he’s tried to get a rise out of you today. What’s he doing?”

“Probably seeing if he can get me in trouble,” Harry replied. “I mean come on, an after-hours duel in the corridors? Who would buy that?”

“I don’t know. He seems smarter than that. Maybe he’s testing you.”

“Well, it doesn’t matter, does it? He won’t learn anything really important.”

“Not if you’re careful,” she warned. She dropped the matter and, as she often wound up doing, spooned some vegetables onto Harry’s plate.

“I still would’ve been your second,” Ron muttered.

“Ron, do you even know what a second does?” Hermione asked.

“Well, a second’s there to take over if you die.”

“No, Ron, a second is there to make sure nobody cheats.”

“What, seriously? I’m gonna kill Fred.”

“You know, I hate to admit it, but Malfoy’s kind of right,” a voice came from behind them. Harry and Hermione turned around and saw Su Li looking over her shoulder from the Ravenclaw Table. “I’ve seen plenty of martial arts, and they aren’t going to stop anyone with a wand.” Some of the other Ravenclaws nodded—some of the majority with whom they hadn’t had this conversation yet.

“Yeah, we know that,” Harry defended himself. “We’re going to switch to duelling when we get the chance. Right now, we’re mostly just staying in shape.”

“Well, just be careful around Malfoy,” said Mandy Brocklehurst. “Daphne Greengrass says he’s been training in magic since he was nine.”

“Sure. Will do, Mandy,” Harry replied. _Of course_ , he thought to himself, _I_ _’ve been training in magic since I was seven_.

* * *

“Harry, are you sure about this?”

“Mione, Hagrid said Snape and my mum were friends in school. We don’t really have any other connection to each other. He’s got to be offering condolences for her death. What else could ‘I regret absence’ mean?”

It was Friday again, and that meant Double Potions with the Slytherins. Hermione was even more nervous than last week, since Harry seemed determined to reply to their professor’s supposed message.

“I’m still not convinced there was a message at all,” she told him.

“Malfoy seemed to think so. And he’s the super-politically-trained kid. Besides, what’s the worst that could happen?”

“Professor Snape could give you detention for your “cheek.” And _you_ get to explain it to Mum and Dad if he does.”

“Fine, but he’s not going to,” Harry said confidently as they entered the Potions classroom.

“Today, you will be attempting to brew the Half-Watch Awakening Potion,” Professor Snape said coldly. “Do read the instructions carefully, and try not to have any…mishaps.” He glared at Ron and Neville. “Open your books to page nine and begin…Yes, Mr. Potter.”

“Professor, I had a question about last week’s potion,” Harry said innocently.

The already cool dungeon seemed to chill a few degrees. Ron Weasley started making a small noise, trying to hint that Harry should back down. Now. Theo Nott and Crabbe and Goyle on the Slytherin side of the room started grinning at what they thought was about to happen, but Draco Malfoy’s eyes narrowed as he watched closely. Everyone else was watching closely, too, waiting to see what would happen to the Gryffindor who dared to question Snape. For his own part, Snape merely cocked a single eyebrow.

“I read in one of my cousin’s books on healing that many healing potions contain…agrimony,” Harry said, almost truthfully, “but we didn’t use it last week. Why wasn’t it suitable for the Boil-Curing Potion?”

Severus Snape paused and regarded the boy. Could this just be a coincidence? But no, if anyone would have asked that for its own sake, it would have been Granger. Oh, yes, he had been watching Harry Potter _closely_ these past two weeks, and he had to admit now that what he saw was not what he expected. True, he knew of the boy’s past—the abuse and the adoption by, by all accounts, a very good family—but it was hard to look at that face and that hair and not see his father. But when Potter showed up at the first class decently prepared, it had been a wakeup call. And then, as he witnessed twice and heard a third time how Potter had verbally slipped his way out of being baited by Draco—something that was starting to seem like an unwise move on Draco’s part—he was forced to conclude that this was not James Potter. Nor, again, was he Lily Evans, though he was unmistakably the son of both, and this sealed it. There was no reason for the boy to know the Language of Flowers off the top of his head, although his studious sister might have caught it. To even think to look for a coded message in Snape’s questions was something only James would do, but to actually take the time to reply—that was pure Lily. She had truly given him more than her beautiful green eyes.

“Excellent question, Mr. Potter,” Snape said.

Several of the Slytherins’ jaws dropped, and the Gryffindors covered their mouths to stifle a gasp. Ron had a small coughing fit. Neville froze like a deer in headlamps, and Lavender and Parvati both let out a small squeak.

But Snape ignored all this. “Agrimony is an excellent medicinal plant for internal ailments,” he explained, almost pleasantly. “However, the Boil-Curing Potion is a _topical_ treatment, and, as such, the nettles in the potion can serve the same purpose and also help the cream to be absorbed into the skin…Well, it’s good to see that _some_ students are taking an early interest in the principles of potion design…” He paused for emphasis and smiled inwardly at the reaction he was about to get. “Two points to Gryffindor.”

Almost the entire class gasped openly. Pansy Parkinson and Millicent Bulstrode both shouted a loud, “What!” Lavender Brown _fainted_ , and Neville nearly did, too. A single token point to Gryffindor was rare enough for Snape, but two was completely unheard of.

“Thank you, sir,” Harry said quietly.

Snape just nodded slightly. “Miss Patil, please take Miss Brown to the Hospital Wing,” he said offhandedly. “The rest of you—if you’re finished gawking—get back to work.”

There was a scrambling of books and potions supplies. A very surprised Hermione leaned over to her brother and whispered, “I can’t believe that worked.” Harry just smiled.

He did notice, though, even after everyone else got over the shock, that Draco Malfoy was staring at him suspiciously for most of the period.

In the meantime, Snape patrolled the classroom as usual, thinking this was turning out to be a surprisingly good day. _And James said he wouldn_ _’t know a good prank if it bit him on the arse_.

Parvati Patil did not return to class that morning. It emerged later that Madam Pomfrey thought she had gone mad when she said Snape had given two points to Gryffindor, and had kept her under observation until the word began to spread at lunch.

* * *

Harry quickly noticed that the whispers about him he returned to a level he hadn’t heard since his first day at Hogwarts. He seemed to have started a new legend or two about the Boy-Who-Lived.

“Yeah, Seeker, that’s what I heard.”

“They say he pulled off a perfect Wronski Feint, and he’d never even been on a broom.”

“That’s impossible! Not even Harry Potter could get two points out of Snape.”

It was annoying but, Harry found, not as annoying as before. At least he was being whispered about for things that he’d actually done. It didn’t help though that Fred and George Weasley came up to him at lunch and started singing “For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow.” From the way Snape was glaring down at the Gryffindor Table, Harry was sure he was about to take those two points back, and then some. Luckily, Percy came over and told them to quiet it down, but then they dropped to their knees and exclaimed, only half-mockingly, “Oh, great Lord Potter!”

“That was the most epic prank we have seen in all our time at Hogwarts,” Fred continued.

“Including all the ones we pulled,” George added.

“Will you grant us the boon of explaining how in the name of Merlin’s Y-fronts you did that?” Fred finished.

“Um, sorry guys, I don’t really think it’s my place to say,” Harry replied. “I just talked to him.”

“Mm-hmm. I’m still surprised it worked myself, but Harry was just being polite,” Hermione added.

“Being polite to Snape!” Fred said, leaping to his feet.

His twin followed suit. “We could never pull that off, even if we tried.”

“He is truly out of our league, brother.”

“We bow to your skill…for now.” They both bowed low at the waist and returned to their seats, undoubtedly to plot how they could possibly one-up Harry Potter.

“Don’t mind them,” Ron said. “You know they’re always like that—I still don’t get how you did it, though.”

That was about how things were like all day. Between beating Malfoy at flying and winning two points from Snape, Harry had been turned into the hero of Gryffindor—hopefully not for very long. It was hard enough being the Boy-Who-Lived, after all. But it was as they were leaving from lunch that Harry and Hermione got their biggest surprise when they heard a very calm voice call out behind them, “Mr. Potter?”

They turned around and saw, of all people, Draco Malfoy, standing alone.

Neither of them had got into the habit of reaching for their wands yet when something so unexpected happened, largely because they were still trying to catch up with wands in Charms Class, but they were both put on high alert—they could both feel the magic crackling at each other’s fingertips, though Malfoy probably couldn’t.

“Yes, Mr. Malfoy?” Harry replied.

“What’s going on with you and Professor Snape?” he asked quietly. His calm did little to remove the deadly seriousness from his voice.

“What do you mean?”

“He says asphodel and wormwood, you say agrimony, and he gives you two points. I know the Language of Flowers, Mr. Potter, and my father’s known Snape for years. What was that about?”

“It’s a personal matter,” said Harry. “It’s not my place to say. You can try asking him if you want.”

Malfoy’s face darkened. “You’re really going to keep us in the dark about this, Potter? I should think Slytherin has some right to know since he’s our head of house.”

By this point, Harry had had about enough of the prying. He stood up as straight as possible and tried to make himself sound as authoritative as an eleven-year-old could: “Mr. Malfoy, this is a private matter between the House of Snape and the Noble House of Potter. I am respecting Professor Snape’s obvious intent of not publicising the details. I hope you will also respect that intent. Good afternoon.” He turned and walked away. Malfoy didn’t follow.

Hermione looked at her brother in awe as they left. “Harry, did you just _pull rank_?”

“I think Cousin Andi called it “familial privilege,” but yeah, I guess. It’s good to know being a lord is good for something around here,” he said with a small grin.

* * *

_Dear Father and Mother,_

_I_ _’m sure you have heard that I was extremely fortunate to be chosen as the Slytherin Quidditch Team Seeker (pending paperwork), due to events involving the Gryffindors barely being able to put together a team. Unfortunately, these events also resulted in Potter being chosen as the Gryffindor Seeker, and, more to the point, he’s actually good at it—good enough that he’ll be a serious challenge in the first match._

_Potter swears he_ _’s never been on a broom before, but he looks like he’s been flying for years. Weasley already compared him with his brother, Charlie. Potter_ _ acted _ _like he didn_ _’t even know how good he was. He claimed muggle sports gave him the skill, but he’s so far ahead of Granger that I suspect it’s at most half-true. I doubt he’s cheating—not even McGonagall would allow that—but there’s got to be more to it._

_That_ _’s not the only thing about Potter that doesn’t make sense. I can confirm that he is definitely a Gryffindor. He stands up for his allies, and he’s not afraid of getting in a little trouble. But he’s also smart—too smart to bait easily, and even if he weren’t, the Professors are sticking too close to him to do it. And if Potter is smart, everyone says Granger is even smarter—smarter than any muggle-born has any business being, but, supposedly, she’s now claiming relation to the Fawley Family. The Ravenclaws say they’re both strangely behind in Charms, though._

_Potter and Granger have both been carefully evasive about their claimed life in the muggle world, but they_ _’ve both_ _ publicly demonstrated _ _advanced knowledge of muggle fighting techniques. I_ _’m not even sure if they were being careless or making a statement. It looked like it could even be a misdirection, but I don’t know for what._

_But today was the strangest part: Potter and Professor Snape appear to be sending coded messages to each other. Last week, Professor Snape asked Potter about asphodel and wormwood. I wasn_ _’t sure if it meant anything, but today, Potter asked him about agrimony, and he gave two points to Gryffindor for it._ _ Neither _ _of them would tell me what it was about. Potter even said it was a private matter between their houses, with the correct formula. If you know of something going on between them, I hope you_ _’ll tell me. I’m trying to put together a useful picture of Potter, but he’s done a good job at hiding all the important pieces._

_Your loving son,_

_Draco_

_P.S. Nothing on Dumbledore so far. Potter_ _’s been working a lot closer with McGonagall, at least in public, and I haven’t seen any problems between them._


	22. The Karate Kids

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Klaatu barada JK Rowling.
> 
> Wow, a big response to my version of Draco. I’m actually not sure what I’m going to do with him yet. So far, all I’ve done is to make him smarter to balance out my smarter Harry. Is he still evil? Eh, probably, but only time will tell.

_The Daily Prophet_

_Monday, 15 September 1991_

_POTTER VERSUS MALFOY!_

_New Quidditch Rivalry Brewing At Hogwarts_

_By Rita Skeeter_

_It is a little-known fact that if a House Quidditch team at Hogwarts cannot field a full team, tryouts are opened up to first years students in hopes of filling the vacancy. That has happened this year as, after the graduation of their excellent Seeker, Charlie Weasley, the Gryffindor Team had no tryouts for Seeker._

_Reports at Hogwarts say that not one, but two first-years performed well enough in Seeker tryouts to join their House Quidditch Teams: Harry Potter of Gryffindor, the Boy-Who-Lived, and Draco Malfoy of Slytherin, son of leading conservative Wizengamot member and Hogwarts Board member Lucius Malfoy._

_“My wife and I are very proud of our son for making the team in his first year, and we thank the Hogwarts staff for allowing him the opportunity. We naturally were not surprised, of course, since Draco has been playing Quidditch with his friends from an early age and has shown a particular aptitude for the Seeker position,” Lord Malfoy’s Office said in a press statement. Representatives for Lord Potter;s Office could not be reached for comment._

_But the real surprise of the tryouts was, of course, that Harry Potter competed at all. According to reports, the Boy-Who-Lived initially showed his Seeker skills in a dispute with Mr. Malfoy over a friend_ _’s Remembrall, leading Gryffindor Head and Deputy Headmistress Minerva McGonagall to encourage him to join the tryouts. Being raised by muggles, Potter claimed to have never flown on a broom before, yet he apparently showed an instant talent for flying and narrowly edged out Malfoy in the tryouts._

_This show of skill, however, raises some questions. Was Harry Potter telling the truth about never having flown before? Was he perhaps given a better broom than the other students to make the tryouts? And why did no older students try out for the Gryffindor Seeker in the first place? Was it simply because of the gap left by Charlie Weasley, or was it secretly orchestrated by the school staff in order to give Potter a chance to compete? And could Lucius Malfoy, with influence on the Board of Governors, possibly have been involved with the plan?_

_However it happened, the rivalry between the two Seekers has already become fierce, with several tense confrontations reported between Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy, and between Gryffindor and Slytherin Houses in general. The first true test of both Seekers_ _’ skills will come on 9 November when Gryffindor faces Slytherin in the first Quidditch match of the Hogwarts season, and, if the rumours are to be believed, both Potter and Malfoy will be flying on new Nimbus Two Thousand brooms. The results of the match are sure to be much anticipated, and the_ Prophet _will provide full coverage._

 

“Oh, come on!” Harry complained. “Can’t she get anything right?”

“Well, it is Rita Skeeter,” Hermione observed. “I don’t think she’s really trying to.”

“My Gran can’t stand her,” said Neville. “When I was little, she ran a piece on my parents, and…well…it didn’t end well.” He shuddered as he remembered his grandmother’s temper on that day.

“I can’t believe she’d accuse me of cheating to get on the team, though,” Harry said. “I’d better write Cousin Andi so she can clear it up.”

“Hey, it’s not so bad,” Ron told him. “All you gotta do is beat Malfoy in the first match, and then everyone will know how good you are.”

Harry smirked at that. Beating Draco Malfoy was something he’d be all too happy to do. The one consolation of the morning was that the blond Slytherin was also loudly complaining about Rita Skeeter casting aspersions on his father. It was good to know that the woman was at least an equal-opportunity offender.

“Just try not to worry about the paper too much,” Hermione insisted. “People are going to believe what they want to believe either way. Come on, let’s look at Mum and Dad’s letter.”

 

_Dear Harry and Hermione,_

_Congratulations to Harry for making the Quidditch team! We_ _’re sure we were just as surprised as everyone else that you did so well your first time on a broom. We guess the karate really did pay off, along with your_ _ other _ _skills. Of course, your mother_ _’s going to worried sick about it now. Quidditch still doesn’t sound very safe to us. She was hoping she could at least wait a year before she had to worry about that. Good luck on the first match, but be careful, and stay out of trouble. We know how sports rivalries can get even in the muggle world._

_We_ _’re proud of you both for handling that Draco Malfoy so well. He sounds like he’s just as much trouble as Cousin Andi said. You should probably keep an eye out in case he tries to cause any more trouble, especially with the Quidditch match._

_Hermione, good job with those Switching Spells. We_ _’re glad to see you’re doing just as well in a magic school as a muggle one. Keep up the good work. That goes for you, too, Harry._

_That sounded kind of strange about Professor Snape. It was nice of him to tell you that message, but we wonder why he did it like that, too, especially since it surprised so many people. Maybe he_ _’d explain it in a more private setting? Anyway, it’s good that he’s not being too hard on you when so many people say he’s unfair._

_We_ _’re glad to see you’re settling in so well after two weeks, and it sounds like you’re making good friends.We hope the rest of the year goes just as well._

_Missing you both,_

_Mum and Dad_

* * *

Professor Quirrell came into Defence Class that day with a stern look on his face. Most of the class was puzzled to see that he was carrying several pieces of wood, about twelve inches square and three quarters of an inch thick. Harry eyed him suspiciously, wondering just what he was driving at.

“It has come to my attention,” Quirrell said in a low, slightly menacing voice, “that Mr. Harry P-Potter and Miss Hermione Granger are well versed in the muggle defensive techniques known as ‘karate’.” Several people nodded. “It has also come to my attention that most of you have dismissed that fact as unimportant—unworthy of much notice.”

The looks on their classmates’ faces said that some of them thought that was a little unfair, but they couldn’t very well deny they were thinking it.

“ _That_ is a dangerous way of thinking,” Quirrell said sharply. Several people flinched. “If you dismiss a threat before you fully understand it, you will put yourselves in serious danger. I myself was not particularly familiar with this “karate,” but I have done some research into it, and I discovered something interesting…” Quirrell made another of his little zoned-out pauses and jerked back into motion. “Mr. P-Potter and Miss Granger, please come forward.”

Hermione and Harry glanced at each other and went to the front of the room. Quirrell then held up one of the boards for the class to see.

“Mr. P-Potter, do you recognise this?” he asked.

“Yes, sir,” Harry replied coolly.

“What is it?”

“It’s the same kind of board we use in karate practice at home.”

“And is it solid wood?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Very good.” Quirrell held the board in front of him by its edges. “Now, without using your wand…break this board in half.”

A couple of people giggled. The board looked far too solid to do that with one’s bare hands. Harry continued to stare at the Defence Professor suspiciously, but he took his stance, measured the distance, and punched the board hard. It clove in two instantly. People gasped around the room. Susan Bones started scribbling notes.

“Miss Granger, the same,” Quirrell said, holding up a second board. “I want to make it clear that this is not just a special power of the Boy-Who-Lived.” He glanced at Harry with what Harry was sure was a small smirk.

Hermione took her stance and also snapped her board with ease. A couple of people applauded.

Then Quirrell faced the class again. “Now,” he said, “that was a very common demonstration of the art. There are quite a few muggles who are capable of doing the same thing.” He held up another board. “Would anyone else like to try breaking one of these boards?”

Harry’s and Hermione’s heads both snapped to look at Quirrell in surprise. That sounded like a really bad idea. But the professor just said, “Look around.” They saw that about half of the other students’ hands were raised, including most of the Gryffindors’ and Zacharias Smith’s, among other Hufflepuffs.” “What do you notice?”

Several hands started to sink in confusion, but no one had an answer.

“None of your other muggle-raised classmates raised their hands,” he said. “Think about that. This is a _muggle_ defence technique. Do they know something you don’t?” All of the other hands went down now. “In order to properly assess threats, it is important to be aware of when your opponent may have different information than you and to consider what their motives are. It is a mistake to underestimate your opponent because what they do looks confusing, and it is also a mistake to underestimate them because what they do looks easy. Miss Granger, would you care to explain _why_ your fellow muggle-raised classmates were so reticent?”

“You have to know how to strike the wood properly, Professor,” Hermione replied without hesitation. “If you hit it at the wrong angle, you could break your hand.”

“Correct,” Quirrell said. There were murmurs from the class at this revelation. “And since sending someone to the hospital wing with a broken hand would reflect rather poorly on my performance, we will not be having any more board breaking in this class. In any case, it is not a particularly useful skill against someone who has a wand.” And at this, Quirrell held up his own wand and faced Harry across the open space at the front of the classroom. “Miss Granger, you may sit down. Mr. P-Potter, what useful skills would you say you _have_ gained from studying karate?”

Harry kept a close eye on Quirrell’s wand and laid a hand on the handle of his own as he answered, “Well, strength, endurance, and reflexes, I suppose, sir.”

“I see. I’m aware that some of your year-mates have seen your reflexes on the training grounds. I wonder if they would serve you as well at dodging spells.”

“Sir?” Harry tensed up.

“Nothing serious, of course, just some mild Stinging Jinxes.”

“Professor—!” Harry started, but before he could say another word, Quirrell pointed his wand at him and, without speaking, a small ball of white light shot out of it and raced toward Harry at high speed. He barely jumped out of the way in time.

“Professor—!” he tried again. But another ball of light was already racing toward him. This one connected with his arm, feeling like a hard slap. “Ow! Professor—” He dove to the side. “Is this an approved lesson plan?” he demanded as he rolled and started dodging faster.

“At some point, I believe the only way to learn is by doing,” Quirrell said lightly as he kept shooting Stinging Jinxes. Several people started laughing at Harry’s predicament…including his own sister, though she hid it behind her hands. He’d get her back later. Meanwhile, Quirrell kept firing faster and faster, and Harry was sure he saw he face contort into an evil glare for an instant. Only after firing off about twenty spells, all but two of which Harry dodged, did Quirrell stop.

“Excellent dodging skills,” he said. “Two points to Gryffindor. You may sit down, now.”

Harry took his seat, red-faced, but things only got worse when Zacharias Smith spoke up and said, “Well of course _he_ _’s_ going to be good. He made Seeker.”

One of Professor Quirrell’s eyebrows slowly rose until it nearly disappeared under his purple turban. With a sudden lurch, he said, “Mr. Smith, I believe you’re a bit of a Quidditch player yourself. Is that right?”

“Yes, Professor,” the boy said smugly. “I’ve played Chaser in the Junior League since I was eight.”

“Well, then, do you think you could put your dodging skill up against your classmates, Mr. P-Potter notwithstanding, of course?” Zacharias turned a little paler, but Quirrell egged him on: “Come, now. Dodging drills are fairly common in the upper-year Defence curriculum. It can’t hurt to get some extra practice in, can it?”

Zacharias smiled weakly and rose from his seat. “I suppose not, Professor.” He walked down to the front of the room and took his place opposite the professor, who immediately started firing spells. The boy started dodging, and while quite a few Stinging Jinxes did hit him, it was clear that he was still pretty good, and Quirrell confirmed this when he finished by saying, “Not bad Mr. Smith. For those of you who weren’t counting—” He glanced at Hermione and Harry. “—that was fourteen out of twenty.” But Harry was sure Quirrell hadn’t fired his spells as fast as Zacharias as at him.

The boy returned to his seat, apparently content with what his fellow Hufflepuffs considered an admirable showing.

But Professor Quirrell gave a knowing smile and said, “Miss Granger…would you please come forward again.”

Hermione turned very pale and started trembling slightly, suddenly wishing she were anywhere but here. But Harry elbowed her in the side and whispered, “You have to go.” It looked like she was going to get some payback sooner than he thought.

“The general consensus is that Miss Granger here could only be considered average on a broom,” Quirrell explained. Hermione’s cheeks turned pink. “This is to demonstrate that these skills are not necessarily a result of conventional athletics.” And without another word, he started casting spells at Hermione.

Truthfully, Harry was too concerned with Professor Quirrell’s behaviour to really enjoy seeing Hermione get the same treatment he had. Besides, taunting his sister was supposed to be his job alone. But as it happened, everyone could now see what Harry already knew: while Hermione Granger might not be that steady on a broom, she was certainly quick and light on her feet. At the end, when Quirrell called her score as fifteen out of twenty, she sat down looking a little better about the experience in front of an annoyed Zacharias Smith.

“So what do you think of Professor Quirrell now?” Harry demanded once the class let out and they started down for lunch.

“Well, I guess he’s…unorthodox,” Hermione said tentatively.

“Unorthodox? Hermione, he’s evil,” Harry hissed in a harsh whisper.

She rolled her eyes. “Harry, he’s not evil.”

“You didn’t see his face when he was shooting spells at me. He was really out to get me.” He stopped and let the rest of the group go on ahead of them.

“You’re being paranoid. It was probably just because you were so good at dodging.”

“I’m not being paranoid. It wasn’t very nice of him to call us out like that in the first place. I’m gonna ask cousin Andi if that’s really an allowed lesson.”

“He was just demonstrating a point, and we were the two best people to do it. I know you don’t like being the Boy-Who-Lived, but you can’t very well say you’re not out of the ordinary.”

Harry grumbled. “ _You_ didn’t have to laugh at me about it, though.”

“Well it _was_ kind of funny.”

“Was not.”

“Was too.”

“Was not.”

“Was too,” she insisted. “You looked pretty silly dodging Quirrell’s spells like that.”

“I did better than you.”

“Still looked silly.”

“You’re asking for it, sis,” he said with a grin. Magic crackled around his fingertips, and Hermione backed away, cautiously readying her own hands. They’d both been known to throw weak wandless Stinging Jinxes at each other at home once in a while (to their parents’ dismay), but they could still hear footsteps in the corridor, so with a look from Hermione, Harry backed down, and they quietly snuck away.

* * *

Harry and Hermione made a beeline for the library after classes ended for the day, partly because of Hermione’s insatiable study habits and partly because it was someplace they could speak in relative privacy. There was always a little something to talk about, like the latest newspaper article or letters from their family. Cousin Andi had promised to send some confidential stationary charmed for their parents next weekend, so that would need to wait a little longer. The children felt a little bad for cutting her out of the loop like that, but Harry’s animagus ability was still too secret to involve anyone else, according to Professor McGonagall.

They talked and did homework for a while until there was a noise at the door, and a gang of first-years in blue-trimmed robes came into the library. The Ravenclaws had just got out of their afternoon classes. A blond girl surveyed the room, spotted them, and quickly approached the table. “Hi, I was hoping I’d see you here,” she said eagerly.

“Hi, Mandy, what’s up?” Hermione asked.

“Well, we heard at lunch when you were talking about Professor Quirrell’s lesson today, and it turns out he gave us the same one.”

“He did?” they both said in surprise.

“Does someone in Ravenclaw know karate?” Hermione asked.

“No, Su Li knows a little bit of—I think it’s called “kung fu,’” Mandy Brocklehurst replied. “Anyway, Professor Quirrell had her do the board breaking thing, and then he started shooting Stinging Jinxes at her.”

Harry groaned. “He did?”

“Yeah, but that’s not the best part—he made Draco Malfoy do it, too, because he’s supposed to be the best Quidditch player in the class.”

Hermione started sniggering. “He did?”

“Yeah, except he didn’t stop at twenty. He said something about how Malfoy shouldn’t make fun of muggle fighting, and he just kept firing spells until he tripped and fell on his face!”

Harry and Hermione both laughed out loud. “He didn’t!” Harry exclaimed.

“He did!”

“Did Malfoy threaten to tell his father?”

“Of course. But Quirrell would have to do a lot worse for them to fire him before exams. It’s hard to find Defence Professors anymore.”

“You see, Harry?” Hermione nudged him. “Anyone who can take Malfoy to task can’t be all bad.”

Harry rolled his eyes. He wasn’t sure he’d go that far, although he did wish he could have seen Malfoy get taken down a peg like that.

Later that afternoon, Su Li came out to join Harry and Hermione for their karate practice. She taught them some of her basic kung fu forms, and they taught her some basic karate forms, but since it was the preparation for duelling, that was really important, and they didn’t spend much time learning each other’s styles. Even so, Su came fairly regularly to practice with them after that, having been inspired to practice more just to stay in shape. A few other people were interested enough in Professor Quirrell’s lesson to get the three of them to teach them a few moves, but none of them became regulars (although Neville Longbottom, to their surprise, did keep showing up once a week or so).

* * *

_Dear Auntie,_

_There are some things I_ _’ve been meaning to tell you, except I wasn’t sure how to explain them. I don’t really understand everything myself, but they’ve got me thinking._

_I saw Harry Potter and his sister, Hermione Granger, practising a type of muggle defence called_ _“karate”—at least, I think that’s how it’s spelt. I don’t quite follow it, but it looks like a lot of punching and kicking, except in special patterns. It’s supposed to be more popular in Asia. I didn’t think much of it at first, but Professor Quirrell made them demonstrate it in class today, and they broke through thick boards with their bare hands! He made them show how their training made them the fastest kids in the class, and they were really good at dodging spells. Now, everyone’s says that’s how Harry got so good at Quidditch._

_I know you know a lot about defence and combat and things like that from the war, but I was wondering if you ever looked at this karate or anything like it. It looks really powerful, even though it doesn_ _’t use a wand, so it might be useful in some way. Harry and Hermione say they learnt it for early training to get better at duelling later._

_The other thing is, I_ _’ve been talking to Justin and Sophie—they’re muggle-borns in Hufflepuff in my year—and it’s really weird how they never knew about the war until this summer, even weirder than not knowing about magic. None of the muggle-borns are afraid to say You-Know-Who’s name or anything. It’s really disturbing. I mean, I guess it’s not_ _ bad _ _—not really. You-Know-Who_ _’s gone—except Professor Dumbledore doesn’t think so. But it’s just that they don’t know any different, and they actually think it’s_ _ silly _ _to be afraid to say his name. But all that_ _’s because they’ve only known about the magical world for a few months._

_Harry and Hermione said they first learnt about magic years ago, around the first time they did accidental magic, and Justin and Sophie said they wished they_ _’d done, too, because it would have made things a lot easier for them. And I was thinking about it, and I was wondering, why wouldn’t it be better to contact all the muggle-borns when they first did accidental magic? It would be a lot easier to keep track of them and keep the Statute of Secrecy because if they start doing accidental magic, and their parents don’t know what it is, they start asking questions. Justin says his parents kept calling muggle priests and doctors until he got his Hogwarts letter. I don’t know if there’s any way to make that happen or even if it’s a good idea, but it makes more sense to me, so maybe it’s worth thinking about._

_Love,_

_Susan_

_From the mouths of babes_ , she thought. Amelia Bones read her niece’s letter with great interest. Both of those points had crossed her mind at times over the years, but she never paid them much attention. Now, seeing Susan point out the same things after just a couple of weeks of being in class with Harry Potter made her reevaluate them. The one about accidental magic was really rather obvious when she thought about it, and definitely worthy of careful consideration. It was just hard even for her to break out of her preconceived notions to think about it that way.

Of course, it couldn’t happen right away. They were having enough trouble already with the Muggle Protection Act, and too much too fast would scare the moderates away. It would be a long-term goal rather than a short-term one, but, she suspected, a good one.

* * *

_Dear Mum, Dad, and Ginny,_

_Can you believe Harry Potter got picked to be Seeker on the Quidditch team? I couldn_ _’t believe his flying even when I saw it! I helped him out with the basics, but he learnt it really fast. He didn’t really fly like Charlie, though. He just dove for the snitch really fast. I don’t know how that’ll work in an actual game, but I think it’d be hard for even Charlie to make catches like that. I really hope he beats Malfoy. I can’t stand that git. He even tried to challenge Harry to a duel, but I guess he talked his way out instead. Anyway, we really need to beat Slytherin to win the Quidditch Cup._

_Did you hear about Snape? Snape actually gave Harry two points! I still don_ _’t know how he did that one. Fred and George said he used dark magic to cancel out Snape’s nastiness, but I think they were joking._

_Ginny, I think I like Charms class the best (except Flying). It_ _’s great finally being allowed to do magic, and that’s where we’ve been casting the most actual spells. Except I keep getting paired up with Neville or Seamus. They’re alright, but Neville’s wand never works right, and Seamus keeps setting things on fire. Defence is pretty cool, too. Quirrell had Harry and Hermione dodging spells and stuff, and I heard he really got Malfoy good in his class. The other classes are just like Bill and Charlie always said._

_I gotta go. McGonagall gave us a lot of homework again._

_Love,_

_Ron_

* * *

_Wotcher Harry and Hermione,_

_Congrats on making the Quidditch team, Harry. I knew you could do it. Mum told me about Snape. She explained it all, and I still don_ _’t believe it. Even out here, people are saying if Harry Potter can do that, he can do_ _ anything _ _. Ha! Sorry, I know that probably bugs you, but I just think it_ _’s funny._

_Hermione, I hear you_ _’re doing pretty well, too. Teacher’s pet already, I’m sure. Remember to take a break once in a while. Just remember everything I taught you, and you’ll be fine._

_Auror training_ _’s great. It gets really in-depth into a bunch of advanced defence-type subjects. I’m sure I’ll ace Concealment and Disguise—even though Mad-Eye’s giving me a hard time because I still “walk clumsy”—it’ll be a pain in Stealth and Tracking, but everyone else says my disguises are just fine. Being a Metamorph does has its advantages. The only problem is they’re still short-staffed. A lot of them blame Snape for turning out so few Potions N.E.W.T.s. Kinda makes you wonder, but maybe that’s just Snape._

_Anyway, I don_ _’t know how often I’ll be able to write. Mad-Eye’s brilliant, but he’s a real slave-driver. Good luck, and go give Slytherin hell for me.  
_

_Dora_

* * *

_Our beloved son,_

_We are very proud of you for getting onto the Quidditch Team. That was an excellent bit of manoeuvring, and, from what we have heard, very good flying. It is unfortunate that Potter also got onto his house team under suspicious circumstances. Whatever the reason for his miraculous skills, we hope that you will be fully prepared to face him on the Pitch in November._

_We can assure you that we know of no relationship between Professor Snape and Potter that would merit a covert message. We fully expected their relationship to be antagonistic and are most surprised by your report. However, Professor Snape operates at many levels, and it is entirely possible that this is part of some plan to which even the House of Malfoy is not privy. As such, you would do well to stay out of his way in such matters, as interference is likely to do more harm than good._

_Professor Snape has informed us that he considers you to have overstepped your bounds in your attempts to antagonise Potter. While the outcome of these attempts was acceptable, and they provided useful information, you should be more careful in your dealings with him. With his obvious training, Potter is not to be underestimated. Your chief objective should continue to be information, both about anything Potter or Granger may let slip, and about their interactions with professors and staff._

_That Potter is being closely monitored by other professors than Dumbledore is of interest. McGonagall is well-known as the old man_ _’s lap cat, but Flitwick’s and Quirrell’s special attention are surprising, and we have learnt something else that is far more significant. We tell you this in confidence that you will not speak of it at Hogwarts: Albus Dumbledore is not Harry Potter’s magical guardian. The permission slip to the Board for Harry Potter to join the Quidditch team was signed by Andromeda Tonks. They have not made this public for reasons that are not yet clear, and we also intend to hold it in reserve until an opportune time presents itself to reveal it. However, taken together, these facts suggest either that Dumbledore is purposefully hanging back to mask his involvement, has suddenly become more trusting of his minions, or no longer wields the influence he once did. Keep watch for any clues that may untangle these possibilities._

_We have had words with Professor Snape regarding Professor Quirrell_ _’s unprofessional behaviour. Unfortunately, it would be counterproductive to remove him at this time, but we have made it clear that we expect fairer treatment of students from him._

_Father and Mother_

* * *

Hermione woke up on Thursday morning expecting a long day. In addition to the academic classes, she once again had flying lessons at three-thirty, and Harry had his first Quidditch practice was at seven, which she was planning to watch. So it was no surprise that Harry barely had time to wish her a happy birthday that morning before the mail arrived and started everything off. Two large teams of six owls flew into the Great Hall, each carrying a long, thin parcel, one to the Gryffindor Table and one to the Slytherin Table. Harry’s and Draco Malfoy’s brooms had arrived. It was only Hermione’s quick thinking to grab the parcel that kept the owls from dropping it on the table and tossing food everywhere—one of the disadvantages of Owl Post, she thought. A bout of cursing from the far side of the room told her that the Slytherins had failed to do the same.

Mum and Dad had sent Hermione a book and some sweets for her birthday, and the Tonkses had sent her a charm bracelet that was charmed to glow in the dark, but she sighed as it seemed like that was the only recognition she was going to get all day. She’d mentioned when her birthday was to her roommates, but they didn’t seem to remember, and Harry (and all of the boys, for that matter) was preoccupied with his new racing broom all day.

In fact, Harry was so distracted that it made things a good deal more difficult than usual in Charms. It was hard enough to begin with learning to cast the Softening Charm without melting their wood blocks into pulp. (Thankfully, the Softening Charm was one of a large class of charms that did not work on living beings, or else it could have been quite deadly if misused.) Hermione was also sure that Harry didn’t remember a word that Professor Binns said in History, as he was daydreaming the entire time. (Granted, few people besides her ever _did_ remember a word Professor Binns said.) Now that he was on the Quidditch team, Harry was excused from the flying lessons, ostensibly to free up study time. He would have still come, except that the _Nimbus Two Thousands_ were banned from the lessons due to the risk of him and Malfoy getting into a disastrous Seeker fight, so he told her he’d stay in and watch the training grounds from the library until she finished.

After dinner, Hermione did head out to the Quidditch Pitch with Harry, where Oliver Wood reviewed the basics of Quidditch and gleefully ran Harry through his paces, repeatedly saying how Gryffindor was assured to win the Quidditch Cup this year. That was a nerve-wracking experience for Hermione. Harry’s _Nimbus Two Thousand_ was _much_ faster than the school brooms. Seeing him zoom around at over a hundred miles an hour, still swerving and diving all over the place, made her want to cover her eyes every other play, not to mention when Wood let one of the bludgers out. She just hoped Hogwarts Quidditch really was as (relatively) injury free as everyone said.

By the time they walked back up to Gryffindor Tower, Harry was in a much better mood than his sister. He was even humming to himself off and on, which only happened anymore when he was having a _really_ good time.

“You okay, Mione?” he asked as they approached the portrait of the Fat Lady.

“Yeah, I guess,” she sighed. “It’s just been a long day.” She didn’t have the heart to tell him the real reason: this was her first birthday away from home—it was hard enough not having their parents there. She was hoping she could get a little more recognition from her brother.

“Well, come on, let’s get inside.” Harry gave the password, and they climbed in through the portrait hole.

“SURPRISE!”

“EEK!” Hermione jumped back so hard that she nearly fell backwards through the portrait hole, and she was so shocked that the fireplace and all of the candles in the room flared violently for a moment before she tamped her magic down, giving the guests a bit of a surprise as well.

Standing in front of Hermione were all of the Gryffindor first years and the entire Quidditch team, surrounding a large cake. She looked back to her brother, wide-eyed, only to see him grinning—appropriately enough—like a Cheshire Cat.

“Harry, you git! You were never in the library at all, were you?” She punched him in the arm and then, before he could react, hugged him tight and fought to keep from crying.

“Come on, like I’d really ignore your birthday, sis,” Harry said.

“Well, you’re a good brother, Harry,” she agreed. “Even if you are a git.” She scratched him behind the ears, but quickly stopped when she heard people smirking at the gesture. It wouldn’t do to have them start asking questions about that.

The guests all sang “For She’s a Jolly Good Fellow,” and Hermione cut the cake. Her admiration for her brother was increased further when she saw he had got her an all-dark chocolate cake, something he didn’t really like, even in human form, on account of it being completely inedible to cats.

“Harry, this is wonderful,” she said as she served herself a large slice. “But how did you ever set this up? How did you get the cake in here?”

“I had a little help,” Harry replied, nodding to Fred and George.

Hermione’s fork stopped halfway to her mouth.

“And I made them swear on the honour of the House of Weasley that it wasn’t pranked.”

“He’s a quick one, isn’t he, Georgie?” Fred said.

“He certainly is, Freddie,” George replied. “We’re friends with the kitchen elves, you see. They like to throw parties.”

Hermione smiled and rolled her eyes a little as she took a bite of cake.

The rest of the cake was soon dished out, and as they finished it off, the Quidditch team started a game of Exploding Snap. But before she could join in, she was surprised when Neville came up to her.

“Hey, Hermione,” he said timidly, “I, uh…I got you these.” He gave her a small package, which she unwrapped to find a box of self-inking quills. “I know how much you like to write,” Neville continued. “It’s really a lot easier with these.”

“Oh, thank you, Neville, they’re great,” she replied. She hugged the round-faced boy briefly, causing him to blush furiously.

Before long, Hermione had also received some Sugar Quills from her roommates and Chocolate Frogs from Ron and the Twins, and, finally, Harry approached with his gift.

“I don’t know if you’ll have much use for it, but Cousin Andi gave me some for myself before we came to school, so I wrote her and said you should have some, too,” he said.

Hermione narrowed her eyes in confusion, but opened the present and gasp slightly when she saw it: personalised Wizengamot stationery with “Hermione Jean Granger, Office of Lord Harry James Potter” at the top. It was true, she didn’t really have any reason to use it, (although she wondered if she could get away with writing to Paul and Tiffany with it to mess with their heads), but it was very nice to have.

“Harry, it’s lovely, thank you.” She hugged him again.

With the gift-giving out of the way, the whole party stayed up late playing Exploding Snap until Percy Weasley told them to cut it out with the noise. Hermione heard Harry softly humming to himself for much of the evening.


	23. Sniffing Around

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Spoiler—Snape kills Trinity with Rosebud—oh, wait, wrong story. Um, Harry Potter belongs to JK Rowling, not to me.

The days began to pass more quickly. Harry had Quidditch practice three evenings per week, where Oliver Wood acquainted him with the team and drilled all the formations into him. He had been surprised the first time he practised with the real Snitch that he couldn’t sense any magic from it.

“You must have a really keen magic sense to even think of that,” Wood had said, impressed. “Of course, the Snitch is charmed against it—also against Summoning Charms, Levitation Charms, Freezing Charms, and all manner of sabotage. You’ll have to catch it purely with your flying skills.” Harry knew that bit, of course, but the fact that it was possible to mask the Snitch’s magical signature was a new one on him.

Even as Seeker, there was a lot to cover in practice, from feints to distract the opposing Chasers and Beaters to guard formations to protect him on his way to the Snitch. They would need a lot of practice, too, since it quickly leaked that Lucius Malfoy had bought the entire Slytherin Team Nimbus Two Thousands, which meant that unless the Chaser Squad could deliver even better than they thought, it was almost entirely down to Harry to win the match before the point spread got too large.

Back on the ground, the murmurs between Gryffindor and Slytherin rose in anticipation of the first match, still several weeks away. Harry and Malfoy were not the instigators of any serious trouble, but they really didn’t do much to discourage it, either.

Meanwhile, classes slowly stepped up their workload, and it took some effort on Harry’s part to keep Hermione from getting too uptight about it. He reminded her several times that they still had eight more months of the term to go. But soon, it seemed like they barely had time to say hello to Mandy or go have tea with Hagrid, and before they knew it, Halloween was fast approaching. This, of course, was always a solemn time of year for one Harry Potter. He rarely let himself show it in public, but Professor McGonagall, who had become good at reading him over the years, spotted it readily, and the week before the date, she called him and his sister to stay after class one day for a brief chat.

“Mr. Potter, Miss Granger, as you may or may not know, Hogwarts holds a special Halloween Feast every year, a very old tradition dating back to the school’s founding. I believe you’re aware that Halloween has been an important wizarding holiday since the Druidic Era. Now, I’m _sure_ you are aware that this Halloween will be the tenth anniversary of the defeat of V…Voldemort—” It was so hard for her to stay in practice. “…and, of course, your birth parents’ deaths, Mr. Potter.”

Harry and Hermione nodded sadly.

“Being as it is the tenth anniversary, there will likely be a resurgence of the ‘Harry Potter Day’ celebrations throughout Britain, but I want to assure you that we actively discourage such nonsense here and will hold a traditional _Halloween_ feast. However, you may be excused from the feast if you do not wish to attend, and I can have some dinner sent up to you in the Gryffindor Common Room that night.”

At that, Harry and Hermione exchanged a look and cautiously nodded to each other.

“Th-thank you, Professor,” Harry said quietly, “but we usually _do_ celebrate Halloween at home, and…um…mark that day the Sunday after. I think we’ll be okay at the feast.”

Professor McGonagall smiled just slightly. “That’s very gracious of you two. You may, of course, change your mind at any time.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Harry said.

“There is one other thing…” she continued. “Because it is the tenth anniversary, if it is alright with you, the Headmaster would like to call a moment of silence at the feast in your parents’ memory.”

Harry’s eyes went wide. He looked to Hermione in a rare moment of real indecision. She laid a hand on his shoulder and whispered that she thought it would be a good thing to do.

“I…I think I would like that,” Harry decided. “Um…please tell him thank you for us.”

“I will, of course.”

It was later that same day, as Harry and Hermione were headed up to the seventh floor to practice karate, that something very different caught Harry’s ear. This was a less travelled part of the castle, and it seemed that they weren’t the only ones who thought so, since a pair of hushed voices was engaged in a heated conversation around the corner of one side hallway. This would happen from time to time, especially with affectionate couples, but it was one phrase Harry heard that made him stop: “Third floor corridor.”

“Harry, what—” Hermione started when she saw him suddenly freeze.

“Shush,” he admonished her.

“What is—”

“Shh!” He motioned for her to come closer and listen.

Peering carefully around the corner for just a moment, they saw two seventh-year Gryffindor boys arguing.

“What, the very painful death Dumbledore told us about?” one of the boys said.

“Yeah, it’s a giant cerberus,” the other one whispered.

“No!”

“Yes!”

“No way, I don’t believe you.”

“I went in there and saw it.”

“You didn’t!”

“Yeah, I did. It only takes an _Alohomora_ to get in.”

“But why would they put something like that on the third floor?”

“There’s a trapdoor in there. It’s guarding something.”

Hermione and Harry stared at each other, remembering their conversation with Hagrid back at the start of term.

“Uh-uh, I still don’t believe you,” the other seventh-year said.

“Then why don’t you go in there yourself and find out?”

“Well, maybe I will. Just have to get past Filch, right?”

At that point, the two children heard a rustle of robes and footsteps heading toward them and fled as quietly as they could up the stairs. It seemed the older Gryffindors were determined to get into trouble. Hermione and Harry kept going until they found an alcove of their own where they could speak privately.

“A cerberus?” Harry whispered incredulously. “Like a three-headed dog?”

“Well, what else would it mean?” Hermione replied.

“But what’s it guarding?” he wondered.

“Harry, you don’t think—the Gringotts break-in?” she stammered.

“I don’t know. And from the way Hagrid acted when we mentioned it, I don’t think anyone’ll be too keen to tell us. But I’ve got a bad feeling they’re related somehow.”

“But Harry, Professor Dumbledore—you don’t think he’d really put a valuable artifact that a dark wizard wants to steal _here_ do you?”

“It’s Dumbledore,” he countered. “I’m not sure I’d put it past him. He’s the one who said how safe Hogwarts is…I wish we had some way of checking it out, though.”

“What! You can’t be thinking of going in there!”

“Of course not! That’d be stupid. Plus, you know how I feel about dogs.”

But for the next couple of days, Harry couldn’t get the thought out of his head. Could the Headmaster _really_ have put whatever valuable thing the Death Eaters supposedly wanted right here in Hogwarts for “safekeeping’? He couldn’t help but keep wondering. And then on Friday afternoon, he got an idea—an idea so simple that he couldn’t believe he hadn’t thought of it sooner.

“Harry, where are we going?” Hermione demanded as her brother dragged her up the Grand Staircase.

“Hermione, not so loud,” he hissed. “I had an idea about the third floor corridor.”

Hermione’s eyes went wide in horror. “Harry, you mustn’t go in there!” she squeaked. “It’s dangerous—and forbidden. You could get in trouble or eaten or—”

“Shh! Mione, calm down,” he stopped her. “I promise I’m not gonna go inside. I just want to check it out around the door.”

“But what good will that do?”

“I’m going to sniff around and see who’s been around there.”

“Sniff around, but—” It finally dawned on her what her brother intended. “No, you can’t! What if you get caught?”

“That’s why I need you to cover me and be a lookout. Stand at the end of the hall, and if someone comes by, start calling for a lost cat.”

“Harry, I don’t like it—”

“Please? It’ll only take a minute. If we know who’s been going in that corridor, we might be able to figure out what’s going on. If it _is_ the thing from Gringotts, I think we need to know.”

Hermione’s lips pressed together in a thin line, eerily reminiscent of Professor McGonagall, but she couldn’t really deny that bit. “Hmm…alright, but _please_ be careful.”

“When am I ever not careful?” Harry said with a grin.

“Every Quidditch practice,” she replied without hesitation.

Hermione initially suggested they find the nearest broom cupboard for him to transform in, but they couldn’t find one nearby. So instead, they found a little alcove that was out of view of any portraits. Standing just in front of it, Hermione looked around to make sure they were alone, including searching the ceiling for any sign of Peeves.

“Okay, coast is clear,” she whispered, and for the first time since he came to Hogwarts, Harry Potter shrunk down and walked out of the alcove around her legs as a black kitten with white feet.

Harry’s cat form had slowly grown larger in the six years she’d known him, apparently ageing at the human rate. Whereas he had first shown up on the Grangers’ front porch looking like a three-month-old kitten, he could now pass for six or seven months, and it was getting harder to tell by sight that he _was_ still a kitten.

Harry looked again to make sure no one else was around and trotted down the hallway toward the locked door into the Forbidden Corridor. Halfway down, he had to fight the urge to turn around and run for it, but he kept going. When he reached the end, he started carefully sniffing around the door with his excellent feline sense of smell.

Hermione stood at the other end of the hall, watching for any adult who might approach. Everyone knew the Forbidden Corridor was being heavily patrolled by Filch, the caretaker, and that scrawny cat of his, Mrs. Norris, and she didn’t fancy being caught by him anywhere near the place. Her pulse quickened when she heard footsteps approaching from the other direction. Thinking fast, she took a few steps down the hall and called out, “Socks, come back, you can’t go down there. Come back, Socks, come here. Here, kitty, kitty.”

Harry bolted toward her, and she quickly scooped him up in her arms. He turned his face toward her chest so that his obvious white lightning-bolt marking would not be visible. It was only then that Hermione turned around and saw that the footsteps were not made by Filch, but by Professor Sinistra, the Astronomy teacher, who smiled in amusement at her and kept walking.

“Phew, that was close,” she whispered to the kitten in her arms. It always embarrassed Harry a little to be carried around like that, but he’d take that over getting caught any day. She carried him back to the little alcove and set him on the floor. With a quick look around, she whispered, “All clear.”

In a blink, her brother was standing before her on two feet again.

“Socks?” he protested.

“You asked for it, furball,” she smirked at him. “What did you find?”

“A lot of strange stuff,” he said. “Let’s go up to the Common Room. There probably won’t be anyone around this early.”

Hermione eyed Harry sceptically, wondering what he found that he was so hesitant about as he led her back to Gryffindor Tower.

Sure enough, the Common Room was empty, as might be expected at that hour on a Friday, except for a fat, grey rat wandering around at the bottom of the boy’s staircase.

“Is that Ron’s rat?” Hermione asked as they found a pair of comfortable chairs over to the side.

The rat locked eyes with Harry and froze. “Yeah, I think so,” Harry said. A moment later, the rat turned and bolted up the stairs with surprising speed. From the first day, Scabbers always seemed to panic around Harry, as if he could sense he was a predator somehow. He thought the rat’s sense of smell might be good enough to pick up the cat in him, but it seemed a little odd after this much time.

Harry shook his head dismissively. “There’s something not right about that rat,” he said.

Hermione shrugged. “So what did you smell down there?” she demanded.

“Mione,” he whispered intensely, “I smelled a _muggle_!”

It was a rare thing for Hermione to be struck speechless.

“Mione?”

“That’s impossible. There aren’t any muggles in the school.”

“That’s what I smelled,” Harry insisted.

“But they can’t even get in without an Anti-Anti-Muggle Charm. You must’ve got it wrong.”

“No, I didn’t. You know how good my nose is.”

“Okay, then.” Hermione crossed her arms. “What exactly did you smell?”

Harry sighed. “I smelled a bunch of wizards who’ve been there in the past day or two—most of them were faint, like they were only there for a minute. There were students, mostly older boys, and some teachers, but only a few people have been there a lot. There was one cat that spends a lot of time there—female, about four years old, not spayed—that’ll be Mrs. Norris. Then, there was a man in his fifties who _didn_ _’t have magic_. I’m sure of it.”

“But who could that be?” Hermione said, just before the answer came to her. There were only seventeen living adults in the school—seven men and ten women, and six of those men were definitely wizards, including Hagrid, even though he wasn’t supposed to do magic. “Oh, that must have been Filch,” she realised.

“Filch?”

“Yes, think about it. He’s always sweeping the floors and stuff by hand. He never uses magic. But he couldn’t be a muggle though…oh, maybe he’s a squib.”

“Maybe,” Harry agreed. “Maybe that’s why he’s so cranky all the time. They say most squibs leave the magical world.”

“That’s got to be it. So had anyone else been in there?”

“Yeah, Professor Dumbledore was in there for a while, and there was a wizard who smelled like he was only half human—I’m pretty sure that was Hagrid.”

“Hagrid!”

“Well, he can’t be all human, can he? He’s eleven feet tall.”

Hermione looked thoughtful, as if that possibility hadn’t even crossed her mind. After a pause, she said, “How do you know it wasn’t Professor Flitwick, then?”

“Flitwick’s older. Plus, the trail smelled like someone…big.”

“But what would Hagrid be doing in there?”

Harry was ready for that one. “Everyone says he like dangerous creatures. Maybe he’s taking care of the dog.”

“So there _is_ a dog.”

“Oh, yeah. The scent is all over the corridor. I almost panicked when I smelled it. I couldn’t tell how many heads it has from outside, but it’s big—like _really_ big—like, at least bear-sized, and maybe bigger.” Hermione covered her mouth with her hands. “Yeah, I don’t know how Mrs. Norris does it. It’s bloody scary being on the other side of the door from it.”

“Language, Harry,” she admonished.

“Sorry. But it is. You couldn’t pay me to go in there.”

“Well that’s good to hear. I looked up Cerberi in the library. They used to be used to guard things a lot, but not so much anymore. I’m not sure why, but that must be what it’s doing. We need to tell someone what’s going on.”

“I don’t know if it would do much good,” Harry countered. “The teachers seem to think it’s fine with just a _Colloportus_ on that door, no matter how many seventh-years go in there.”

“That seems pretty stupid,” Hermione grumbled. “If they keep going in there, it’s only a matter of time before someone gets that “very painful death’…What about Professor Quirrell?” she asked, remembering the Defence Professor’s first lesson.

Harry glared at her.

“Harry, I know you don’t like his methods, but—”

“I don’t trust him,” he cut her off. “There’s something…off about him.”

“Fine,” she huffed. “We’ll do it your way for now. But shouldn’t we at least tell Mum and Dad?”

“Probably. We can say we just overheard people talking about it. Still, there hasn’t been any trouble so far, so maybe it’s not too bad.”

Both children hoped he was right.

* * *

On Monday, it rained profusely, but this didn’t stop Quidditch practice. After all, the first match was now less than two weeks away, and Oliver Wood was listed in the dictionary under “fanatic.” This meant that Harry Potter was quite a sight as he traipsed back to Gryffindor Tower, soaked to the bone, covered in mud, and hoping he could get showered in time for dinner. He was certainly not in the mood for…

“Nice, look, Potter. Too bad it’s not gonna help you.”

Harry strongly considered ignoring it and moving on, but the politics of Noble Houses advised at least an acknowledgement. He ground his teeth and turned around to face the dark-haired Slytherin boy.

Theodore Nott grinned smugly at him. “You may be good on your own, but you _know_ Malfoy’s gonna flatten you on the pitch when our team’s got his back. You’re wasting your time out there.”

Harry rolled his eyes. While he was much more subtle than Crabbe or Goyle, it was clear that Nott wasn’t one to make a move without Malfoy’s say-so. “Since Malfoy is clearly the one running this game, you can tell him that if he wants to insult my Quidditch skills, he might have the courtesy to do it in person,” he replied.

“I am perfectly capable of thinking for myself, Potter,” Nott snapped.

Harry bit back the response he wanted to give. No need to escalate, he thought. “I’m sure you are, Mr. Nott. If you’ll excuse me, I’m quite busy.” He walked on, ignoring Nott’s further comments. It _was_ annoying, though. Plenty of Slytherins were making arses of themselves over the match, including some smarmy comments from Malfoy himself, but the heir to the House of Nott was quickly supplanting Slytherin’s new seeker as the most overtly annoying of the pack.

* * *

_Dear Harry,_

_I thought you should know that I finally got something useful out of the Diagonal Theatre. They_ _’re going to publicly announce their Christmas production on 1 November. They plan to keep the actual script secret until December, but it won’t be hard for scholarly types to piece together what they’re doing. But the most important part is that they’re going to give me an advance look at the script that weekend. It won’t be a final version, but it should give us some idea of where they stand. The wild card is still Adrian Greengrass Sr, though. If you can learn anything more about his stance, it would help us to develop a strategy for the spring. (Although it would be good not to be too direct about it.)_

_Be sure to thank Amanda Brocklehurst again for the tip. The power of popular culture should not be underestimated._

_Sincerely,_

_Cousin Andi_

* * *

It was hard to get a hold of Slytherin students outside of classes. For a Gryffindor to sit at the Slytherin Table at mealtimes would not be tolerated, and they tended to travel in groups if they ever wandered the grounds on the weekends. Free flying time on Thursdays might have been a way to peel one of them away, except that Harry wasn’t going to the lessons anymore. That meant the library was probably the best bet—one more reason for Harry and Hermione to hang out in there.

They finally caught Daphne in the library on Wednesday afternoon, just before dinner. She was sitting with a girl with limp brown hair and glasses whose name Harry didn’t quite remember, although he knew they usually went everywhere together. Toward the end of the free period, Harry led Hermione over to their table.

“Excuse me, Miss Greengrass, may we join you?” Harry asked.

Daphne looked mildly annoyed at being interrupted for a moment, but she quickly took on a diplomatic tone and graciously acquiesced. “Of course, Mr. Potter.”

“I don’t believe you’ve met my sister, Hermione Granger.”

“No, not in person,” Daphne admitted. “Pleased to meet you.” She shook Hermione’s hand without incident, although couple of other Slytherins in the room starting eyeing them suspiciously. “My friend, Tracey Davis.”

Tracey followed her friend’s lead and shook both of their hands.

“How do you do? I was hoping we could talk for a bit,” Harry said.

Daphne sighed with resignation, as if she had expected this for a while. “About the Muggle Protection Act, right?”

“Not exactly. More about your grandfather’s general positions and philosophy. My proxy’s explained it to us, of course, but we wanted to hear it from you.”

Daphne cocked an eyebrow and exchanged an intrigued look with her friend. If Potter was smart enough to do more than just blunt campaigning, this could get interesting.

“Well, here’s the thing, Mr. Potter,” Daphne said shrewdly, “and I _expect_ you won’t go blabbing about such things to someone like Rita Skeeter if you care anything about your House’s honour…”

Harry and Hermione both nodded. They had a passing understanding of how politics actually worked, plus Rita Skeeter was causing them enough trouble as it was.

“…Grandfather _says_ he wants what’s best for the wizarding world, but that’s only half true. What he really wants is what’s best for the House of Greengrass. But one thing that is definitely true is that he doesn’t want another war. The Death Eaters were putting more and more pressure on us because he continued to maintain our neutrality the last time around. If you hadn’t stopped You-Know-Who—” She paused when she saw Harry’s face. “—or however it happened, we would have been in big trouble before long.”

“Well, that doesn’t sound too hard,” Hermione suggested. “Don’t let the pureblood supremacists get enough power to start another war.”

Daphne and Tracey both snorted at the idea. “As if politics is ever that simple,” Tracey replied patronisingly.

“For one, in case you haven’t noticed,” Daphne continued, flipping her bleach-blond hair, “they’ve already got enough power, or close to it. All the biggest money’s on the conservative side, and Lord Malfoy controls a third of the Wizengamot and a majority of the school’s Board of Governors. He’s got the same political network he used to slow up the Ministry in the war. It’s just that all of the Death Eaters who did the dirty work are dead or in Azkaban.”

“Officially,” Hermione said shrewdly.

“Officially,” Daphne agreed, “and best not say that too loud, especially being muggle-born.” Hermione rolled her eyes.

“Still, your grandfather has the votes to slow them down, doesn’t he?” asked Harry.

“You think the moderates are all neutral in this, Mr. Potter? They’re all still old pureblood families. They’re just like Grandfather—they don’t want another war. For most of them, it’s good business to stay out of that mess, and some of them are just scared, but a lot of them would support a conservative takeover of the Ministry if they thought it could be done cleanly.”

Harry and Hermione exchanged a nervous glance. Cousin Andi had glossed over that part. “And what does your grandfather want?” Harry asked.

“I told you. He wants what’s best for the House of Greengrass. We’re more about tradition than blood, if that’s what you mean. We support maintaining purity of blood as much because that’s what’s expected of us as anything else.”

That was the opening Harry was looking for: “Well, speaking as someone muggle-raised, tradition would be that much more appealing to preserve if the wizarding world seemed more inviting.”

“ _Aaand_ there it is,” Tracey interrupted. “I was wondering when he’d get to that. C’mon, Daphne, let’s go to dinner.” She made to get up.

Harry frowned. “Well, um…is that wrong?” he tried. He and Hermione got up to follow the two Slytherins.

Daphne actually wagged her finger at him, though at least she didn’t seem to be trying to shake them off as they walked. “Neutral family, remember? You could just as easily say there should be restrictions on muggle-borns to reduce their influence. After all, you’re as likely to corrupt our traditions as you are to adopt them—nothing personal, Mr. Potter, that’s just how the conservatives talk, and that’s ignoring the part about bloodlines. Conservatives and moderates both would really rather maintain the status quo.”

Hermione was sorely tempted to make a comment about the health of those bloodlines, but that wouldn’t go over well with the daughter of a Most Ancient House. Harry, however, focused on a different point. After thinking on it for a minute, he asked, “But can they, though? I mean, there’s so few purebloods in Hogwarts right now, the muggle-borns are twice as large a fraction as usual.”

“Which is exactly why it’s such a crisis right now,” Daphne confirmed. “But that’s not going to get Lord Malfoy to hug a muggle-born, is it?”

They were reaching the Great Hall, now, and Daphne’s demeanour changed subtly. She was clearly aware of being in a more public place and took a more aloof tone. Nonetheless, Harry and Hermione kept following her towards the Slytherin Table. “Look, Mr. Potter,” she said, “you can talk pretty well, but talk’s not worth two knuts in politics when it comes down to it. If you want to even _try_ to get Grandfather’s support, you’re going to have to do something for him.”

“What, all that stuff like broomstick monopolies and tax exemptions,” Harry said disdainfully.

“To put it crudely,” Daphne huffed.

“Sorry,” he replied, “my proxy is better at those kinds of things than I am, but I’ll be sure to pass that along, Miss Greengrass.”

They reached the group of first-years, and a hard-faced, dark-haired boy rose to confront them.

“Potter.”

“Nott.”

“You have some business here?”

“We were just wrapping up.”

“I’ll see you at flying practice tomorrow, Miss Granger,” Daphne said, taking the hint.

“Right, thanks, uh, Miss Greengrass,” Hermione replied, wondering why she couldn’t live in a world where she could call people by their first names.

“Good evening,” Harry said as they walked away.

As soon as the pair of Gryffindors left the Slytherin Table and Daphne sat down, Theodore Nott rounded on her: “Alright, what are you playing at, Greengrass.”

Daphne rolled her eyes and scoffed at him. “It’s called politics, Theo. You should try it sometime.”

“What did he want, Miss Greengrass?” Draco Malfoy asked in a formal tone.

“Just what you’d expect—Muggle Protection Act and general lay of the land,” she replied, deliberately dismissively. “I laid it out for them—no harm in that; they’d figure it out soon enough.”

Daphne Greengrass usually kept her own counsel, and now was no exception. She would have to think about what Harry Potter had told her. She’d heard the words before, but it was rare that she really talked to anyone who was muggle-raised, much less one who had any real power. Here was proof that it wasn’t _all_ talk. Plus, if there was one thing Potter was right about, it was the population crisis here at Hogwarts and the fact that Grandfather’s dedication to the status quo wasn’t going to be sustainable for much longer.


	24. Halloween

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: All these Harry Potters are yours, except the copyright, which is JK Rowling’s. Attempt no landings there.

On Halloween morning, the smell of baking pumpkin pies was already wafting up from the kitchens through the entire castle before breakfast. All the Gryffindors were excited for the evening feast and the general air of festivity. A few of the older girls had taken it upon themselves to decorate the Common Room with charmed orange lights and black and orange banners. Harry saw Ron trying fruitlessly to turn Scabbers orange for the occasion. Harry privately thought the rat’s squeaks of protest sounded eerily human, but maybe that was just the holiday getting to him.

Halloween always had that weird bittersweet feeling for Harry and Hermione, no matter how much they always off memorialising Harry’s parents to the following Sunday, but they were actually in a pretty good mood this morning because Professor Flitwick was finally going to teach the Levitation Charm in class today. Seeing as that was their best wandless spell, it was pretty important for them to learn it with a wand, and they would be glad to finally be able to use it in public.

After a long lecture on the theory of the charm, Professor Flitwick put them all in pairs to practice. Harry, as usual, was paired with Hermione. At the next desk, Ron was paired with Neville—a dangerous combination, although Neville and Seamus probably would have been worse.

Professor Flitwick had taught them the swish and flick, the same movement Harry and Hermione had been unconsciously using with their hands for over a year, and the incantation, “ _Wingardium Leviosa_ ,” but control was still a problem. When Harry first incanted, “ _Wingardium Leviosa_ ,” his and Hermione’s feather shot up like a rocket and bumped into the ceiling. There were a few giggles at this, but the class was mostly used to seeing his wand go haywire whilst learning charms. The Levitation Charm was more difficult than usual because he needed to supply a continuous flow of magic, and it was very easy to lose control. He practised the charm a few more times, each of which ended in either no effect on the feather at all or a second or two of levitation followed by shooting up again to the ceiling.

Meanwhile, Ron and Neville were taking turns casting the spell on their own feather without effect. Neville was looking increasingly depressed about it, while Ron became very vocally frustrated. Eventually, Harry gave up on trying to get his feather to stay steady for more than three seconds and let Hermione have a turn.

“ _Wingardium Lev—Ahh_!” There was a loud crackle and a flash of blue light. Ron had swung his arm back so wildly that it collided with Hermione’s arm in the middle of her incantation.

“Hey, watch out!” Hermione squeaked. “You need to calm down. And it’s Levi- _o_ -sa, not Levio- _sa_.”

“Well, why don’t you try it, then?” Ron said indignantly. “Go on, see if you can do better than your brother.”

Hermione rolled her eyes and cast the spell again: “ _Wingardium Leviosa_.” The feather rose smoothly off the desk and hovered for a couple of seconds, then shot up so fast that the shaft stuck into the ceiling.

“Oh my, well, this spell can be tricky to start off,” Professor Flitwick said. He summoned the feather back down.

As if to illustrate the point, Seamus Finnigan tried again: “ _Wingardium Leviosa. Wingar_ —” BANG!

Ron might have been in a better mood about the whole thing, except that he still hadn’t got much of anywhere with the charm himself by the end of class. As Harry and Hermione left the room, they heard Ron complaining to Neville in front of them.

“It’s Levi- _o_ -sa, not Levio- _sa_. Honestly, I know she’s Harry’s sister, but she’s kinda mental.”

“Hey, she was trying to help you,” Neville replied. “You saw what happened to Seamus.”

Ron’s eyes involuntarily glanced up to his eyebrows, which the unfortunate Irish boy was now missing. “Well, there _is_ that,” he admitted. “Still, I think they’re _both_ a little mental. You know how Harry is. And I don’t know _what_ their deal is with Charms.”

“Oh, if only you knew, Ron,” Harry whispered to Hermione, who smiled slightly.

“Seamus got off easy.” Sally-Anne Perks came up on Harry’s other side. “Did you see that awful haircut Justin had this morning?”

“Yeah,” Hermione said. “I was wondering about that.”

“Sophie said he set it on fire when he tried that spell,” Sally-Anne reported. “No one’s really sure how he did it.”

“Oh, Justin,” Hermione shook her head.

“Yeah, well, they’d better warn us if they ever pair him with Seamus,” Sally-Anne smirked. “There’s no telling _what_ could happen.”

* * *

The biggest problem Harry and Hermione had with Halloween during most of the day was when several people started asking about “You-Know-Who” in history class. Since the war was after Professor Binns’s time, he didn’t have much to say on the matter, and Harry had to explain that he didn’t remember anything and didn’t know any more than what was in the books. By the end of the day, though, they were very much looking forward to the Halloween Feast. If it was anything like the Welcome Feast, it promised to be a great time.

“How was Ron in Flying Lessons?” Harry asked Hermione as they headed down to the Great Hall from their karate practice.

“Okay. He mostly just stayed away from me, but he still helped me out when I asked.”

“Well, don’t worry. He’ll come around. The Slytherins didn’t cause any trouble, did they?”

“I tried to stay away from _them_.” Harry nodded in agreement.

When they reached the Great Hall they were stunned in amazement. The teachers must have been busy all afternoon to set this up since lunch. Many of the usual thousands of candles were hidden inside carved, floating pumpkins whose faces moved in silent laughs or exaggerated scowls. The Hall was also “decorated” from floor to ceiling with live bats, the tables carried Halloween-themed centrepieces (though as always, a long stretch of their lengths was bare), and at the corners of the room were huge pumpkins from Hagrid’s garden that might well have weighed a ton each at harvest.

“Hey guys,” Ron pushed his way in past them, far too preoccupied about the feast to remember any earlier disagreements.

As they looked around the Hall, three of the tables looked very excited, while the fourth, at the far right, was more subdued.

“Well, I for one am glad they’ve kept the traditional feast,” and aristocratic voice proclaimed loudly. Harry, Hermione, and even Ron, stopped and turned to see Draco Malfoy expounding his view to anyone who would listen. “Father says the modern post-war celebrations are completely inappropriate—don’t you think, Mr. Potter?” Malfoy turned and grinned at Harry smugly.

“Actually, yes,” Harry called over to him, surprising the group of Slytherins. “For once, we agree on something, Mr. Malfoy.”

“What? You don’t want to have your little Potter party?” Theodore Nott mocked him.

“Uh, not really,” Harry said, as if it were obvious. “That kinda wouldn’t seem right, considering.”

“Oh, you gonna cry about it instead, Potter?” said Pansy Parkinson.

Before Harry could respond about just how sad that comment was, Ron jumped in: “You’re just jealous “cause your parents never let you have a party like the rest of us.”

“Ron…” Harry started.

“I bet _they_ were the ones crying when You-Know-Who got beat.”

“Ron!” Harry and Hermione said together before someone could start a fight.

“What?” Ron looked surprised that they weren’t backing him up.

“This is not the time,” Harry said. “Let’s just sit down.”

They started to turn to leave, but then Nott spoke again: “Well, can you really blame him if he does, Pansy? I’d be crying, too, if I got stuck with muggles.” Some of the other Slytherins laughed.

Hermione instinctively grabbed Harry by the arm before he could make a move. Yes, they were her parents, too, but she knew Harry’s patience was wearing a lot thinner than hers after the past few weeks. She felt his magic flare up, and the floating candles around them followed suit for a moment. At this rate, they were both going to get a reputation for having poor magical control.

“To be fair, I wouldn’t expect _him_ to,” Malfoy said, albeit cautiously. “We all know the Potters were muggle-lovers.”

“You know, you sound like you’re trying to be insulting, Malfoy,” Harry shot back, “but you’re not doing a very good job of it to me considering I was, in fact, raised by muggles. I love my family very much, and Mr. Nott, I’ll thank you not to cast aspersions on them. Good evening.” He walked away in a huff before they could say anything else.

The students all proceeded to their seats, and Professor Dumbledore stood up at the High Table. “Good evening,” he said in a solemn voice. “Before we begin, I would like to say a few words…Ten years ago tonight, the most feared dark wizard of the past half-century was defeated. We all know the popular story of that night. But the facts are that that defeat did not come at the hands of an infant—” There were murmurs throughout the Hall at this. “—but at the hands of a young couple—a gifted witch and wizard who fought most bravely in the final three years of the war, who gave their lives to protect their son, and who in doing so saved many others. On this anniversary night, I would like to ask for a moment of silence in honour of James and Lily Potter.”

The Hall bowed respectfully. There were a few annoyed whispers from the Slytherin Table, but nothing more.

“Thank you. And now, let the feast begin.”

As the long tables filled with food, Harry took off his glasses and wiped his eyes on his sleeve. He might have been a little embarrassed about that after that confrontation with the Slytherins, but he could see he was hardly the only one tearing up.

Soon enough, though, Ron was back to telling stories of his own family gatherings: “Well, we always have a party. Ginny always wants to read the beginning of _Harry Potter on the Orient Express_ where he beats You-Know-Who—you know, that was the first book…” Harry mostly tuned him out.

But the staff and students barely had time to finish loading up their plates when it happened. A scrawny brown tabby cat bolted in through the doors of the Great Hall and up to the High Table, screeching like a demon. There were two people in the Hall who actually spoke cat. When they heard the screeching, they both immediately jumped from their chairs and shouted, “There a giant monster downstairs?!”

One of those people was Minerva McGonagall.

The other was Harry Potter.

Luckily, no one had much time to notice that because at that moment, Argus Filch ran into the Great Hall, shouting like a lunatic: “Troll in the dungeon! Troll in the dungeon! Troll in the dungeon!” He didn’t stop until he tripped and fell against the High Table right in front of Albus Dumbledore.

There was silence for a fraction of a second, and then the students started screaming. There was a mad dash for the exits that only stopped when the Headmaster rose to his feet.

“SILENCE!” Dumbledore roared. “Everyone will please not panic. We have contingencies for this. Now, Argus, where is the troll?”

“It’s—it’s—in the East Wing dungeon by the Potions classrooms,” Filch rambled fearfully, “but it won’t be for long. It nearly got us, di’n’t, Mrs. Norris?” He scooped up his protesting cat in his arms.

Dumbledore sprang into action. Speaking quickly, he said, “Prefects, take a head count and inform your head of house if any students are missing. Then lead your houses back to your Common Rooms. All other teachers proceed with me to the dungeons. We must not let the troll get into the residential sections. Hagrid, go up and warn Madam Pomfrey, and guard the entrance to the Hospital Wing. Professor Binns, go down to the kitchens and warn the house elves. Argus, it’s probably best if you go with Hagrid. Go now.”

The prefects were already taking their head counts and reporting the results. Percy Weasley rounded up the first year Gryffindors and confidently led them up the stairs, as if no troll would dare to attack a prefect. The heads of house quickly conferred and determined that the only students missing from the feast were the two who were accounted for in the Hospital Wing.

“How did troll get into the castle?” Harry wondered.

“I don’t know,” Hermione said. “Maybe Peeves let it in. Do you really think it’s safer to send us back to our dorms instead holing up in the Great Hall?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. A troll wouldn’t fit through the doors to the dorms.”

“Hmm…”

As the Gryffindor first years were heading up to the third floor, Hermione noticed something strange on another flight of the Grand Staircase.

“What’s Snape doing over there? Doesn’t that go to the forbidden corridor?”

“Yeah, it does,” Harry said. “That’s strange…” He lowered his voice. “Maybe I should follow him.”

“What? No! You can’t!”

He leaned closer to her and whispered, “It’s okay. You saw Mrs. Norris. I’ll be faster on four legs.”

“Harry, no, Percy’s watching! He’ll see you’re missing.”

“Percy—” Harry considered the rule-obsessed and ever-vigilant prefect. He had to admit the odds were not good. “Fine,” he whispered. “But I’m checking it out in the morning.”

Hermione sighed and gave up arguing for the evening. Harry put a reassuring arm around her shoulder, though, and helped her up the last few flights.

The whole of Gryffindor House was sitting and standing in the cramped Common Room for a little while before Professor Dumbledore’s magically-amplified voice echoed through the castle: “The troll has been contained and is being removed from the castle. Curfew is in effect until the breech in the wards in sealed. The feast will now be delivered to the House Common Rooms.” Just like that, a long buffet table appeared in the middle of the room, carried at the corners by house elves, and the same food from the feast in the great hall was delivered up by more elves. A number of people shouted. For many of the younger students, including Hermione and Harry, this was the first time they had ever seen house elves, but the little bat-eared creatures didn’t stick around long enough to talk to them.

“Hey, Harry.”

The pair turned around and saw Ron and Neville lining up behind them for their plates.

“So, do you seriously speak cat or something?” Ron asked. “How’d you know what Mrs. Norris was yelling about?”

Harry’s pulse quickened, and Hermione had to fight the urge to slap him for his stupidity. That had been his worst slip-up in years. She prayed he could find a way to talk his way out of this one. “Kinda,” he said, groping for any idea he could think of. “Professor McGonagall does because she’s an animagus, and she taught me a little…she says I have the ear for it or something.”

“Uh, yeah, I told you Harry’s not exactly normal,” Hermione played along. “He just _has_ to wind up with weird talents. It just sounded like a bunch of screeching to me.”

“Huh. Wow, that _is_ strange,” Ron said.

“It’s no big deal,” Harry said quickly. “It’s not really useful, except when something like this happens. I just learnt it for fun.”

To Harry’s and Hermione’s great relief, Ron dismissed this as just another quirk of Harry Potter, and Neville had the sense not to spread it around. No one else at the Gryffindor Table seemed to have noticed, so it looked like his secret was still safe…for now.

* * *

A four-legged Harry Potter crept down the hall toward the door into the forbidden corridor the next morning. He was being more cautious this time, keeping his ears open for anyone who might approach. After last night, people were sure to be watching the place more closely, but even so, he was lucky enough to find a moment when the place was unguarded. He began sniffing around, trying to find out what had happened last night—whilst fighting every instinct to run for it. When he was sure he had it figured out, he bolted.

“Harry, what is it? What did you smell?” Hermione whispered when they had got back to the alcove down the hall and he changed back.

“Mione,” he whispered back. “I smelled _blood_.”

“What? Do you know whose it was? Was it the troll?” she asked fearfully.

“I’m not sure. There were two men in their thirties who went down there, and it came from one of them. But I didn’t smell anything that could be a troll. Whoever one it was, I think the dog bit him.”

“You mean someone tried to break in there? Well, it has to be Snape and Quirrell—they’re the only men in the castle that age—maybe that’s what Snape was doing there.”

“But why would Snape try to steal whatever it is?”

“Harry, we _know_ he was a Death Eater.”

“Yeah, but Dumbledore trusts him to teach here. I bet it was Quirrell.”

“Harry—”

“The Defence Professor’s always the top suspect.”

“Unless someone broke into the castle. Maybe that’s how the troll got in.”

“I don’t know,” Harry admitted. “I just wish I had some way to tell them apart.”

“Well, you can’t very well go following them around in cat form,” Hermione warned him.

“But if no one sees me change…”

“Harry, how many other cats have a white lightning bolt on their head.”

“Yeah, I guess…wait, maybe if one of us can touch Snape’s robes during class, we can get his scent on us.”

Hermione scrunched up her face. “Okay, one, that’s gross, and two, that sounds like a good way to get detention.”

“It’s worth a try,” he insisted. “Just pretend to trip or something.”

“Hmm…” She thought about it. It probably wouldn’t be that hard. “ _Maybe_ ,” she conceded. “ _If_ I get a good chance.”

But she didn’t get a good chance. Snape never stood up from his desk for the entire class period that morning. Somehow, he still managed to be as intimidating as ever, especially to Neville, who looked more uncomfortable than usual to start with. Harry was reluctantly forced to concede that that seemed suspicious.

* * *

The following Sunday was probably the most difficult day Harry and Hermione had yet had at Hogwarts. While everyone else was having a relaxing weekend, they sat subdued and ate breakfast in silence. If there was one day they would have liked to be able to get away from school, it would be today.

Ron Weasley seemed to be oblivious to their attitude, as he rushed over and sat down next to them, whispering excitedly. “Hey, guys, did you hear what happened?”

“Uh, I don’t think so, Ron, what happened?” Harry asked halfheartedly.

“I heard that Marcus Flint got in a big argument with Oliver Wood about the Quidditch match next weekend, and then Wood dared Flint to go in the forbidden corridor on the third floor.”

“Oh, no,” Hermione groaned. “He didn’t do it, did he?”

“Of course he did. The rumour is Flint barely got out of there alive. They’re saying there was a giant, three-headed dog in there. How weird is that? What is it?” he added when he saw his fellow Gryffindors roll their eyes. “What, did you you already know that?”

“Sorry, Ron, we figured everybody knew about that by now,” Harry told him. “A lot of the seventh-years have been talking about it.”

“What? Why doesn’t anyone ever tell me about this stuff?”

“Because it’s _forbidden_ ,” Hermione chided. “No one wants to say it out loud because they’re not supposed to know about it. Harry just seems to attract trouble and manages to overhear things he’s not supposed to.”

Ron seemed to grudgingly accept this as he dug into his breakfast.

It was as people were wandering out from the Great Hall that Harry pulled Hermione and Neville aside to talk.

“Harry? What’s up?” Neville asked.

“Would either of you two mind if I invited Ron to come with us to Hagrid’s this afternoon?”

Neville shrugged his shoulders and said, “Okay,” but Hermione looked surprised.

“Ron? Why? He doesn’t really seem like the type to bring along for that,” she said.

Harry shrugged. “I thought he might like to come—”

“But you heard him talking on Halloween, Harry. He doesn’t really get it.”

“Yeah, but that’s why. I want to give him a chance to see how we spend the day today.”

“But do we _really_ need to bring him?”

“Mione, he’s our friend—and, let’s face it, a political ally. We’ve hung out with Paul and Tiffany on this day before. He’s a nice guy most of the time. He’s still been helping you with the Flying Lessons, right?”

“Yeah,” she admitted.

“So I justed want to give him another chance to see how we really mark Halloween.”

Hermione looked to Neville to gauge his feelings on the matter, but he got a nervous look on his face and wisely indicated that he was staying out of this.

“Harry, it’s—it’s kind of your day,” she said, “so if you want to bring him, I won’t stop you. I hope you know what you’re doing, though.”

“Thanks, Mione.” He ran ahead to catch up with Ron, who was on his way out to the Middle Courtyard to get some fresh air, although Ron was beginning to rethink that plan, as the November weather was fast turning frosty and cold.

“Hey, Ron,” Harry called as he found the redheaded boy.

“Hey, “sup, Harry?”

“Hermione, Neville, and I were going to down and spend some time with Hagrid this afternoon. Do you want to come with us? It’s kind of a post-Halloween thing.”

“Really? Gee, thanks, that’d be great,” Ron said excitedly. “I haven’t really had a chance to meet Hagrid yet. Charlie always talked about him, though.”

“Cool. Meet us at the Clock Tower at one? I’m heading back inside.”

“Sure. See you then.”

Harry rejoined Hermione in the castle and informed her that Ron would be joining them later. In the meantime, by unspoken agreement, they started looking for a secluded place they could sit for the morning and look over the grounds. (“It’s too bad the Astronomy Tower’s off limits,” Hermione said.) Eventually, they decided the balcony in the Clock Tower was the best place. There were a few places that overlooked the ravine, but they would be less likely to be interrupted on a higher floor. They curled up against two adjacent pillars, facing each other. From here, they could look over the low railing and see much of the grounds, from Hagrid’s hut, past the Owlery and over to the river. They sat silently for a while, taking in the calm November morning.

After a while, Harry sighed, almost wearily. “Ten years,” he said quietly.

Hermione sighed, too and repeated, “Ten years.”

There was a long pause.

“I wonder if Professor Dumbledore would let us floo home to visit…” Harry said.

“He might,” Hermione replied. “But it wouldn’t really be appropriate. Remember, you’re not the only one you lost your parents in the war. This is why we already decided on Christmas holidays.”

Harry nodded and looked back over the grounds, blinking back tears. He wasn’t ashamed of crying about it—not today, of all days, but it was definitely something private, something he didn’t want just anybody to be able to see. “I know. It’s just hard,” he said, his voice catching, “not being able to get out of here for the tenth…”

Hermione scooted over to him and got up on her knees, draping an arm around his shoulders so she could do her rarely-used big sister routine: “I know it is, Harry, but we always knew we’d have this problem. That’s why we came up with this plan.”

Harry leaned into her and let out a small whine that sounded suspiciously like a meow. She ran her fingers through his hair and gently scratched him behind his right ear. He relaxed some.

“That _was_ nice of you to invite Ron,” she said.

“Mm hmm…I like having friends around for this day.”

“I know, Harry. I’m sure we’ll have a nice time with Hagrid.”

They both left unsaid what else they were thinking: they might well have invited Susan or Mandy—or Dean or almost any of the Gryffindors, really. But Neville and (a little to their own surprise) Ron were the closest two friends they had so far, and neither of them wanted to make this a big get-together.

They sat there on the balcony for a long time, watching the grounds, glad of the peace and quiet. The first Sunday in November always involved some quiet time with family, along with the visits, and they were content to while away the morning on that. They’d made sure to get their homework done early, so they could take the whole day out. Finally, as the time began to run short, Hermione spoke up. “Come on, little brother, let’s go get lunch,” she said with a slight smile. Harry would never let her get away with calling him that in public, but he followed her without complaining.

After lunch, the two of them met up with Neville and Ron at the Clock Tower and walked down the path to Hagrid’s hut. The huge man opened the door and greeted them warmly. As usual, Harry jumped out of the way as Fang came bounding out to meeting. By now, Hermione and Neville had figured that out, too, so Ron took the full force of it. He soon wound up flat on his back with the boar hound licking his face.

“Ah! Geroffme!” he yelled. Neville and Hermione pulled Fang off of him, and Hagrid pulled the dog back inside. “Why didn’t you warn me about him?” he demanded.

“Sorry, Ron,” Hermione said. “We’ve kind of got used to him by now.”

“Speak for yourself,” Harry said, keeping his distance from Fang. Neville tentatively pulled the dog alongside him. They went inside, with Harry and Hermione sitting in one over-sized chair and Ron and Neville sitting in another.

“Thanks for having us over, Hagrid,” Harry said as they got settled.

“Aw, “s no trouble, Harry,” Hagrid replied, blushing through his thick beard. “All o’ yeh are welcome anytime. Especially today.”

“What’s going on today?” Ron asked as he tried and failed to mask his disappointment at the quality of Hagrid’s rock cakes.

“Well, Ron,” Harry started slowly, “you know about me and Halloween—and since Halloween is a holiday, and the tourists are always out in Godric’s Hollow, our family always just celebrates the regular holiday on that day and that’s it. At home, we save the memorial stuff for the Sunday after. We usually spend the day with our friends and family, and we visit my birth parents’ graves. Except we can’t really do that here.”

“Ohh…” Ron said, finally understanding the somber faces around him. “I’m sorry, mate.”

“It’s kind of the same for me,” Neville said quietly, looking down at his hands. “My Gran always took me to visit my parents on the first of November—and birthdays and holidays and stuff—but I can only visit them at Christmas and Easter while I’m here.”

“Your parents, Nev?”

Neville looked reluctant to answer and looked to Harry and Hermione for help.

“They’re in St. Mungo’s,” Hermione whispered, sending Ron a look that indicated he should not pry further.

“Ohh…” Ron repeated. “Wow, I guess that’s gotta be hard for all of you. You, uh, you didn’t really need to invite me.”

“We wanted to,” Harry insisted. “You’re our friend, right?” Ron’s unconsciously held his head a little higher at Harry Potter calling him his friend. “We like to have our friends around on this day. Anyway, we came to see Hagrid today because he worked with both of our parents in the war.”

“Yeah, that’s right,” Hagrid said. “Matter of fact, I worked with yer uncles, too, Ron—Gideon and Fabian.”

“You did?” Ron said in surprise. “What were they like? Mum doesn’t really talk about them much.”

“Ah, they were both great boys,” Hagrid said wistfully. “I know yer brothers, Fred and George, were named for them, but they really acted more like Bill and Charlie—fought like true lions, too.” Ron beamed with pride.

They talked for a long while, swapping the few stories they had about their families, with Hagrid, of course, doing most of the talking. Harry told them about Godric’s hollow (Ron had been there, but Neville’s Gran was too sensible for that kind of thing, and neither of them had seen the Potters’ grave), and how they would have tea with Bathilda Bagshot every year, which impressed Neville. Neville himself didn’t have many stories to tell, since he was still tight-lipped about his visits to St. Mungo’s, but Hagrid regaled them with tales of the little pranks Frank and Alice Longbottom would play on each other in school.

“Well, Neville, yer dad took a page from yer granddad’s book—” he said.

“He did _not_ put a fanged gerbil in her handbag,” Neville said with surprising force. The other children all stared at him. He started blushing and stammered, “M-my granddad had a weird sense of humour.”

“Nah, he didn’t put it in yer mum’s handbag,” Hagrid clarified. “He pretended it was a regular one and gave it to her as a gift.”

“Oh, well, that’s not so bad.”

“Well, yer mum didn’t take it too well after it bit her. She really hexed yer dad good after that. And then she gave the gerbil away to one of her roommates.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“Yeah. The funny thing was it kept changing hands. No one wanted to keep it once they saw the fangs, so they just kept giving it away. And them, somehow, _Harry_ _’s_ dad, who was a second-year at the time, got hold of it and planted it in…well, uh…somebody’s hat.” Everyone but Ron had a decent idea of who that somebody was, but they didn’t want to say it.

Ron’s laughed uproariously. “Bloody hell! What happened?”

“Oh, they got in a nasty fight. And Harry’s mum told him off somethin’ fierce—they didn’t like each other yet…nope, yeh didn’t want to get on Lily Evans’ bad side.” He rose to his feet for some more tea.

Hermione was reminded about something that had been bugging her and made an opportunity for herself: “Hey, Hagrid, speaking of animals, we thought we saw Sn…someone trying to get past that three-headed dog on Halloween. Do you know anything about that?”

Hagrid nearly tripped and fell over, which would surely have been disastrous given his size. “How do you know about Fluffy?” he said.

“ _Fluffy_?” Ron and Neville demanded.

“Hagrid, half the school knows about Fluffy!” Harry said. “The upper years have been daring each other to go in that corridor.”

“What?” Hagrid roared. “What’re they doin’ that for? Don’ they know it’s dangerous?”

“Hagrid, they’re teenage boys,” Hermione said. “They _like_ to do dangerous things. Especially if it’s also forbidden, and no one tells them why.”

“Well, they need to cut it out. Fluffy’s alright to his Papa, but he takes his job serious.” The children shuddered a little at Hagrid describing himself as that thing’s “Papa.”

“But the door’s only protected by a _Colloportus_ ,” Hermione said, “or so they say. It’s too easy to get in.”

“Well, someone’s gotta get in to take care o’ Fluffy,” Hagrid said proudly.

They all looked at each other. That would explain a lot. “Are you taking care of Fluffy?” asked Harry.

“Well, of course I am. He’s my dog. Bought him off a Greek chappie last year. I just lent him to Dumbledore to guard the, uh…”

“Guard the what?”

“I shouldn’ta said that. It’s none of yer business, tha’ is. It’s top secret Hogwarts business.”

“Is it the thing someone tried to steal from Gringotts?” Harry pressed.

“Nope, not sayin’ anything more. Yer meddlin’ in dangerous business, yeh are. Just forget about the whole thing. It’s all between Professor Dumbledore and Nicolas Flamel—”

“Who’s Nicolas Flamel?” Hermione asked.

Hagrid opened his mouth angrily, and then scowled at himself. “I shouldn’ta told yeh that. I should _not_ have told yeh that,” he muttered.

Hermione wasn’t done, though. Hagrid had told them he wasn’t supposed to use magic, but these seemed like pretty high-stakes. “Hagrid, even if someone needs to…take care of Fluffy,” she said sceptically, “can’t Professor Dumbledore put a stronger locking spell on the door and give you a magic key or something?”

“Huh? Uh…maybe…” he said. “Might be a good idea if a lot o’ people are breakin’ in there. I’ll have to talk to Dumbledore about it…Look, I don’ want to get unfriendly with yeh, especially not today, but yeh can’t be askin’ me any more about that—thing. I’ll see about protectin’ that door, and tha’ should take care of it.”

Hermione and Harry looked sceptical at that, but they let the matter drop. They talked for perhaps another half hour before the conversation finally wound down.

“Thanks for comin’ out to see me,” Hagrid said as they left. “And if you happen to run into that little Susan Bones, let her know she can come talk to me, too. I knew her Uncle Edgar in the war.”

“Sure, Hagrid, bye.”

“So who did you see trying to break in to the third floor corridor?” Ron asked as they walked back up the path to the castle.

“We’re not completely sure—” Harry started.

“We’re pretty sure it was Snape,” Hermione insisted.

“Snape!”

“I don’t know,” Harry countered. “I still think it might have been Quirrell—maybe Snape was trying to stop him.”

Ron and Neville looked confused.

“We know both Professors Snape and Quirrell went down there on Halloween,” explained Hermione. “But did you see how Snape never stood up in class Friday? We think he got bitten.”

“Oh, I bet he _was_ up to no good,” Ron said.

“Y-yeah,” Neville said nervously. “Y-you know how nasty Snape is.”

“I guess,” Harry said, “but Snape’s been here for years, and he hasn’t done anything _that_ bad.”

“But so was Professor Quirrell,” Hermione observed. “You’re just hung up on that Defence Professor curse.”

“Hey, the curse is real!” Ron said. “My whole family talks about it. But I still bet it was Snape. I bet Quirrell’s _really_ gonna get sacked for hexing Malfoy.” Even Harry laughed at that.

“So have either of you heard of Nicolas Flamel?” Harry asked.

Neville and Ron both shook their heads no.

“It sounds vaguely familiar,” Hermione said in frustration. “I just don’t remember where I read it.”

“Yeah, same here,” Harry confirmed. “We’ll have to try to look it up somewhere.”


	25. Quidditch

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Is Quidditch honestly a well-designed game. No? Then I am not JK Rowling and do not own Harry Potter. (But it’s fun to write anyway.)

The Quidditch rivalry continued to heat up around Harry. A lot of it came from the older Slytherins, who weren’t intimidated by the Boy-Who-Lived because of the age difference. (Ironically, those Slytherins were more sensible about that than most of the rest of the school.) Many of them would make rude comments as he passed in the hall or joke about him getting knocked off his broom. They all knew how good a flier he was supposed to be, but not all of them believed it or cared.

Illicit bets on the match were changing hands all over the school, allegedly involving some of the teachers, which wouldn’t have surprised anyone, considering that it was possibly the worst-kept rule in Hogwarts after “no magic in the corridors.” Normally, the Weasley Twins had a corner on that market, but since they were on the Gryffindor team, they deferred to some of the older Ravenclaws to make the books. Flying even faster than the bets themselves were the rumours about just what McGonagall and Snape had wagered each other over the match, but fewer people believed those, since Snape would never do anything that carried any real risk of public humiliation.

Oliver Wood was really going over the edge, giving Harry flying tips anytime they met in the halls and insisting he be escorted everywhere so that the Slytherins couldn’t knock him out of the match. Admittedly, this last bit was probably sensible, since there were so many skirmishes going on. Only a couple of people actually wound up in the Hospital Wing, but the last thing Harry needed was to get on Madam Pomfrey’s bad side right before the match.

It was on Friday, the day before the match, as Harry was huddling in the frosty courtyard with Hermione, Neville, Ron, and Angelina Johnson as his escort, that they heard a certain blond boy bragging to a large gaggle of Slytherins with Marcus Flint standing over his shoulder in addition to his usual bodyguards. “I’m not worried,” said Draco Malfoy in what was probably a blatant lie. “Potter may be fast on a broom, but that’s no substitute for growing up with the game. Besides, you know why Gryffindor always loses—they’re too _honourable_ to do what it takes. They’re almost as bad as Hufflepuff.”

The other Slytherins laughed loudly at this, and Angelina decided to take matters into her own hands. Striding up to the group, she called out, “Yeah, wait till you’re facing the Weasley Twins tomorrow and then try saying that, Malfoy!”

“Right, like we’re gonna be scared of a team of a bunch of little third years,” Marcus Flint growled out, sending Angelina a leering grin with his big snaggleteeth.

Angelina grimaced and shot back, “Yeah, well, we’re not scared of a team of spoilt rich kids.”

Malfoy and Theodore Nott glowered at Angelina, but Malfoy had a comeback ready: “You’re just jealous because we’ve all got decent brooms…Say, Weasley, what are your brothers flying? Cleansweep Fives? You’d be better off selling them to a museum to make a few galleons. Merlin knows you could use it.” The other Slytherins laughed again.

Ron turned very red at this. “Why you little—!” He started to run at Malfoy, but Harry and Angelina held him back while the Slytherins closed ranks around their Seeker.

“If the shoe fits, Weasley,” Draco said, “although with you, maybe it doesn’t.”

“Shut up, Malfoy!” Neville said, to his own surprise.

“Ooo, the squib standing up for the blood traitor. Now I’m really scared.”

“Neville’s no squib, Malfoy,” Harry said, stepping out in front. “And he’s not alone, either.”

Malfoy glared at him, but Harry had already proved himself as a serious opponent in this game, so he shut his mouth.

Unfortunately, Nott was ready to take up the slack: “Right, he’s just an idiot who hangs around with a half-blood who was raised by muggles.”

The other Slytherins sniggered derisively. Harry stood very stiff. “Do we have a problem, Nott?” he said threateningly.

“Oh, it’s nothing personal,” Nott said in a tone that made it clear that it was. “It’s a tragedy, really,” Nott continued. “The last member of a Noble pureblood family is a half-blood who didn’t even get a proper magical education. It’s all these silly modern ideas that breeding doesn’t matter that do it.” He was obviously quoting his father’s talking points, now. “Spread by Dumbledore and all those other mixed families who keep trying to bring down the best and brightest of the purebloods. You can see the damage it’s down to your own family, Potter—it only takes a few bad decisions to end a great pureblood line.”

Hermione grabbed Harry by the arm at that. With the glares he was shooting out, the other Slytherins sensed a fight brewing and edged away. Malfoy looked at the whole situation with disapproval. Nott may have been from a Noble House, but they were perfectly willing to make him the sacrificial lamb if it could get Potter in trouble before the match, especially if he was foolish enough to say that to his face. Angelina was just too shocked to intervene.

Harry was well aware of the danger of upsetting the match, though. He would handle this verbally. He shook off Hermione’s hand and suppressed the crackle of magic around him. The, he drew himself up and stepped forward until he was just out of arm’s reach of Nott. He remembered these facts well. He remembered because Cousin Andi had strongly advised him to memorise the arguments. True, she had not advised him to use them in such a confrontational manner, but he was really getting tired of all the bigotry.

“Theodore Nott,” he said harshly. “In 1932, your great-grandfather, Cantankerus, said that there were only twenty-eight families—out of over a thousand in Magical Britain—that were still ‘pureblood’ enough for his standards. The Potters weren’t even on that list, although we were still pureblooded enough for the Blacks. Do you know what’s happened to them? Many of the bloodlines are failing on their own. Look at your own family, Mr. Nott: a single heir born late in your parents’ life. Or my father’s pureblood family: also a single heir born late in his parents’ life. And that’s just the start. It’s no secret that Adrian and Hyacinth Greengrass have been trying for a son for years without success. A generation ago, Mr. Nott, there were ten Malfoys. Now, there are only three. A generation ago, there were over a dozen Blacks. Now, the last of the Blacks is deservedly rotting in Azkaban. And then there’s the war. Because of the war, the last of the Crouches is an ageing widower. All of the remaining Lestranges are in Azkaban. The Longbottoms are as good as down to a single heir—sorry, Neville. The Rosiers are extinct in the male line, and the Prewetts are extinct in the male line. In your grandfather’s time, Mr. Nott, the Fawleys were major power players. Now, they’re a small family without a political role thanks to Grindelwald’s war. The Gaunts vanished entirely during Grindelwald’s War. So much violence, most of it pureblood against pureblood, and yet during all this time, not a single one of those twenty-eight families lost their pureblood status to intermarriage. So tell me, Mr. Nott, who is the _real_ enemy of the purebloods here?”

Everyone present, even Hermione, was staring at him wide-eyed. Harry began to get very nervous. He was suddenly aware that what he had just said could possibly have either Malfoy or Nott challenging him to a duel for the dig at their bloodlines, even though he _had_ included his own family in his pronouncement. True, supervised duels were allowed under the school rules, and, true, he could play his “no wands’ trump card and win it, but the press it would generate would not be good. Worse, he could see a number of people already had their hands on their wands.

Harry could tell just by looking that Malfoy had already come to the same conclusions. But Malfoy was also smart enough not to get into a fight the day before the match. Nott, on the other hand…but Malfoy had precedence over Nott in demanding satisfaction, being from a Most Ancient House, and everyone knew it. Even Nott openly looked to Malfoy for a cue.

Malfoy, of course, didn’t want to see his fellow aristocrat get humiliated in a muggle duel any more than himself. Baiting for duels was a dangerous game at the best of times. You weren’t actually supposed to get yourself into one. Potter and Nott may have both gone too far unintentionally, from their faces, but Potter had managed to gain the advantage. Nott might be clever enough to see how it would end, but Malfoy didn’t feel like taking the chance. He’d deal with Nott’s indiscretion himself later.

“You’d better watch what you say, Potter,” Malfoy said with even more venom than Harry. “It might come back to bite you. Father says your parents didn’t know what was good for them, either.” That was a classic evading tactic: using hearsay to deflect responsibility.

“I didn’t hear an answer to my question,” Harry said carefully.

“That’s enough! We’ll settle this on the Pitch, Potter!” Malfoy spat.

“Fine by me.” Harry stalked away, with his fellow Gryffindors quickly closed ranks around him.

“Wicked!” Ron said.

“Harry, that was…” Neville started.

“Awesome!” Ron offered.

“It was reckless!” Angelina chided him.

“Yeah, sorry, I got carried away there,” Harry replied. “What he said about my family…”

“You really need to work on your temper, Harry,” Hermione said. “Picking fights won’t solve anything, no matter what they say.”

“Yeah, I know,” he sighed.

“You need to convince them in civil discourse…the ones you can, anyway.”

“Still, I wish I could say something like that,” Neville said nervously, still in awe of Harry’s rant. “My Gran might be able to get away with it, but I sure couldn’t.” Hermione and Harry gave him a sympathetic look.

“I can’t believe you told them off like that, mate,” Ron said.

“Uh, thanks. Probably _wasn_ _’t_ the best idea, though,” he admitted.

“I should think not,” Angelina said. “Come on, I’m going inside. It’s too cold out here.” She poked a finger at Harry. “And make sure you stay out of trouble until after the match.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

* * *

The next day was the big day. Harry woke early that morning, feeling very nervous about the impending match. It was his first time flying in public, and all eyes were sure to be on the Boy-Who-Lived. He went down to the Common Room to find that Hermione was also already up. They both read uneasily for a while until the rest of their house-mates were up and moving.

“Morning, guys,” said Ron Weasley as he descended the staircase with the other first years.

“Morning,” a few people said.

He sat at one of the tables with a book, which raised some eyebrows. Ron wasn’t exactly the type to crack a book that early in the morning. Hermione and Harry watched in confusion until he set a squirming Scabbers on the table and tapped the rat with his wand.

“ _Colovaria bestia rufus. Colovaria bestia rufus_ ,” he chanted.

Hermione and Harry laughed. “Still trying to turn Scabbers different colours?” Harry asked.

Ron blushed a little and explained, “I wanted to make him Gryffindor red for the match. I don’t get it. It’s not like this is one of Fred and George’s fake spells. It’s supposed to be a spell to change the colours of animals. You know, Fred and George actually did turn him green once when Percy was ten…course they mighta used dye or something.”

“Hmm…let me take a look,” Hermione said, budging in to get a clear view of Ron’s book. She looked over the page on animal colour changes. “I don’t know. It seems like kind of an advanced spell,” she said. She drew her wand to try it herself, and Ron opened his mouth in protest, considering her frequent overpowered mishaps in Charms class, but before he could speak, Scabbers noticed Harry coming too close for comfort. The rat squirmed away and ran under a chair.

“Oh, sorry,” Harry said.

“I don’t get why he’s afraid of you,” Ron said. “He’s normally fine with people.”

Harry was starting to wonder himself why he always felt a little uneasy around Scabbers, but his dismissed the thought for the time being. He was far too worried about the match.

The chatter had reached a fever pitch by the time they made it to the Great Hall. Everyone was excited to see the two youngest Seekers in a century in action. Spirits were so high that Harry and Hermione could feel the change in the magic in the air. As soon as Harry entered Hall, he was whisked away to sit with the team, where Wood was making sure everyone got a good breakfast and was ready for the game. Harry was too tense to eat much, but he did help himself to some sausages.

As the clock approached eleven, the Gryffindor and Slytherin teams headed out to the locker rooms to suit up, and the rest of the school heading for the Pitch. It was quite possibly the largest turnout in years. The castle would be all but empty. Even Dumbledore would be attending. In the chaos, Hermione just barely caught Harry on his way into the locker room.

“Hey! Hey, Harry!” She called. He paused on the threshold. “I just wanted to say good luck out there.”

“Thanks,” he said. Then he stared off into space wistfully for a moment.

“Harry?”

“Mione, do you realise it was six years ago today that I first showed up on our porch?”

Hermione chuckled and pulled him into a hug. “How could I forget? That was the weirdest day of my life.”

“Well, it was the _best_ day of mine—or really the day after was…Thanks for everything, sis.”

“Anything for you, little brother,” she said, too quietly for the others to hear. She pulled back and made a show of ruffling his hair and whispered, “Go get ‘em, furball.”

Harry followed the team into the locker room, his fears banished for now. Soon, after the inevitable awww’s had subsided and Wood gave his pep talk—with the Weasley Twins mocking the whole thing behind his back—they made their way out to the Pitch.

“You scared, Potter?” Angelina said as they stepped into the sunlight.

He shook his head. “Nope. Are you? Their Chasers are on Nimbus Two Thousands.”

“Don’t worry about us,” she assured him. “Bletchley’s on a Nimbus, too, and that is _not_ a Keeper’s broom. Plus not much gets past Wood. We’ll be fine. You just focus on showing up that little blond ponce.”

A wicked grin crossed Harry’s face. “With pleasure.”

The crowd was roaring. Almost everyone was dressed in red or green. The Hufflepuffs and most of Ravenclaw had sided with Gryffindor. Harry saw cameras dotting the crowd. Apparently, several seventh-years had been recruited as press representatives. The weather was good, though not perfect—cold and very sunny, but not too windy. It looked like it was going to be a good match.

“Potter.”

Despite that.

“Malfoy.”

The Slytherin boy smirked at Harry and said, “May the best Seeker win.”

Harry did his best to smirk back: “Don’t worry, I will.” Both of them hid their true apprehension well. No matter what either of them said, they were close to evenly matched. This was going to be a tough competition.

As the two teams faced off along a line, Madam Hooch stepped in between them. She released the Bludgers, followed by the Golden Snitch, which buzzed around Harry’s and Malfoy’s heads before zooming off into the sky. She held up the Quaffle in one hand and called out, “I want a nice fair game—from all of you. Mount your brooms, please.”

Harry straddled his Nimbus Two Thousand, not taking his eyes off Malfoy. His cat-like stare usually got to most people after a while, but Malfoy seemed to be resistant to it.

Madam Hooch blew a long blast on her whistle, and Harry kicked off the ground—hard.

Between his Nimbus Two Thousand’s power and his natural magical affinity, it was easy for Harry to coast high into the air, above the unfolding action, hopefully above the Snitch, which would be more visible against the green of the grass than the bright blue of the sky. Malfoy had to push it to catch Harry, but he was soon on the same level. They began slowly circling the pitch opposite each other, mostly looking down, but each taking frequent glances at their opposite numbers.

“And the Quaffle is taken by the lovely Angelina Johnson of Gryffindor.” The Weasley Twins’ friend, Lee Jordan, was providing commentary, with Professor McGonagall acting as his foil. “And passes to Alicia Spinnet—good find of Wood’s, moved up from reserve. They make quite a pair, don’t they?”

“Jordan!” McGonagall cut in.

“Sorry, Professor. Spinnet passes to Katie Bell—no, intercepted by Marcus Flint of Slytherin. Flint races down the pitch—damn, those Nimbus Two Thousand’s are fast—sorry, Professor—he’s leaving the Chasers behind—it’s all up to Wood—YES! He saves it!”

Harry did a loop on his broom as he continued circling the pitch. Malfoy rolled his eyes at him.

“Katie Bell takes the Quaffle—coming up the middle, Johnson and Spinnet guarding close—whoa, just dodges a Bludger—and there’s the other one—watch out! No! That was deliberate!” One of the Slytherin Beaters had ploughed straight into the Gryffindors’ formation, nearly knocking them out of the air. Katie dropped the Quaffle, and one of the opposing Chasers snatched it out of the air.

“Pucey takes the Quaffle—the Weasley Twins are on him—he ducks the Bludgers—lines up his shot and…Slytherin scores,” Lee groaned. Cheers erupted from one quarter of the stands, and boos from the other three quarters.

“Johnson takes the Quaffle, passes to Spinnet, back again, over to Bell,” Lee reported breathlessly. The Gryffindor Chasers were flying in a tight weave to try to dodge the faster Slytherins.

Harry decided to get in on the action and see just how good Malfoy was on a Nimbus. He sped up, tightened his circle, and then, with a deliberate swoop, flew under Malfoy toward a random point on the far side of the pitch. Malfoy swung around and started following, but not marking him that close just yet. Malfoy had seen him fly at that first lesson and had some inkling that Harry was playing with him.

“Looks like Potter’s spotted something, maybe,” Lee said. “I don’t know, looks like Malfoy’s calling it a feint. Hang on…”

Harry spotted an opportunity and went for it. He turned his swerve into one of his trademark straight-line sprints, and Malfoy noted the change and followed him at top speed. But Harry wasn’t going for the Snitch; he was dashing in front of one of the Slytherin Beaters, who was lining up a bludger shot on Alicia. Between him and Malfoy getting in the way, the shot went wide, leaving Malfoy and the Beater shouting at each other.

“Nice one, Harry!” George yelled as he flew past.

“And Potter saves Spinnet! Excellent!” Lee said. “Wait, where’s he going?”

Harry pulled back and suddenly realised that his broom wasn’t slowing down. He was hurtling straight toward the stands at top speed and couldn’t stop. He pulled harder and harder, to no avail. But finally, at the last second, the broom swung into a gut-wrenching left turn that left his head spinning, and he started circling around the pitch again.

 _That was odd_ , he thought. _It_ _’s never done that before_.

“Gryffindor scores! Ten-ten!” Harry was just in time to hear. There was a far louder roar from the crowd, as just about everyone wanted to see the snakes put down.

But the rest of the match didn’t go as well. As good as the Gryffindors were, they were just no match for a whole team with Nimbus Two Thousands. The scores climbed: twenty-ten, thirty-ten, forty-ten, forty-twenty.

But Harry had a far more pressing problem. That glitch with his broom was no fluke. He had pushed his broom for all it was worth in practice, but now, every time he took it into a fast sprint, the control would seize up, and he couldn’t stop or turn. With Bludgers and other players zooming everywhere, that could turn bad very fast, not to mention making it harder to catch the Snitch. To add insult to injury, Malfoy had noticed.

“What’s the matter, Potter? Can’t handle a _real_ broom?”

Harry didn’t dignify that with a response, instead, angling his broom just so, and he buzzed Malfoy’s slicked-back hair with his feet. The Slytherin Seeker ducked out of the way, cursing, which, luckily for him, Madam Hooch didn’t hear. He swung around and started following as Harry did another fast lap around the field.

“Looks like we’ve got a Seeker battle brewing—hang on, Potter’s gone wide again.”

The Slytherins in the stands jeered at Harry’s poor flying. Something was really going wrong. What he wouldn’t have given to be able to use his wandless magic right now to keep steady. But it was against the rules, and he’d never be able to cast a wandless Levitation Charm strong enough to stabilise something as large as a broom anyway. Whatever was happening, he’d have to fight it with flying skills alone.

Down in the stands, Hermione, Ron, and Neville were all standing with Hagrid in the middle of the Gryffindor section. Hermione had monopolised Hagrid’s binoculars and was worriedly following he brother’s flight around the field.

“I don’t understand,” she said. “He never flies like that in practice. Could something have happened to his broom?”

“Can’t have,” Hagrid insisted. “It’s brand new. Only thing’ll interfere with a top model broom is powerful dark magic.”

Immediately, Hermione whipped the binoculars around to the teachers’ box, watching the teachers intently while taking frequent glances back to Harry’s flying.

“What’re you doing?” Ron asked.

“If it’s powerful dark magic, it has to be one of the teachers doing it,” she said. “None of the students would be powerful enough.”

“No way,” Hagrid jumped in. “None o’ the teachers would try an’ hurt Harry.”

“But Hagrid, something _is_ wrong with Harry’s broom. What else could it be?”

“Johnson takes the Quaffle around the edge,” Lee announced. “Oh, foul! Flint grabs the Beater’s club! Get him, Fred!”

“Jordan!” McGonagal scolded, though only half-heartedly.

“Sorry, Professor. Johnson passes to Spinnet. Weasley and Flint are fighting over the Bludger—oh, come on, Professor, that’s a major foul!”

Harry looked over and saw Madam Hooch trying to break up Fred and Flint and get Flint to give back the Beater’s club he’d grabbed. But before she could call it, Alicia took the opportunity to go for the goal. She faced down Miles Bletchley, swerved left, then right, took the shot, and…

Alicia made the goal! But Gryffindor was still down thirty to sixty. This was as good a chance as any, though. “Time out!” Harry yelled. Wood waved his agreement to Madam Hooch, and she blew her whistle.

“Time out!” she shouted. “And penalty shot to Gryffindor!” The players descended to the pitch.

“What’s the matter, Potter?” Wood said. “Why do you keep flying like that?”

“My broom’s acting up,” he said. “The braking charm keeps cutting out, and it’s not turning well, either.”

“The braking charm? It shouldn’t be doing that. Are you sure?”

“Well, it’s sure not handling like it does in practice.”

“Huh…we can’t back out now, though,” Wood said firmly. “Try putting it down and picking it up again. Maybe that’ll reset something.”

“Like rebooting a computer?”

“Like what?”

“Never mind.” Harry dismounted his broom and held it where it wanted to hover. “Down,” he said, and the broom slipped out of his hand and fell lifeless on the grass. After another moment, he said, “Up,” and it leapt back into his hand. He hopped on and flew a few circles around Wood. He shrugged his shoulders. “It’s doing alright, now.”

“Good, let’s hope it stays that way. Let’s go. Angelina, take the penalty shot.”

The problem with the Nimbus Two Thousand—and with racing-type brooms in general—was that what it gained in speed, it lost in manoeuvrability. From _Quidditch Through the Ages_ , Harry had learnt that there was a big debate between Quidditch teams that always bought seven top-of-the-line brooms for their players and teams that bought different models optimised for each position. Harry thought Angelina was proving the second point when she out-flew Bletchley’s Nimbus and easily made her penalty shot with what was supposed to be an inferior model.

But Harry didn’t have time to dwell on that, because Malfoy had finally taken the initiative and was diving for something. Harry couldn’t tell if it was the Snitch or not, but he wheeled around to follow. He picked a place a little ahead of Malfoy and dove straight at it, hoping to get in front, but then it happened. His steering failed again.

A short scream was the only warning Malfoy got. Harry zoomed inches in front of him, breaking off his pursuit. Harry got a brief glimpse of something gold and fluttering to his left, but it was gone in a flash. At least he’d kept Malfoy off it.

“Watch where you’re going, Potter!” the boy yelled.

“Whoa, and Potter charges Malfoy!” Lee said. “To bad he missed—I’m kidding, Professor.”

Malfoy was angry now. He took the lead, leading Harry all over the pitch. Harry tried to keep up as best he could and managed to cut him off a couple more times, but he just wasn’t a match for the Slytherin with his faulty control. He couldn’t understand what was making it glitch like that, but the calls kept getting closer and closer. It seemed like the braking charm always failed at the worst possible time, whenever he was about to hit something. He needed to catch the Snitch soon so he could get back on the ground before he crashed.

“That’s it! I knew it!” Hermione shouted.

“What?”

“What is it?”

“It’s Snape! He’s jinxing Harry’s broom!”

“What!”

Hermione had been watching the teachers’ box and Professor Snape in particular very carefully, looking for any patterns, and she found one: every time Harry’s broom went out of control, Snape was staring intently at him and muttering something.

“Can’t be,” Hagrid said. “Snape’d never do that.”

“He is! I know a jinx when I see one,” she insisted.

“What do we do?” Ron said.

“I don’t know…I’ve gotta try something.” Hermione turned and sprinted around the pitch toward the teachers’ box.

Meanwhile, Harry managed to get back in front, but Malfoy was marking him closely. He tried to shake him off by diving into the heart of the action, and hopefully fend off the Slytherin Chasers from Katie Bell while he was at it. But nothing went right, there. Katie swerved in his direction at the same moment Harry’s broom seized up once again. Malfoy flew wide, and with good reason. In the stands, Hermione squealed with fear when she saw it. Harry was rapidly headed toward a three-way, no, a four-way collision, as he was headed straight towards Katie Bell, even as Marcus Flint moved to intercept her, _and_ a Bludger sailed their way.

“Oh no, watch out!” Lee shouted.

Harry waved his arms frantically and yelled, “Get out of the way!” But it was too late. Katie barely had time to start pulling up when Flint and Harry both slammed into her broom and sent it spinning so hard that she flew right off the handle. She flipped through the air as Harry reached out to grab her.

The crowd rose to its feet in horror. They could barely see anything in the tumble of bodies and broomsticks. Lee yelled out, “What’s going on? I can’t see!” The Bludger had clipped Flint’s shoulder and sent him careering toward the teachers’ box, blocking their line of sight. With one bad arm, he couldn’t get control again until he had flown into the crowd—straight into Professor Quirrell, who dove to the floor, clutching at his turban and cursing most unprofessionally.

But when the view cleared, Harry heard a roar from the crowd. His broom had miraculously started obeying him again at the last second, and he caught Katie by her wrists. He was now hanging upside down, his scarlet robe billowing around his shoulders, with Katie swinging from his arms like a trapeze artist.

“YES!” Lee bellowed. “I don’t believe it! Potter has caught Bell in a Serafini Snatch! I’ve never seen anything like it!”

“Thanks,” Katie said with a shaking voice as she looked up at Harry’s face.

“Anytime,” Harry replied. He gripped her left wrist as hard as he could while she held out her right hand and called her broom back to her. In another moment, they were off again.

He took a lap low around the stands, not too fast this time. It could almost have been a victory lap: everyone but the Slytherins was giving him a standing ovation.

Hermione breathed a sigh of relief and kept running. Finally, she snuck around to a place close by where she could see both the teachers and the match, and waited. Not a minute later, she saw Harry bolt down the pitch, and she made her move. Not bothering to draw her wand, she surreptitiously waved her hand, and Professor Snape’s long, greasy hair flew in front of his eyes. The Potions Master staggered in surprise.

 _That_ _’ll teach you to try to hurt_ my _brother._

Harry was growing more excited by the second. He had finally spotted the Golden Snitch on his own and made a beeline for it. Then, as it got closer and closer, he noticed something else: his broom was still responding! Whatever was messing with it must have stopped. And it was a good thing, too, because the Snitch made a sudden turn downward. Harry took a chance and dove and was pleased to find that he pulled out of it just fine. But now the Snitch doubled back, giving Malfoy a chance to catch up. They were side by side, now, racing as fast their brooms would carry them just feet above the grass. Malfoy bumped Harry to the side, but Harry bumped Malfoy back. Their brooms were too evenly matched. They were both closing in on the Snitch, inches apart. But then Harry had an idea. He kicked he feet up and laid completely flat along his broom, his shins balancing on the tail, and his chin on the very front of the handle, cutting down his air resistance and giving him the extra burst of speed he needed to—

YES! His fingers closed around the fluttering golden ball three feet in front of Malfoy’s face.

“ _Potter_ _’s caught it! Potter’s caught the Snitch_!” Lee Jordan was ecstatic. “ _Gryffindor wins a hundred and ninety to ninety!_ _”_

Harry held the Snitch triumphantly over his head as he took another lap around the pitch. He waved to the teachers’ box, where Professor McGonagall was beaming at him, Snape was yelling at Dumbledore for some reason, and Quirrell was still recovering from his collision with Flint and looking confused.

The roar of the crowd was deafening as he descended to the grass. The Slytherins were all sulking away, but the Gryffindors and some Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs stormed the field, crowding around the team. Oliver Wood had tears in his eyes when he landed. “Potter, that was incredible!” he said.

“Amazing!”

“Unbelievable!” Fred and George echoed.

“Party in the Common Room!” They bellowed, lifting Harry onto their shoulders. They started singing an improvised song as they carried him back to the castle: “Harry Potter is our king! Potter can catch anything…” Harry blushed when they started including some off-colour lines about catching girls, but it wasn’t too bad since Katie Bell was laughing hysterically by the end of it.

Harry finally got them to set him down when they reached the Great Hall, where the despondent Slytherins were sitting down to lunch. Malfoy seemed to have only Crabbe, Goyle, and Pansy Parkinson wanting to sit near him. Deciding it was only sporting, he walked up behind him. He was vaguely aware of Hermione and some of his teammates following at a distance.

Malfoy spun around and stood up, glaring at him, but Harry just offered him a hand and said, “Good game, Malfoy?”

Malfoy seemed to consider the offer, but didn’t take him up on it. “Beginner’s luck, Potter,” he grumbled, and he sat back down.


	26. Catching a Rat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: In the beginning was JK Rowling, and without her no Harry Potter was made that has been made.
> 
> Thanks to Endgames for some good advice on just how this chapter should play out. I’ve been waiting for this for a while, but I had to tinker a bit to make the pieces all fit together.

The party was winding down for the afternoon, although it was sure to pick up again in the late evening, probably with some contraband firewhiskey, if the rumours were true. More than a few people decided to take a nap before dinner with all the excitement. Harry and Hermione snuck away to find a quiet place to talk. The Clock Tower balcony once again looked promising, even if it was getting colder in the open air.

“Harry, that really was amazing flying,” Hermione said, “but you about gave me a heart attack up there.”

Harry would have found that funny if it weren’t for the fact that his broom’s antics nearly gave him a heart attack. “I’m just glad I beat Malfoy. I think that’ll wipe that grin off his face for a while.”

Hermione half-smiled. “Harry, your broom…”

“Yeah, I know. I was gonna have Madam Hooch check it over.”

“No—I mean, I know what was wrong. It was Snape!”

“What?”

“Snape was jinxing your broom. I saw it.”

“What do you mean? He wouldn’t do that.”

“Harry, Hagrid said that the only thing that would interfere with a top-model broom’s control charms is powerful dark magic. That means it had to be one of the teachers messing with it, and I was looking, and every time your broom acted up, Snape was staring up at you muttering something. He did it, Harry. And before you asked, I looked at Professor Quirrell, too, and I never saw him muttering anything.”

“Maybe you just missed it,” Harry said angrily. “He would’ve had to have done it before my broom acted up. Maybe Snape was saying the counter-curse.”

“Harry, I know it was him.”

“No, you just _want_ it to be.”

“No! It’s not like that. Listen, remember when you went after the Snitch, and your room still worked? I snuck up behind Snape and used a wandless Levitation Charm to blow his hair into his eyes.”

Harry’s jaw dropped, too shocked and angry to laugh. “You what…! N-no…No! I don’t believe it.”

“Harry, will you just get over your prejudice against Quirrell?”

“Will _you_ get over your prejudice against Snape?” he shouted. “Even if it wasn’t Quirrell, I can’t believe Snape would try to kill me. Not after that message he gave me the first week. There’s no reason for it.”

“Sure there is.” Hermione counted them off. “He doesn’t like Gryffindors. He didn’t like your birth father. He’s obsessed with winning the Quidditch Cup. He’s a Death Eater double agent and needs to keep up appearances…”

“But Hermione, he’s never been any worse to me than anyone else. There’s no reason for him to start up now, and even if he did, trying to kill me is way too obvious.”

“He was trying to make it look like an accident.”

“Well, if he was, he wasn’t doing a very good job of it if a twelve-year-old figured him out.”

Hermione was speechless. Did Harry just put down her intelligence? It took her a minute to notice him walking away. “Harry…Harry, where are you going?”

“Back to the Tower,” he shouted behind him.

“Harry…” she whined, but he didn’t answer. She followed him back.

Harry made a point of sitting on the opposite side of the Common Room from his sister. He had a book in his lap, but wasn’t really reading it. How had _this_ day gone so wrong? He had won the Quidditch match! Against Malfoy! That ought to have been perfect, but then there was his broom going nuts, and it all went downhill from there. But he just couldn’t believe Snape would try something like that. Quirrell might, sure. Or maybe Malfoy—somehow—tried to sabotage him. Maybe he’d got a dark artifact from his father. Actually, that seemed disturbingly plausible.

Harry did feel a little bad about snapping at Hermione, but he was too preoccupied to care much. After a few minutes stewing in his thoughts, he gave up and walked out. Hermione didn’t even notice. He needed to get away. He went back to the Clock Tower balcony and checked to make sure no one was around. He knew he really shouldn’t be doing this without Hermione around to cover for him, but he needed to clear his head. He changed to cat form and lay down by the railing.

Immediately, the storm of his emotions calmed. The cat didn’t feel those things as strongly, leaving him room to think more analytically about the situation. It was a trick he’d used more than a few times at home. With a deep breath, he started thinking back over the day. He really wasn’t being nice to Hermione. She was trying to help him, looking at the events and coming to the best conclusion she could. He still thought she was wrong, but he could have been nicer about it.

He worked backwards, thinking over the events of the match. Had Malfoy stopped jinxing him when he was distracted by going after the Snitch? Had Quirrell stopped jinxing him when Marcus Flint flew into him? Had it really been Snape, and Hermione blocked his line of sight? Was it someone else? All he knew was the way his broom had acted, and that wouldn’t tell him much unless he could look up how the charms on it worked and figure out what the curse was, which was sure to be way over his and probably even Hermione’s head.

He thought back to before the match. He had carried his broom to the locker room. His broom had been locked in his trunk during breakfast. Before breakfast, he had been in the Common Room, where Ron—

He stopped. Another thought started to come to him—not Quidditch-related, but far more pressing. He didn’t want to believe it, but the pieces fell into place unbidden. It made far too much sense to be a coincidence, and the stakes were too high. He had to know for sure right away.

Harry was halfway back to Gryffindor Tower before he remembered to duck into an alcove and change back to human form.

The Common Room by now had mostly emptied out with people headed up to the rooms or taking a stroll around the castle. Hermione was curled up sideways in a chair reading a book with an annoyed look on her face when he approached her again.

“Hermione?” he whispered nervously.

She ignored him.

“Hermione?”

“Oh, so you’re talking to me again?” she said without looking up from her book.

“I’m sorry, okay? I shouldn’t have yelled at you like that.”

“No, you shouldn’t’ve.”

“Mione, I need your help.”

“Why don’t you get one of your other friends to help you,” she said, too loudly.

“I can’t,” he whispered. “This is about you know what.”

Hermione looked him in the eye. “Harry, if want to check out that door again, do it yourself,” she whispered back.

“It’s not about the door. It’s about…it’s about my room.”

“Huh?”

“Mione, do you remember what Ron said this morning about Scabbers? Fred and George turned Scabbers green when Percy was _ten years old_. Percy’s fifteen, now.”

“So? That just means Scabbers is over five years old, then.”

“Yes! Don’t you see? _Rats don_ _’t live that long_.”

“Well, maybe he’s a magical rat.”

“Yeah, but do you remember how Ron’s Animal Colour Change Charm didn’t work on him…?” Harry looked around again to make sure no one was listening in and crouched down beside the chair behind her head. “What if it didn’t because he’s not really an animal,” he whispered more quietly. “What if he’s really an animagus?”

“Augh!” Hermione slammed her book closed and turned to face him, “Will you cut it out with your conspiracy theories?” She hissed. “The odds of that are astronomical. Probably Ron’s just not that good at charms.”

“But it would make sense. That would explain why he’s lived so long. Just like my form’s got bigger, but it’s still a kitten.”

“Or he’s just a weird magical rat, and you’re being paranoid.”

“Mione, please. I know my rodents. You know how I’ve got that feline sixth sense? Well, even in human form, it’s been telling me all term that there’s something not right about that rat. And think about it. If I’m right, that means there’s a grown man who’s been sleeping in my dorm all year. I need to know for sure.”

“Harry, if you’re thinking what I think you’re thinking…”

“It’ll be fine. You go up to my dorm and distract whoever’s in there, and then I’ll sneak in and sniff around for Scabbers. If he’s an animagus, we’ll tell Professor McGonagall, and if not, no one’s the wiser.”

Hermione sighed. “If you feel that strongly about it, why don’t you just tell Professor McGonagall and let her deal check it out?”

“I would, but I don’t want Scabbers to get suspicious. I think he’s already on to me. That’s why he always runs away from me when he’s fine with other people.”

“Or maybe he can sense that you’re paranoid and doesn’t like the way you stare at him like a you know what.”

“I don’t think so. Listen, I’m sorry, but I have to try it. It’s gonna keep worrying me until I know. And if you’re right, and he’s just a rat, then we can forget the whole thing.”

Hermione grumbled. It was just her luck that her brother had turned out as stubborn as she was. “It’s too dangerous,” she insisted. “If you really want to try it, you should wait until dinner. Then nobody will be in your room.”

“No, all the teachers will be at dinner too, then. I don’t want to risk anyone hearing about it.” Harry glanced around again, but no one seemed to be looking in their direction. “It should only take a minute. I’ll be fine if you distract whoever’s in the room.”

Hermione sighed again. Scabbers couldn’t _really_ be, could he? No, they could check it out, Harry wouldn’t find anything, and then he’d shut up about it. “Look, Harry, I’ll help you out just so you can be sure, but we _need_ to have a talk about these crazy theories of yours.”

Harry jumped up and smiled. “Thanks, Mione. Let’s go.”

Hermione reluctantly followed him up the staircase, climbed the seven floors to the first years’ dormitory. About halfway up, when no one was around on the stairs, Harry changed to cat form and let Hermione go on a few steps ahead.

They reached the dorm room and peered inside. Ron was the only one in the room, passed out on his bed. Dean and Seamus were probably wandering the grounds somewhere, and Hermione thought she’d heard Neville say something about going to the greenhouses, no doubt to decompress after the excitement of the party. That was what _she_ ought to be doing right about now, she thought—just substitute library for greenhouses.

Harry thought he was in luck. He knew how heavy a sleeper Ron was. He pushed past Hermione’s robes right away and slunk into the room.

“Harry, no!” Hermione whispered. What did he think he was doing? She knocked on the door frame of the room and called out, “Ron.”

Ron didn’t respond. Harry turned around and hissed in protest, but Hermione knocked louder and yelled, “Ron…! Ronald!”

“Huh? Wha…?” Ron grunted groggily.

Well so much for that plan, Harry thought angrily. He needed to finish this fast or hope Hermione did. He sniffed around, picking up the scent of Ron’s fat, grey rat. If he _was_ an animagus, his act was pretty good. He spent most of his time sleeping or chewing on Ron’s sheets. But Harry’s instincts told him different. He padded around the room; he smelled a few mice wandering the tower, but only one rat. Already, his feline sixth sense was triggering stronger than ever.

“Hermione, what are you doing here? You can’t be here,” Harry heard overhead.

“There’s no rule against it.”

Harry eventually the trail under Ron’s bed where his excellent night vision spotted Scabbers.“So what do you want?”

“Harry wants to talk to you in the Common Room,” Hermione lied, not very convincingly.

So close to him now, he caught the rat’s full scent, and his pulse quickened. Scabbers was no ordinary rat. He was definitely an animagus. But there was more, mingled with the smell of magic was something else—something that he couldn’t really define, much less explain, but something that his feline sixth sense pegged as untrustworthy.

“Why doesn’t he just come up here himself?”

“Uh, Fred and George pinned him down—will you just come on?” There was a shuffling of feet as Hermione tried to drag Ron out of the room.

But it was then that Harry realised that he had miscalculated. He’d assumed that Scabbers would be asleep after that wild party, but the lazy rat was a little more alert than he’d always let on.

Scabbers awoke with a sudden twinge of nervousness. That wasn’t uncommon for him. He was in hiding, after all, and it had grown more common in this school year, whenever the boy was around. Rodents had a sixth sense, too. It told them when a predator was near, but Scabbers’s was triggering more than it ever had before. He blinked awake with a jolt, looked around, and saw one of his worst fears (though he had many): a cat. A lone cat he could usually handle if his “owner” was around, but what he saw now made his blood run cold and rocketed _this_ cat to near the top of his list: bright green eyes and an odd white mark on the creature’s head. A white mark in the shape of a lightning bolt.

 _Squeak!_ Scabbers bolted even before he had consciously put two and two together, and Harry let his cat instincts take over and gave chase without realising that Ron was still in the room.

“Scabbers, no!” As much as he complained about his rat, Ron didn’t take the sight of him bolting from under his bed pursued by a cat very well. He gave chase himself.

“Ron, stop!” Hermione yelled as she tried futilely to hold him back, but he slipped from her grasp as he tried to follow the animals as they bolted around bed posts and under beds and around and around the radiator.

“Socks, stop it!” Hermione stumbled around, unwittingly cutting Scabbers off from both Ron and the door. Harry used the opportunity to chase Scabbers farther back into the room.

“Get away from him, you mangy cat!”

But Harry couldn’t stop. If he let the animagus get away, he’d never find him, and if he let him untransform, there was no telling what could happen. It was probably only the urge to stay in hiding that had kept him from doing it already.

With a loud crash that she prayed didn’t alert the seventh years on the floor below, Hermione tried to pursue Ron again, but they just wound up tripping over each other. Meanwhile, Harry was closing on Scabbers. The rat was more manoeuvrable, but it was a small room with only one way out. As Scabbers made for the exit, Harry cut him off, pushed him against the wall, and sank his jaws into his upper back, not deep enough to kill him, but plenty deep enough that the rat passed out from shock. Harry felt with his whiskers and made sure he was still breathing.

“Scabbers!” Ron jumped up and tried to run toward him, but Hermione grabbed him by the ankle. “Hey! What are you doing?”

Harry knew he didn’t have much time. He had to get Scabbers to Professor McGonagall before he woke up. He picked the rat up in his jaws and ran out the door, oblivious to the scuffle behind him. But he couldn’t keep that up. His four-legged speed advantage was no good while trying to carry a live rat. When he had descended a few steps, with no one coming up the stairs, he dropped the rat onto his paw and untransformed.

“ _Harry, you idiot_!”

He whirled around to see Hermione and Ron staring straight at him.

“Bugger.”

“Harry?” Ron squeaked in horror.

“Ron, he’s—”

“You killed Scabbers!”

“He’s not dead,” Harry said quickly.

“Ron, be quiet!” Hermione hissed at the same time.

“Oh, Merlin! Harry, how could you!”

“Ron!” Hermione scolded again. But he started to run at Harry, reaching out to grab the rat. She stopped him with a couple of well-placed karate chops and pushed him against the wall. Ron’s eyes widened as he remembered the board-breaking demonstration from the start of term.

“He’s not dead,” Harry repeated.

“Harry Potter turned into a cat!” Ron whined as his brain struggled to process what he’d just seen. “Harry Potter killed Scabbers!”

“Ron, will you shut up!” Hermione clapped a hand over his mouth. “You can’t tell anyone about this.”

Ron grunted a muffled protest.

“He’s not dead!” Harry said again. “He’s just stunned.”

“Harry’s not registered,” she whispered. “He could get in big trouble if anyone finds out about this.”

“Why did you wake him up?” Harry demanded.

“You said the plan was to distract him.”

“He _was_ distracted. He was asleep!”

“Like your screeching wouldn’t have woken him up.”

“He’s Ron. It probably wouldn’t have.”

“Mmpf!” Ron grunted.

“But I was right, he’s an animagus,” Harry said, holding up the unconscious rat.

“What?” _Just_ _…what?_

“Mmpf?”

“Scabbers is an animagus.”

 “Are you kidding…? Harry, are you sure?”

“Mione, I think I know what an animagus smells like.”

Ron pushed Hermione away. “What the hell is going on?” he shouted.

“Ron, be quiet!” Harry and Hermione said in unison.

Harry stepped closer and lowered his voice, holding up the rat. “Scabbers is an animagus. He’s an overweight man in his thirties who’s been hiding out as a rat.”

“What? He can’t be—”

“Shhh!”

Ron finally got the message and started whispering. “He can’t be. He’s been in my family for—”

“How many years, Ron?”

“A-a-about ten…”

“Exactly. Rats don’t live that long. That’s like two hundred and fifty in rat years.” Ron started muttering to himself incoherently in confusion and growing horror. “Listen,” Harry said, “I’m sure he’s an animagus because I could smell it on him. I’m an animagus too because of some weird accidental magic, but you _can_ _’t tell anyone!_ Only Dumbledore, McGonagall, and our parents know. And we have to get Scabbers to McGonagall before he wakes up or Merlin knows what could happen.” Harry grabbed Ron by the wrist, Hermione quickly grabbed his other wrist, and they dragged him down the stairs. Ron kept muttering to himself most of the way.

“Ron, do you know the Leg-Locker Curse?” Hermione said as they approached the Common Room.

“What?”

“The Leg-Locker Curse. Do you know it?”

“Um, no.”

“What about the Full Body Bind?”

“No.”

“Jelly-Legs Jinx?”

“Uh, kinda. Why?”

“Well, if Harry’s right, we should try to restrain Scabbers, but I don’t trust either of us to cast one of those on a rat without breaking his legs.”

“You really think—?”

“Come on, let’s just hurry,” Harry said.

They slipped through the Common Room without attracting any attention and then ran through the halls, Harry and Hermione still pulling Ron to keep pace, until they reached Professor McGonagall’s office. Harry pounded frantically on the door.

“I’m coming! I’m coming!” a voice called from within after a few moments. The door flew open, and there stood Professor McGonagall, looking even more stern than usual, though she paled a fraction when she saw who was there. “Mr. Potter! Whatever is the matter?” she demanded. With Harry Potter, it could be any number of bizarre things, none of which she would like.

Harry held up the still obliviously unconscious rat. “We caught an animagus,” he said breathlessly.

McGonagall stared at the boy. “What?” _Just_ _…what?_ You can think of a dozen things, and it’s the thirteenth that actually happens.

“Ron’s pet rat is an animagus. I could smell it on him.”

“He—he turned into a cat,” a still-dazed Ron said, pointed at Harry.

McGonagall’s eyes grew saucer-sized. “Inside, quickly!” she hissed, ushering them into her office and locking the door. She whirled on Harry. “Harry James Potter, you told him?”

“It was an accident.”

“Harry wasn’t thinking,” Hermione corrected.

“Hermione messed up the plan.”

“I did not! _You_ messed up the plan. Twice.”

“Mr. Potter, I can’t believe—that was extremely reckless of you,” McGonagall scolded. “You really shouldn’t be transforming at all here.”

“Yes, I know, but can we talk about this later, Professor? I don’t know how much longer Scabbers will be out.”

McGonagall sighed. She was having such a good day, too. Why couldn’t they just share a butterbeer over the Quidditch victory? “You really believe this rat is an animagus?” She took Scabbers in hand and laid him on her desk. “He’s been bitten!” she exclaimed as she looked closer.

“Yeah, sorry,” Harry said sheepishly. “It was the only way I could stop him. And I’m positive. You can smell him yourself if you don’t believe me.”

“That won’t be necessary, Mr. Potter.” McGonagall drew her wand, pointed it at the rat, and spoke, “ _Veritas Oculum_.”

A red aura surrounded the rat, and McGonagall staggered back, keeping her wand trained on Scabbers. “Merlin’s beard, you’re right.”

“He is?” Hermione said.

“He is?” Ron repeated.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Weasley, but your rat _is_ an animagus.”

“You mean a grown man’s been sleeping in my bed for three months?”

“I’m afraid so.” Oh, Merlin, the paperwork on _that_ … “All of you stand back, please. We professors will handle this.” Keeping her stare fixed on Scabbers, McGonagall backed away toward her fireplace. Working by touch, she opened a large urn, grabbed a handful of green powder, and threw it into the flames, saying, “Ravenclaw Head of House Office!”

A moment later, Professor Flitwick’s head appeared surrounded by green flames. “Minerva? What’s wrong?” he squeaked.

“Filius, come through at once. It’s an emergency.”

Flitwick hopped straight through with ease, wand drawn in a duelling stance. “What is it?”

“Mr. Potter…” McGonagall quickly edited the story, “…had suspicions that Mr. Weasley’s pet rat was an animagus. I have performed the charm and am shocked to learn that he is correct. I believe we should reveal and confine him before he can get away.”

“An animagus?” Flitwick squeaked in shock. “Yes, yes, we must. Children, please step through to my office.”

“Can’t we stay, Professor?” Harry asked.

“No, Mr. Potter, it is too dangerous,” McGonagall replied.

“But he’s been in Ron’s and my dorm all term, ma’am. I think we have a right to see.”

“Oh, very well,” McGonagall grumbled, just to end the argument. “But keep the Floo open and be ready to run through, all three of you. Even if “Scabbers’ is friendly, the spell will wake him up, and he will likely be disoriented and aggressive after what’s just happened to him.” The three children stood behind the professors. “Ready, Filius?” the Charms Master nodded, training his wand on the rat. “One—two—three— _Homenum Revertio_!”

A flash of blue-white light erupted from McGonagall’s wand. When it struck Scabbers, he jolted awake, began to stagger, trying to get away, then flopped off the desk and on to the floor, only to rise up on his hind legs, rippling and growing, until a man stood in his place, wobbling on unfamiliar legs.

Ron gave a cry of horror and fell on his bum.

The man before them was short and fat, with hair so colourless it couldn’t even be dignified as grey and clothes that were grubby and tattered from a decade of wear. He still looked very rat-like, with a pointed nose, small eyes, large ears, and buck teeth much worse than Hermione’s. He stumbled around angrily, still not sure what was going on and in obvious pain from the now sabertooth-sized teeth marks on his back; and in the haze of his mind, his eyes fixed on Harry, and he reacted on a very misguided instinct.

“Potter!” he shouted, drawing a wand from his sleeve.

“ _Stupefy_!” rang out two voices. Two bolts of red light hit the man square in the chest, and he collapsed to the ground. It was only then that McGonagall’s own mind caught up with her.

“Great Merlin! It can’t be…” she exclaimed. “It’s Peter Pettigrew!”

“What!” Harry and Hermione shouted.

“Who?” Ron asked weakly.

“Filius, it _is_ he, isn’t it?” McGonagall asked.

“I can’t believe it myself, but he is,” the Charms Master said.

“Who’s Peter Pettigrew?” Ron asked again.

Harry turned to the redheaded boy. “I thought you’d read the books,” he said shakily. “Peter Pettigrew was one of my birth parents’ best friends. But he’s…he’s supposed to be dead.” Harry turned back and approached the prone man cautiously.

“He must have used his rat form to escape,” Hermione mused. “What are you doing?”

Harry was struggling to get Peter Pettigrew’s tattered overcoat off of him, which turned out to be surprisingly easy, since it tore as easily as if he had been in human form wearing it for ten years in all weather. “He’s a friend, isn’t he? He’s been hurt,” Harry explained. “He’s gonna need Madam Pomfrey after…” he glanced at Professor Flitwick, “…after that cat bit him.”

“Mr. Potter, you should let the professionals—” McGonagall started.

“ _Bloody buggering hell_!” Harry jumped back as if he’d been bitten himself.

“Harry!” Hermione yelled.

At the same time, McGonagall and Flitwick both shouted, “Potter!”

“Look!” Harry was pointing at Pettigrew’s outstretched hand. Where he had pulled away the tattered sleeve of the man’s robe, there was a dull red mark, faded, but easily identifiable as a snake emerging from the mouth of a skull.

“Morgana’s garters! A Death Eater?!” McGonagall gasped.

Hermione clapped both hands over her mouth and staggered backwards until she tripped over Ron and fell to the floor.

“There was a Death Eater sleeping in my bed?!” Ron whimpered. He looked ashen grey, now, like he was on the verge of fainting.

Luckily, Professor Flitwick still had his wits about him: “ _Expelliarmus! Incarcerous_!” The unconscious Pettigrew’s wand flew from his hand, and he was bound by tight ropes in such a way that the Dark Mark remained visible. Then, Flitwick cast a complex charm that caused two thin, self-tightening cords to be tied around his ankles so that he couldn’t get away, even by transforming.

McGonagall snapped out of it and absently conjured some bandages that she bound over the four teeth wounds on his back. Wasting no more time, she pushed the children aside and went back to the fireplace. Resetting the Floo, she threw in another handful of powder and said, “Headmaster’s Office!”

A few moments later, a congenial voice sounded: “Good evening, Minerva, is there a problem?”

“Albus, I have an unconscious Death Eater tied up in my office.”

“Now, Minerva, I’m sure Severus was just—”

“That wasn’t a joke, Albus! It’s not Severus—it’s Peter Pettigrew!”

“What?” Albus Dumbledore said. _Just_ _…what?_ “I…I’m coming through…” A moment later, Dumbledore stepped out of the fireplace, his wand drawn, his silver beard and burnt orange robes quivering with energy, only to come face to face with Harry Potter. His mind started racing. _Him? Here? Now? Why?_ He looked around and saw Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley, then Filius and Minerva, and then, tied up on the floor, a man who was supposed to be dead and was definitely _not_ supposed to have that awful tattoo. How had he even got into the castle? And what was Harry doing here? With the boy around, everything immediately got twice as complicated.

Albus gave Minerva a questioning look: _Who knew what, and why, and how?_

Minerva got the message. “Filius, would you return to your office, please,” she said gently. “We will need to speak about some particularly sensitive matters here.”

Flitwick shot Pettigrew a suspicious look and reluctantly headed back to the Floo.

“What happened, Minerva?” Albus asked.

She took a deep breath. “Peter Pettigrew is a rat animagus. He’s been hiding out as Mr. Weasley’s pet rat. Mr. Potter captured him just minutes ago.”

“ _Harry_ captured him?” Albus thought he knew the answer, but he had to ask: “How?”

“How do you think, Albus? Unfortunately, Mr. Weasley saw the whole thing.”

Albus looked to the youngest Weasley son who was lying on the floor, deathly pale, looking up at him with terror in his eyes. The poor boy must have had quite a shock. “Well, then,” he said grimly, “I was hoping we wouldn’t have to deal with a situation like this so soon.”

“W-w-what?” Ron stammered. “You’re not gonna obliviate me, are you?”

Albus shook his head. That was his old way of doing things, and even then not in front of Minerva. “No, Mr. Weasley, we are not. After all, memory charms were not entirely reliable and were not advised for use on children. “However, I must impress upon you the need for secrecy in this matter. We have kept your friend Harry’s ability a secret for his own protection. It would draw even more unwanted attention than he receives already, and keeping this secret would give him an additional advantage in the event that he is attacked. I know this must be difficult for you, Mr. Weasley, but can we trust you to keep this secret? And to cover for any awkward questions your family may ask?”

Ron took a moment to process this. He hadn’t _really_ had cause to pay attention to the fact that Harry didn’t much care for his fame, but he finally said, “Y-yes, Professor. I-I will.”

“Thank you, Mr. Weasley. Now, as for our rodent friend…” Albus inspected the Death Eater—Peter Pettigrew, of all people! “He’s been injured. What happened to him?” he asked.

“Mr. Potter happened to him,” McGonagall said dryly.

“Harry?” Albus turned to the boy and raised an eyebrow. That was surprisingly violent for an eleven-year-old, which was a bit worrying.

“I’m sorry, Professor,” Harry said nervously. “I changed to cat form to smell him—because he was acting suspicious—but he woke up and tried to get away. I didn’t want to hurt him, but it was the only way I could think of to stop him.”

Albus sighed with resignation. It was just the boy’s animal side showing through. It wasn’t pretty, but his heart was in the right place, so he supposed he shouldn’t be too concerned at the moment. “I see. What happened then?”

Hermione spoke up: “After we calmed down Ron? We brought him straight here, and Professor McGonagall checked him over. I couldn’t believe Harry was right, but…” Another thought came to her. “Professor, if Peter Pettigrew’s alive, that means Sirius Black didn’t kill him.”

McGonagall started at that. She was still amazed at times how these two muggle-raised children could take her by surprise by pointing out the obvious. “Apparently not…” she said apprehensively. “And if Peter Pettigrew’s a Death Eater…Oh, Merlin, Albus, now that I think about it, I’m not sure if Black even got a trial. Do you remember?”

It took a lot to surprise Albus Dumbledore, but he was getting enough to last him the rest of the year today. With wide eyes, he said, “I couldn’t tell you. I certainly don’t remember hearing about one. I was worried about Harry at the time, and I’d just assumed Barty Crouch had the whole thing in hand.”

“Barty Crouch, the one who sent his own son to Azkaban on shaky evidence?” Hermione observed.

“I’m afraid so, Hermione. The very fact that Pettigrew is alive and bears the Dark Mark suggests that Black did not commit at least some of the crimes of which he was accused.”

“You mean Sirius Black might be _innocent_?” Now _Harry_ looked like he might faint as he finally joined Hermione and Ron in sitting on the floor.

“I’m not sure I’d go that far, Mr. Potter,” Minerva said. “They still got him on those other twelve murders…although seeing this now, I can’t help but wonder if Pettigrew as a Death Eater might have orchestrated the whole thing…”

“Either way, even if Black _did_ get a trial, finding Pettigrew alive will be enough for a retrial,” Albus said. “Minerva, I think we should take this directly to Madam Bones. As I recall, Cornelius Fudge was part of the team that arrested Black. It wouldn’t take much for Lucius Malfoy to ‘convince’ him to interfere, so it would be safer not to give him the opportunity.”

“Yes, probably…” she agreed. “But Albus! If Pettigrew goes to Azkaban, he could tell the other Death Eaters—”

Albus’s eyebrows shot up. “Yes, he could…there’s not much choice, then—we’ll have to Memory Charm him. Hmm…we’ll need a cover story, anyway…alright, listen carefully, please. We will say that Pettigrew was injured by a cat in an unrelated incident earlier today. Harry, Hermione, you became suspicious of his behaviour and captured him using Levitation Charms.”

“Which would have been a better way to do it in the first place,” McGonagall quipped.

“So Harry and Hermione came and told me Scabbers was acting suspicious, and when I went to get him he ran away, but they caught him with magic?”

Everyone stared at Ron. That was surprisingly good, especially given his current mental state. They might just pull this off after all.

“I believe that will work,” Albus said. He waved his wand over Pettigrew and incanted, “ _Memento Figmentum_.” A white glow briefly surrounded the man’s head. “There. He will likely harbour an irrational fear of cats and of you, Harry, from now on, but he should not reveal your secret. Now, I will take Pettigrew to Amelia Bones and try to get an emergency trial arranged for Sirius Black as soon as possible. If she is on top of things as usual, I believe it could be tomorrow. I will be contacting your families, and you will be excused from school to attend.”

Ron’s face lit up in surprise at the thought of being able to get out of school for a day—even if it was a Sunday. Harry’s and Hermione’s faces lit up, too, at the prospect of seeing their parents.

Minerva, however, looked less enthused. “Albus…?”

“I think that’s only fair, since this concerns all three of the children personally.”

Minerva pressed her lips together and hummed to herself. “Perhaps. But given those circumstances, I’m not sure I’m comfortable sending them back to the Tower until we know more. For that matter, it would be safer if we don’t want to tip our hand too quickly…Would you three mind staying in here until we’ve made the arrangements?”

“But what about dinner?” Ron protested.

“I will take care of that. Nellie?”

There was a popping sound, and a small elf with yellow eyes and scraggly brown hair appeared in the middle of the office. “Professor McGonagall is calling Nellie—? Eek!” The elf spotted Pettigrew and scampered behind Minerva’s legs. “Bad wizard! Death Eater!”

“Do not worry, Nellie. He will be removed shortly. Nellie, please have four meals brought here when dinner starts.” She motioned to the children who were finally picking themselves off the floor. “These three will be dining with me tonight.”

“Yes, Professor McGonagall, ma’am.” The elf gave a small bow and popped away, eager to get away from the bad wizard.

“Ah, good. _Mobilicorpus_ ,” Albus said. As Pettigrew rose into the air, he continued. “I will take care of our little pest problem right away. Minerva, please tell Filius and Severus to come up to my office at once.” She nodded as he reactivated the Floo. Then, just before he stepped through, he said, “Oh, and fifty points to Gryffindor for ridding the school of a Death Eater. Good evening.”

All three children smiled. Ron and Hermione both thought privately that it would be nice if they could get rid of Snape, too, but they weren’t about to say that in front of McGonagall. Still, fifty points was nothing to sneeze at. It was more than the thirty-three House Points Gryffindor had won from the spread in the Quidditch match.

“Harry,” Hermione said.

“Yeah, Mione?”

“I take back everything I ever said about your habit of chasing mice.”


	27. The Ministry of Magic

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I am not JK Rowling under any disguise including, but not limited to Polyjuice, glamours, invisibility cloaks, or anonymous proxy. Harry Potter is not mine.

It was well past dinner by the time Dan and Emma Granger were startled away from their Saturday night television shows by a whooshing sound from their fireplace. They rushed over fearfully, and, sure enough, there was Albus Dumbledore’s face in the flames.

“Dumbledore, what’s wrong? Was Harry hurt in the match?” Emma said.

“No, Mr. and Mrs. Granger, your children are fine. Harry won the match for Gryffindor.”

Dan and Emma grinned with pride at this, but their levity was short-lived. “There’s something else, isn’t there,” Dan said shrewdly. “We could’ve read that in the morning paper.”

“Yes there is. There has been a…very unusual incident.” Dumbledore seemed to steel himself. “This afternoon, after the match, your children apprehended a Death Eater.”

“What?” the Grangers said in unison. _Just_ _…what?_

Dan was the first to snap out of it. “You let a Death Eater in your school!” he shouted.

“I assume you don’t mean Professor Snape,” Emma said coldly.

From somewhere behind the flames, they heard a small, familiar voice giggle and say, “I told you so.”

“Hermione?” they said.

“Hi, Mum! Hi Dad!” both of their children called through the flames.

“Kids! Are you alright?” Emma said.

“We’re fine, Mum,” Hermione replied. “Things have just got _really_ complicated.”

“Complicated? There was a Death Eater in the school, and you go with complicated?”

“Mr. and Mrs. Granger, if I could possibly impose on you to come through and explain things—and I was hoping you could have your children stay at your house for the night,” Dumbledore went on. “Not because of any further danger at Hogwarts, I assure you, but there are some sensitive political matters in play, and for privacy’s sake, I thought it would be best to get them away from the castle.”

Dan smiled weakly. “Well, we’re certainly not going to refuse. It’ll be good to see the kids again. You might as well come through now, if they’re ready.”

“Thank you, Mr. Granger. Harry, Hermione, please step through the fireplace.”

Dan and Emma waited with anticipation. Despite talking through one several times, their children had never actually travelled by Floo before. They could only guess how that would go. After a few seconds, Hermione staggered out of the fireplace, dizzy and disoriented. A moment later, Harry appeared, but he landed even harder and fell on top of his sister, knocking them both to the floor. Their parents rushed to help them up.

“Are you two okay?” Emma asked as she grabbed both of them in a hug.

“That’s harder than it looks,” Harry mumbled.

Dumbledore stepped through behind them, and the flames changed back from green to their usual crackling orange. He waited politely for them to finish getting reacquainted.

“So you really caught a Death Eater,” Dan said in a hard voice as he held an arm around Harry. “And how, pray tell, did that happen?” He glared at Dumbledore.

“It would seem that this particular Death Eater has been in hiding for some time as your children’s friend, Ronald Weasley’s, pet rat.”

“Oh, no,” Dan and Emma groaned. Dan took his son by the shoulders and said, “Harry, please tell me you didn’t eat him.”

“No! I…I did bite him, but only to stop him from getting away.”

“Oh, Harry…I think you’d better start at the beginning.”

Emma made some tea, and the family sat down to hear the story of the wildest day they’d had since that first one exactly six years earlier. Harry and Hermione started with the Quidditch match to break the ice. Dan and Emma congratulated Harry on his flying, but expressed concern about the trouble with his broomstick. They didn’t mention their theories as to who might have done it in front of Professor Dumbledore, but he did reassure them that Professor McGonagall and Madam Hooch would be looking into it when they had the time.

Thence followed a brief description of the party plus a bit of complaining that they were missing the second half of it. Then Harry told of his suspicions and a play-by-play of the capture of Scabbers. His parents gave him a long lecture about his foolishness in letting Ron see him transform, and another one about how much danger he was in going after a suspected animagus by himself, but Harry supposed he deserved that (and Hermione wholeheartedly agreed).

Then, the real bombshell: the Death Eater in question was none other than Peter Pettigrew, a dead hero, which meant there was a decent chance that the man who was supposed to be the arch-traitor, Sirius Black, was innocent, and he would be receiving an emergency trial at the Wizengamot tomorrow. The political ramifications of that were why everyone involved was being kept isolated. It was nice to have the children over for the night, Dan and Emma agreed, but the circumstances could definitely be better.

Once the Grangers were pretty sure they understood everything, Dumbledore took his leave, by which time it was past time for bed. None of them would get much sleep that night though, and not just because of the trial itself. After all, tomorrow, Harry would be making his first appearance in the Wizengamot. What new changes, they wondered, would that bring?

* * *

While Albus was handling the Grangers, Minerva McGonagall thought she was getting the short end of the proverbial stick. Once dinner was over, she had to make the calls and manage a hysterical Molly Weasley along with her husband and five of her children. Unsurprisingly, Percy was taking the news particularly badly.

“You mean there was a grown man sleeping in my bed for ten years?” he yelled.

“And he was a Death Eater, too,” Ron said.

Percy fainted.

Fred and George weren’t much better. They were furious at the news.

“I can’t believe it,” Fred said.

“I know. I really feel cheated,” George replied.

“Betrayed!”

“Double-crossed!”

“What’re you going on about?” Ron demanded.

“That was the greatest prank we’ve ever seen, and it was a bad guy that did it,” Fred explained.

“Oh, is that all you’re thinking about?” Molly scolded when she could get some coherent words in.

“Well, he made Percy faint, and we can’t even feel properly happy about it,” George said.

“What I don’t get is how we never saw it on—oof!”

George elbowed Fred in the side and jumped in, “Plus, how are we ever going to top that?”

Little Ginny looked torn between horror at what had happened and wonder at being caught in the middle of one of her storybooks. A Death Eater had been living in her house for almost her entire life, and then _Harry Potter_ caught him and saved them all. It was hard for her to help being excited over that, and her reaction would have been quite amusing if it weren’t so serious.

Ron, meanwhile, was dutifully keeping his mouth shut about what had really happened, but his mind was reeling. All of the weird things about Harry made sense now—well, not all, but a lot of them—trading for a corned beef sandwich, forgetting to eat his vegetables, not liking dogs, being a “cat person”—Ron groaned when he remembered that one. Harry Potter was somehow both cooler and weirder than he’d ever imagined, but they’d _definitely_ need to talk when they both got back to Hogwarts.

In the end, all the Weasley boys went home for the night. They would be at the Ministry tomorrow, too, and with luck, no one on the outside would would what was happening until after the morning _Prophet_ had run. Then Harry would make the front page two days in a row.

Minerva sighed. It was going to be a long day tomorrow.

* * *

The sun was rising on Sunday morning, to the extent that the sun ever shone on the dreary and barren walls of Azkaban.

Padfoot lay motionless in his cell, half-asleep, retreating into his animal mind to stay sane under the weight of the Dementors. Truth be told, we was as glad of his fur coat as his animal mind. The weather was growing colder again.

Padfoot wasn’t one to count days. One could rarely keep one’s head clear enough in here to do so. He wasn’t even sure what month it was—probably near Halloween, he decided. The thought stubbornly stuck to him—it wasn’t a cheerful one.

He was pretty sure he had counted the turnings of the seasons correctly, though. It must be the fall of 1991. Harry would have started at Hogwarts by now. For what little he could force his mind to focus on happy things, he wondered what house the boy was in, and whether he was as good at broomstick riding as his father or at charms as his mother, and whether he still looked like a spitting image of James with Lily’s eyes.

James and Lily.

It was almost like a physical blow as the memory of that horrible night hit him again: the ruined house, Peter’s betrayal, the disastrous confrontation in that muggle street, being buried in this hole in the ground while the rat went free. On some level, he was sort of used to it by now. After all, the memory never fully left him. Not in this place.

He heard incoherent babbling echoing around the prison. The other prisoners were waking up—being louder than usual, in fact. Bellatrix started screaming incoherently for the whole cell block to hear, but then, someone was shouting at everyone to be quiet, and then he saw it: a glint of silver light floating down the cells. Aurors were coming.

Padfoot backed to the corner of his cell and discarded his wet nose and black fur. In his place stood a man, thin, gaunt, and trembling, dressed in rags and looking almost like a corpse with his long, stringy hair hanging limply into his sunken eyes, which showed the only spark of life in him. Immediately, the weight of the Dementors increased, though it lessened as the light of the Patronuses came nearer.

A few seconds later, three Aurors stepped into view outside his cell door. Two of them, Proudfoot and Williamson, had been doing the inspections lately. The third was a newcomer, at least to the cell block: a tall black man in an African-style robe. To his surprise, the newcomer opened the cell door.

“Sirius Black,” the man said in a deep, stern voice, “come with us.”

Black took a hesitant step forward. There were only two reasons that he would be let out of his cell. One was if some jerk in the DMLE decided to give him the Kiss to score some political points, while the other would be so good that even in the light of the Patronuses, he couldn’t think about it clearly enough to name it. “W-w-what’s going on?” he rasped as he staggered out into the corridor, his voice cracking from years of disuse.

The black man motioned with his wand for him to walk forward and said, “Apparently, one Harry Potter discovered that you didn’t get an actual trial, and he decided he wants to see you answer for your crimes _personally_.”

 _Harry!_ he thought, his breath catching. Of course, if anyone had a reason to dig into the details of his case, it would be him—and at only eleven, too! Oh, the boy must surely hate him, but if he was finally getting his day in court, maybe someday he could repair the damage. Sirius Black’s spirits began to lift for the first time in ten years as he was led up and away from the pit of Azkaban and then down to the boats to take him to shore. Away from the Dementors, he felt his mind coming back to him. It was sluggish and fragmented, but the despair wasn’t quite so crushing anymore.

As they stepped into the boat, he spoke up again: “W-what day is it?”

The black man, whom Proudfoot had called Shacklebolt, didn’t look at him, but answered, “Sunday, tenth of November, 1991.”

Sirius Black would remember that day.

* * *

The Grangers drove into London and parked where Cousin Ted had recommended in his letter. A short walk away, they met the Tonkses to escort them into the Ministry of Magic. Andi was wearing very fancy plum-coloured robes with a silver W on the chest. They had never seen her out of muggle robes before, and they all thought she looked much more powerful and aristocratic like this. Dora wasn’t with them, but would be attending with Moody, who was heading up security for the trial. Andi and Ted showed them how to get into the entrance: a bank of phone booths connected to the Floos below, where a large number of oddly-dressed people were going in without coming out—as if _that_ weren’t conspicuous.

“Just step inside, tell the voice on the phone your names and that you’re attending a trial. It’ll give you ID badges and Floo you to the Atrium,” Andi explained. She and Ted made to step inside ahead of them.

“Wait? All four of us?” asked Emma.

“Yes—Oh, don’t worry, it’s bigger on the inside.”

Harry’s face lit up. “Like the TARDIS?” he asked.

“What’s a tardis?”

“It’s a spaceship that looks like a police phone box,” Hermione explained. “The Doctor explores the universe with it.”

“Doctor who?”

“Yes!” Harry and Hermione shouted, laughing and pointing at Andi, who now looked extremely confused.

“Kids,” scolded Emma.

“It’s one of our television shows,” Dan explained.

“Oh, right.” Andi and Ted stepped into the booth. After about a minute, they appeared to vanish through the floor.

The Grangers stepped into the phone booth themselves. It wasn’t _exactly_ bigger on the inside, but it seemed to bend and stretch to accommodate the four of them. Sure enough, they stated their names and business and were issued ID badges. And then, without warning, the floor dropped out from under them.

There was a sensation of spinning very rapidly, the air rushing around them. They caught glimpses of buried cables and pipes and Underground tubes and, appropriately enough, other fireplaces, seen from the inside, whirling around them. Dan and Emma clung to their children for dear life and remembered what Andi had once said about all fast forms of magical transport being very uncomfortable. Finally, they hit the floor hard, and the four of them tumbled out of a large fireplace and landed in a heap.

“Sorry about that,” said Ted as he and Andi helped them up. “You get used to it after a while.”

“Come on,” muttered Andi. “Let’s get to the courtroom before too many people notice who just walked in here.”

The Atrium of the Ministry was a beautiful work of art: polished floors, an enchanted ceiling with golden runes dancing across it, an ornate fountain featuring the various magical races. But there was little time to appreciate all this, as the place was already filling up with witches and wizards apparating and flooing in, many of them members of the media, wizengamot members and their families, and interested and influential citizens. The news had spread pretty quickly after the Wizengamot was summoned that there would be an emergency trial for Sirius Black, of all people, and that Harry Potter would be in attendance. In a place as small and well-connected as wizarding Britain, that turned into a media circus very quickly, so Andi and Ted led the Grangers to a lift straightaway, which descended two more floors to a smaller, but similarly ornate hallway.

The Wizengamot Hall was on the lowest level of the Ministry of Magic, below even the Department of Mysteries—or rather, below and to the side. Public information about the Department of Mysteries was sketchy, but it was widely believed that it was carved outward from the Ministry complex on Level Nine because of some naturally-occurring magical formation they were studying. In any case, it was only to be expected that the Wizengamot would want their meeting place to be in the deepest, safest location possible.

There were people milling around down here, too, leaning more toward members of the press. It was here, as they were getting ready to go inside, that Harry’s presence was finally noticed. A crush of reporters and fans appeared around them, but Cousin Andi pushed them away.

“Lord Potter has nothing to say until after the trial,” Andi called out before ushering the family inside. “I’m sorry, but you probably won’t be able to get away without saying something,” she said more quietly. “We’ll help you the best we can. I have to take my seat—or rather your seat, Harry. Ted will stay with you.”

The courtroom—for that’s what it was today—was just starting to fill up. About a dozen wizards in plum-coloured robes were scattered among the seats at one end of the oblong, terraced chamber. Albus Dumbledore sat behind a tall podium in the front row. He gave the Grangers a friendly wave, and whispers broke out as people started to realise who had just entered. Beside him sat a portly grey-haired man with an anxious expression, whose face they recognised from the banners in the Atrium as Cornelius Fudge, the Minister for Magic.

The other three quarters of the room was filling with spectators. Ted led the Grangers to a group of front row sets just to the left of the section for the Wizengamot members. Ted waved as he sat down, and they spotted Dora’s pink hair on the other side of the chamber where she stood next to a horribly-scarred old man leaning on a staff, who had a bright blue eye that kept spinning around and around in his head. He could only be Mad-Eye Moody. The Grangers all shuddered at his piercing gaze.

The courtroom looked like quite the appropriate meeting place for the aristocrats of magical Britain, with carved wooden benches and decorations of polished stone running from floor to ceiling in dizzying patterns. The only things that looked out of place were two chairs sitting in the middle of the ring of seats. They were rough-cut wood and equipped with numerous chains to confine anyone who sat in them.

“Oh, Mum, Dad, there’s the Weasleys,” said Hermione. She pointed to where a harried-looking family of redheads filed in through the courtroom doors. Three of the boys spotted Harry and Hermione at once and waved to them. They led their family through the aisles to sit in the row behind the Grangers.

“Hey, guys,” Ron said. “Dad, this is Harry and his family.”

“Of course. It’s quite an honour. Arthur Weasley, at your service.” The Weasley patriarch was the only member of the family present today whom Harry and Hermione hadn’t yet seen: tall and balding, but with the same flaming red hair as the rest of his family. He shook Harry’s hand eagerly. “Lord Potter, I can’t thank you enough,” he said. “To think we had a dark wizard living under our noses all these years—Molly and Percy have been simply beside themselves. Our boys have told us all about you of course. That was some great flying yesterday from what I hear, too.” He then turned to Dan and Emma. “And you two, you’re muggles, aren’t you? You simply _must_ allow me to buy you a drink after the trial. It’s the least I can do after what your son’s done for us. Please, allow me to introduce my family…”

Dan and Emma shook all the Weasleys’ hands, trying not to be too put off by the over-eager wizard. His boys were a boisterous bunch, but the poor little girl, Ginny, looked petrified by Harry’s presence. They couldn’t help but hope that wasn’t _too_ common among the younger witches. His wife, though, was perhaps the most eager to thank the Grangers. As soon as she was in arm’s reach, Molly Weasley wrapped Harry and Hermione with one arm each and hugged them within an inch of their lives in gratitude for “rescuing” her family.

“Oh, dear, I’m so sorry, Lord Potter,” she apologised as she let the addled boy go. “I just can’t believe all this is happening.” Harry straightened himself out and assured her that it was alright.

The hall was mostly filled when another man came walking through the aisles, this one thin and drawn with a slightly scarred face and limp, brown hair flecked with grey. His robes were dingy and had been darned in several places. He was staring at Harry, but not with the same adoring stare most people were giving him. He looked sad and uncomfortable, as if something had shaken him greatly.

The man walked toward the Grangers slowly, and Ted rose to his feet to intercept him. They exchanged a few muttered words and seemed to be arguing until Ted looked over at Dumbledore, who nodded to him, and he stepped aside to let the man pass.

The Grangers looked at the man with great interest as he fixed his eyes on Harry and crouched down in from of him. “Harry Potter…” he said slowly. There were tears in his eyes.

Harry just nodded.

“My name is Remus Lupin…I was a good friend of your parents.”

The Grangers all sucked in a breath. They had heard a lot about Black and Pettigrew, but only a few mentions of a Remus Lupin, the most mysterious of the Potters’ friends. In fact, no one had even mentioned whether he was still alive, and given the war, they’d had no reason to think he was.

“You were…? I—I’m pleased to meet you…” Harry shook his weathered hand gently. “I’m sorry, Mr. Lupin, I don’t really know much about you.”

Lupin sighed. “Please call me Remus if you like, Harry.” No one missed the fact that Lupin was one of the very few adults who used Harry’s first name. “And I’m not really surprised. Our little pa—band hasn’t fared too well. There were four of us in the beginning, you see: your father, myself, Black, and Pettigrew. And…well, you can see what’s happened. I couldn’t believe Black would ever betray us, but it looked for all the world like…Dumbledore sent me an urgent owl this morning and told me what happened. _You_ caught Pettigrew, Harry? You personally?”

Harry nodded. “Yes, sir—Remus,” he said nervously. “I didn’t know who he was, though.”

Remus shook his head and smiled sadly. “So much like your father, Harry…Well, if what I suspect now is true, it’s the perfect irony on Pettigrew…Only, now I fear I’ve spent the past decade hating the wrong friend.” He sighed again and stood back up. “Your family?” he asked, indicating the others.

“Mm hmm,” nodded Harry. “This is my Mum, Dad, and my sister, Hermione.”

Remus started to tear up again at the thought of Harry having a new set of parents as he shook their hands. “I can’t tell you how happy I am to see that Harry went to a good family. I wish I could have taken him in myself, of course, but there were…extenuating circumstances. I only hope I’ll be able to see him from time to time.”

“Of course, Remus,” Emma said. “Any friend of Harry’s birth parents is a friend of ours—as long as they’re not a Death Eater, anyway.”

Remus flashed another sad smile and rolled up his sleeves—both of them, for good measure—revealing several scars, but no tattoos. “Well, as you can see…I’m clean.”

They didn’t have time to speak further, as a bell tolled somewhere in the Ministry, and the entire hall stood as Dumbledore stepped up to the high podium, his plum-coloured robes with special gold trim dancing in the torch light. He raised his wand, which emitted a single loud crack. “Good afternoon,” the Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot said solemnly. “I hereby call the Third Special Session of the Three Hundred Eighty-Ninth Wizengamot to order. I want to thank you all for coming on such short notice. Before we begin, I would like to extend a special welcome to our youngest member, who has joined us for the first time after an eleven-year absence of his House. Welcome, Lord Harry James Potter.”

There was loud applause and cheering, and soon, the entire hall was on its feet. Harry felt Cousin Ted elbow him, and he stood as well. He was blinded by camera flashes, and it was a solid three or four minutes before everyone finally calmed down. Harry didn’t think he’d ever get used to people calling him “Lord,” much less this. He hoped this would be a one-time thing. In the chaos, though, he did notice a group of Lords and Ladies who were just standing politely and not applauding. He resolved to keep a close eye on them.

When the hall finally fell silent, and the spectators sat down, Dumbledore asked, “Lord Potter, would you like to take up your seat at this time?”

Harry blinked a couple of times. “I can do that?”

The crowd laughed pleasantly. He may have been a Lord of the Wizengamot, but he was still eleven.

“Lord Potter, as the head of your House, you are entitled to take up your seat at any time after your eleventh birthday,” Dumbledore said with a chuckle, “with the permission of your magical guardian, of course.”

 _Who also happens to be my proxy_ , Harry thought. _No need to make a mess of that._ “I, uh—I don’t wish to change my arrangements at this time, um, Chief Warlock. Thank you.” Harry sat down.

Ted leaned over to him and whispered, “Well done.”

Meanwhile, Dumbledore went on: “Is there any business pending before the Wizengamot?” Of course, he knew exactly what the business was, but he was going by the book.

A monocled woman with greying hair and, Harry and Hermione thought, a familiar square-ish jaw stood up. “Chief Warlock, I have business,” she said.

“Madam Bones,” he recognised her.

“Ladies and gentlemen, it came to my attention last night that there were certain irregularities surrounding the trial of one Sirius Orion Black, then heir apparent to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black—namely, that he never received one.”

A gasp ran through the courtroom. Apparently, most people thought this would be a “retrial.” That the heir to a Most Ancient House, no matter how guilty, would be imprisoned without trial was unthinkable.

“I move that we adjourn to the Council of Magical Law to hold an immediate trial for Lord Black,” Amelia Bones concluded.

“I second the motion,” Cousin Andi called out, leaping to her feet.

“I have a second,” Dumbledore said. “Without objection, we will adjourn to the Council of Magical—”

“Excuse me, Chief Warlock,” and unctuous voice sounded. A man who seemed to be the leader of the group of wizards who had not applauded Harry stood up. He had pale blond hair, nearly white, descending to his shoulders, and a pointed face with an upturned nose. He leaned lightly on a snake-headed cane, and he was staring coldly at the Grangers.

“Lord Malfoy,” Dumbledore recognised with a barely-suppressed grumble. The Grangers all stiffened, even Dan and Emma.

“I must object to the presence of muggles in the Wizengamot Chambers.” Lucius Malfoy spoke with the same smooth, ingratiating voice that Draco liked to use to get his way. An angry murmur circled the hall at the suggestion, and many people turned to stare at Harry’s family. “I’m sure Lord Potter’s adoptive parents are very nice people…” It was clear he believed nothing of the sort. “…but I cannot condone their being privy to sensitive Wizengamot matters.”

Harry and Hermione were fuming. So were their parents, Lupin, the Weasleys, and many of the other people around them. But Cousin Ted leaned over and whispered, “Just scoring points with his allies. Don’t worry about it.”

Sure enough, his wife stood up again. “Chief Warlock?”

“Madam Tonks.”

“I don’t believe there is any law against the presence of muggles at Wizengamot sessions, or trials of the Council of Magical Law. Moreover, Daniel and Emma Granger are fully authorised as privy under the Statute of Secrecy as immediate family, and they are here at the personal invitation of the Office of Lord Potter—” There was some stifled laughter at that. “—and, if I’m not mistaken, personally approved by the Chief Warlock.” The Grangers were amazed to see a fire in the woman’s eyes that they had never seen before—from Dora, sure, but not Andi. Ted had a goofy grin plastered across his face at the sight.

“You are correct, Madam Tonks. The Grangers’ visit has been approved by the Chair. Lord Malfoy, if you would like to call a vote to overturn that approval…”

Lucius Malfoy didn’t even need to look at the glares he was getting to know how that vote would go. “I withdraw my objection, Chief Warlock.”

Dumbledore nodded. “Without further objection, we will adjourn to the Council of Magical Law. Madam Bones, I yield the Chair.”

The Chief Warlock sat down, and Madam Bones stepped up to the podium. With a crack from her wand, she said, “I hereby call the Council of Magical Law to Order in the matter of the Trial of Sirius Orion Black, and Related Matters.” Another murmur circled the hall at the addition. “Auror Shacklebolt, have the prisoner brought in.”


	28. The Trial

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I plead no ownership of Harry Potter.
> 
> And finally, we have the Trial of Sirius Black. I’ve been waiting for scene this since I started this story. I had a lot of it written in my head from the beginning, but I added a little twist. Normally, we see Sirius testifying, so I thought I’d do things a bit differently. I hope you enjoy it as much as I have.

Sirius Black was led in chains before the Wizengamot. He stumbled as he was dragged along by the aurors, keeping his head bowed to see well enough to keep from tripping over his own feet. He was led to one of the two iron chairs in the centre of the chamber, and the chains leapt into motion to secure him. Once seated, his head lolled to one side, and he looked up for the first time…straight into the haunting green eyes of Lily Potter.

Yes, they were her eyes alright, as sure as anything, and the face they were set into was the face of James as a boy.

“Harry…?” he mouthed, failing to produce any sound from his throat. It could only be his godson. But the boy was sitting with a family he didn’t recognise—a girl about his age with bushy brown hair, a woman with darker, but equally bushy hair who was clearly her mother, and presumably her father with them. Both of the children were in Hogwarts robes, and Sirius noted with a long-dormant spark of pride that they both had red trim. A gaggle of redheads behind them could only be the Weasleys.

But what took his breath away was the look in Harry’s eyes. After what the boy must have been told, they should have been filled with hate, but they weren’t. It was more a look of uncertain appraisal with just a hint of…was that pity? Was it possible he already knew?

He glanced to the side and saw Moony—Moony, who had just as much right to hate him, but he didn’t look like he did, either. He looked nervous and confused as he sat there in his worn-out clothes. He knew something as well. But what had happened? Sirius didn’t dare hope—

“Auror Shacklebolt, bring in the second prisoner,” a voice in front of him called. He snapped his head forward to see Amelia Bones presiding over the court (she must be in charge of Magical Law Enforcement, now), with old Albus Dumbledore sitting beside her. A murmur of confusion began. Then, there were scattered gasps from some of the members of the Wizengamot. Sirius craned his neck to see who was being brought in, and he couldn’t believe his eyes.

“Peter!” He tried to shout it, but fell into a coughing fit. The rat was here! He strained against the chains, trying to throttle him on the spot before coming to his senses. All he needed was some Veritaserum, and it would all be over. Yes, the rat would finally get his. Sirius bit his tongue to be sure it wasn’t a dream, but of course, in Azkaban, he never would have had a dream this good.

“Peter, you traitor!” Sirius barked out.

“Me? It’s him! _He_ _’s_ the traitor!” Peter yelled back, his words quick, like a rat’s squeaking. He strained against his own bonds.

“Silence!” Amelia Bones shouted. Sirius and Peter both stopped yelling. “Let the record show that the second prisoner before the Council today is Peter Pettigrew.” There were shouts from around the hall, which she silenced with a blast from her wand.

Sirius started to scan the courtroom. He looked over the rest of the Wizengamot. Augusta Longbottom was in her son’s seat. Sirius knew from Bellatrix’s shouting what had happened there. He flinched when he spotted Andromeda. Damn, he’d forgotten how much she looked like her sister. She was sitting in the seat he had last seen occupied by James—no surprise—she was the natural choice for proxy. And there was Narcissa sitting in _his_ seat! Had his mother finally kicked the bucket? Barty Crouch and Cornelius Fudge were there, too, glaring at him. They must be still be at the top level of the Ministry. He wondered if one of them was Minster, now. There were others in the audience, too. Alastor Moody was standing guard. He seemed to have lost an eye since Sirius last saw him, and he now had a creepy-looking magical replacement that constantly roved around the room. Beside him was a pink-haired girl who could only be Nymphadora. An Auror in training? He could almost have laughed. Further down, a blond newspaper reporter in hideous lime green robes was looking increasingly gleeful at the proceedings as a quill was writing by itself in front of her.

But Sirius was quickly snapped out of his musings by what Bones said next: “Peter Pettigrew was apprehended last night at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry—”

“What!” shouted Sirius, and he wasn’t the only one shouting. He looked back at Harry to convince himself that the boy was alright.

“Order!” Bones roared with another crack from her wand. “He was apprehended on the advice of our own Lord Potter—Order! Order—! Who noted the suspicious behaviour of a classmate’s pet rat—I will have order! As a result of that arrest, Mr. Pettigrew has so far been charged with failure to register as an animagus, criminal use of unregistered animagus ability, and membership in a banned terrorist group.” Before anyone could react to that last bit, she called out, “Auror Shacklebolt!”

The large Auror strode over to the bound Pettigrew and tore back the man’s sleeve, revealing the Dark Mark.

The hall erupted into total chaos.

Sirius’s mind was reeling, barely registering the shouting and screaming around him. “What?” he choked. _Just_ _…what?_ Peter had been at Hogwarts? With Harry’s classmates? Quite possibly in Harry’s dorm room? _And Harry had personally found him out?!_ How was any of that possible? Did Remus tell him something?

No one heard Shacklebolt utter the words, “Evidence for the defence, exhibit one,” in reference to Peter’s Mark, since Lucius Malfoy and his cronies were loudly protesting anything they could make stick, while half of the liberals and moderates were demanding to know how a Death Eater had evaded capture for so long and got into the school. One of the conservatives, Lord Jugson, demanded the arrest of the Weasleys for abetting Pettigrew, which Andromeda and Augusta Longbottom both protested. Lord Nott demanded that Harry be questioned, which was eventually dismissed as unnecessary. When Madam Bones finally calmed the Council again, she went straight ahead with the trial.

“Lord Sirius Orion Black,” she said, “you are hereby charged with the following crimes: membership in a banned terrorist group, high treason, two counts of accessory to murder in the first degree of Lord James Potter and Lady Lily Evans Potter, conspiracy to commit murder in the first degree of Harry James Potter, gross breach of the Statute of Secrecy, illegal use of dark magic, _attempted_ murder in the first degree of Peter Pettigrew, and twelve counts of murder in the second degree of…” and here Madam Bones named the twelve muggle victims of Peter’s curse. “Lord Black, how do you plead?”

Sirius’s voice became quiet and tired, but he looked determined as he responded, “Not guilty to all.”

“Will you submit to questioning under Veritaserum?”

“I will.”

It was at this point that Lord Malfoy stood again and said, “I must object, Madame Bones. Lord Black is a suspected occlumens based on both his record and the fact that he is coherent just hours after being removed from Azkaban. Therefore his testimony under Veritaserum cannot be considered trustworthy.”

There was more shouting from the hall as many liberals protested this move, but the Azkaban card was a good one, Sirius had to admit. Most prisoners took weeks to recover after long sentences. It raised just enough suspicion to kill the idea. Who would have thought that Padfoot would hurt him one day? Granted, he did know some Occlumency, but not enough to beat Veritaserum.

“I would question _anybody_ _’s_ ability to properly guard their mind after that long in Azkaban, Lord Malfoy,” Andromeda countered.

“We want to do this by the book, don’t we?” said a smug-looking man who turned out to be Lord Smith. “Especially after uncovering the unfortunate oversight of a decade ago. I call for a vote on the admissibility of Lord Black’s testimony.”

“Seconded,” spoke a witch whom Sirius didn’t recognise.

“Very well,” said Madam Bones. “On the admissibility of the testimony of Lord Black under Veritaserum: all those in favour…all those opposed…” The vote was close, but a definite loss. “The motion is not carried. I remind the Council, though, that we have a witness to the events in question. Peter Pettigrew, will you submit to questioning under Veritaserum as witness for the defence?”

“N-no, no I will not. I will not defend that traitor,” the rat said. No surprise there. If he’d had money or political allies, Peter could have spilt everything and claimed Imperius, except that Sirius would still kill him. But since he didn’t have either of those, all he could do was to clam up and hope Malfoy and Nott would help him out to save their own skins.

“I believe the testimony of witnesses on the scene will be quite sufficient to settle this matter, Madam Bones, even with these…startling revelations about Mr. Pettigrew. Don’t you agree, Minister?” Lord Malfoy said, giving Cornelius Fudge a pointed look. So that answered one question. Sirius put two and two together and vowed to keep a close eye on this Minister if he got out of here.

“Madam Bones,” the Auror called before Fudge could respond.

“Auror Shacklebolt.”

“I would like to submit evidence for the defence, exhibit two.” He held up a vial containing a silvery liquid. “My own Pensieve memories of the interrogation of Peter Pettigrew under Veritaserum, as witnessed by myself, Auror Scrimgeour, and the Chairwoman.”

“Objection! Self-incrimination!” Lord Malfoy shouted.

“Madam Bones, I remind the Council of the Uniform Trials Act of 1816, which permits the admission of Veritaserum testimony when collected under probable cause and restricted to questions pertinent to the charges filed. I also remind the Council of the War Crimes Act of 1980, which provides significantly expanded leeway in this matter in cases involving war crimes, which includes the case before the Council today.”

Sirius saw Harry and the family sitting with him looking surprised at that. They started whispering intently to Andromeda’s husband about it. It seemed odd that they wouldn’t know about that law. Was the girl a muggle-born, he wondered disconnectedly.

“Madam Bones, I call for a vote on the admissibility of this evidence,” Lord Malfoy said, not bothering with a counterargument of his own. He was quickly realising that he had been outplayed from the beginning. Lord Nott seconded, but the vote went solidly Sirius’s way. Few besides Malfoy’s allies would give any sympathy to a marked Death Eater.

“The motion is carried, and the evidence is admissible. Mr. Croaker, please enter.”

The doors of the hall opened a second time, and Algernon Croaker, the Head Unspeakable, wheeled in a large stone basin apparently filled with water. Croaker gave a small nod to his sister-in-law, Augusta Longbottom, as he walked. He looked a more affable sort than she did, rather like a younger Dumbledore, right down to the twinkle in his eyes, despite having a much less outlandish fashion sense and keeping his iron-coloured hair and goatee trimmed short. But most of the hall was focused on the artifact he was wheeling in. A Pensieve was not that commonly used in the Council, since the projections were usually hard to see, and, more to the point, Veritaserum testimony was almost always sufficient, but the Department of Mysteries did maintain one specifically for this purpose. He brought the artifact to the front of the hall and took the vial from Shacklebolt.

“Mr. Croaker, have you inspected the evidence?” Bones asked.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Have the memories been modified in any way?”

“No, ma’am.”

“Good. I warn you all that the testimony you are about to hear is quite disturbing,” she said. “If any guests wish to leave the trial for this next part, they should do so now.” She was staring directly at Harry. The girl’s family whispered to each other for a minute, but Harry seemed emphatic about staying, and the girl seemed to insist on staying with him. A few people did get up to leave, and it looked like it was a hard-fought battle for the little Weasley girl (a Weasley _girl_?) not to be sent out of the room.

When the departing witches and wizards had left, Bones said, “Play the memories, please, Mr. Croaker.”

The Unspeakable nodded and poured the silvery liquid into the Pensieve. Letting it mix for a few moments, he drew his wand and prodded the surface. A ghostly silver image of Pettigrew’s head and shoulders rose from the basin, looking very much like he did now, except fighting an unseen person trying to restrain him. The memory began with Pettigrew being forcibly administered three drops of a certain potion and growing strangely still. Then, an echo of Amelia Bones’s voice began speaking.

“What is your name?”

“Peter Pettigrew,” the projection spoke in a flat monotone.

“Are you a Death Eater?”

“Yes.”

“When were you marked as a Death Eater?”

“The thirtieth of October, 1981.”

“What did you do to receive the Dark Mark?”

“I betrayed the Potters to the Dark Lord.”

There were gasps in the hall at this as the renewed suspicions about what had happening in 1981 began to be confirmed.

“How did you betray the Potters?”

“I told the Dark Lord the location where they were hiding under a Fidelius Charm.”

“You were the Secret Keeper?” It was Shacklebolt’s voice that asked that one.

“Yes.”

“It wasn’t Sirius Black?” another voice asked, presumably Auror Scrimgeour’s.

“No.”

Sirius looked back over at Harry. A look of horror was on his face, and the people around him didn’t look much better.

“Who cast the Fidelius Charm?” Bones’s voice sounded again.

“Lily Potter.”

“Why did Lily Potter make you the Secret Keeper when it was believed to be Sirius Black?”

“James and Lily wanted Sirius to be the Secret Keeper, but Sirius believed that was too obvious. He said he would claim to be the Secret Keeper, but would secretly switch with someone else. He suggested me as the least likely person.”

Sirius started crying.

“Did anyone else know about this change?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“They wanted as few people to know as possible. They were on to the fact that there was a spy among them, but I think Sirius suspected it was Remus.”

There was a sound of shuffling papers. “For the record, you are referring to Remus Lupin, correct?”

“Yes.”

Sirius heard Remus let out an actual whimper at this revelation. Enough eyes turned toward the man to make it clear who he was.

“Why did you betray the Potters?”

“The Dark Lord ordered me to bring him any available information on their whereabouts.”

“Why were you working for You-Know-Who?”

“I was afraid. The Dark Lord tracked me down and threatened me a year earlier. He said I must serve him as a spy or else die painfully. I already thought he was going to win, so—”

“Coward!” Sirius shouted over the recording.

“Be quiet!” snapped Shacklebolt, prodding him with his wand.

“What did You-Know-Who do after you told him the Potters’ location?”

“The Dark Lord marked me that night and said he had plans to make. The following night, he ordered me to escort him to the cottage, which I did. He ordered me to wait outside while he went in…”

“What happened next?”

“I heard James yell out, ‘ _Lily, take Harry and go! It_ _’s him! Go! Run! I’ll hold him off_ —’”

There were more gasps in the hall as the people sat transfixed, none more so than Sirius himself, except perhaps Harry.

“I saw spell fire. I believe the Dark Lord was mostly using Killing Curses. It stopped after just a few seconds. A few seconds later, I heard Lily scream, ‘ _Not Harry, not Harry, please not Harry_!’ then, ‘ _Not Harry, please no, take me, kill me instead_ —’ then, ‘ _Not Harry! Please_ _…have mercy…have mercy_ …’”

Despite Pettigrew’s monotone, or perhaps because of it, those words were the most haunting thing that Sirius had ever heard. Not in all his time in Azkaban had his mind generated that awful scenario. Through his own tears, he saw that Harry’s face was buried in the bushy-haired woman’s chest, and Remus was covering his face with his hands. Indeed, most of the spectators at least shed a tear or two upon hearing Lily Potter’s last words.

“After that, I saw the light from two more Killing Curses,” Pettigrew continued relentlessly, “but after the second one, the cottage exploded. I ran inside, but I found no sign of the Dark Lord. I found only his wand. I took it and apparated away.”

“You have You-Know-Who’s wand?” Shacklebolt’s disbelieving voice said.

“No.”

“Where is You-Know-Who’s wand?” Bones asked after a pause.

“In a disused, but warded sewer pipe in Salisbury.”

There was some sputtering and coughing in the memory at that.

“Did you kill twelve muggles in Salisbury?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

“I cast a _Confringo_ at a gas valve cover on the street, causing an explosion.”

“So our cover story of a gas explosion was for an actual gas explosion?” Scrimgeour said.

The question wasn’t intended for Pettigrew, but he answered, “Yes.”

“How did you escape?” Bones asked.

“I used a Shield Charm to protect myself, cut off my finger as a cover, transformed to rat form, and escaped through the hole into the sewers.”

“You are a rat animagus?”

“Yes.”

“Are you registered?”

“No.”

There was a pause as the Amelia Bones in the memory seemed to switch gears.

“Did you see Sirius Black kill anyone that day?”

“No.”

“Did you see Sirius Black attempt to kill anyone that day?”

“Only me.”

“Did you see Sirius Black break of the Statute of Secrecy that day?”

“Yes.”

“How so?”

“He apparated, brandished his wand, and attempted to curse me in front of muggles.”

“Was Sirius Black ever a Death Eater, to your knowledge?”

“No.”

The memory ended abruptly, and a heavy silence descended on the Wizengamot. The horror of what had been done to Sirius was slowly sinking in. Even Malfoy knew he had no way to walk this back. At least Pettigrew hadn’t named any names. Andromeda stood up to speak, but Madam Longbottom beat her to it: “Madam Bones, I move that all charges against Lord Black be dropped immediately.” Many of the Lords and Ladies looked to be in favour of that already.

“Madam Bones, that is preposterous!” Barty Crouch growled, doing his best to save face. “Mr. Pettigrew’s testimony clearly indicates that Lord Black _did_ attempt to murder him and also violated the Statute of Secrecy. Furthermore, we have no definitive proof that he is not a Death Eater.”

“Well, why don’t you roll up my sleeves and actually _check_ for once, Barty?” Sirius demanded.

“That’s enough, Lord Black,” Bones said. “Auror Shacklebolt, do it.”

The Auror quickly pulled back both of Sirius’s sleeves, revealing bare forearms.

“I move that all charges against Lord Black be dropped except minor breach of the Statute of Secrecy and attempted murder in the first degree of Peter Pettigrew,” Lord Smith suggested. The Lords and Ladies started talking over each other again.

“Madam Bones, Lord Black was employed as a Hitwizard at the time, and as such was authorised—”

“I second Lord Smith’s motion—”

“Order! Order!” Amelia Bones silenced the hall. “I have a second on Lord Smith’s motion to drop all charges except minor breach of the Statue of Secrecy and attempted first degree murder. All those in favour…? All those opposed…?” The motion carried easily. “Lord Black, would you like to revise your plea at this time?”

Sirius stared at the monocled witch in confusion. That wasn’t normal procedure. She must want him to do something. Of course, if he was found innocent, then he could be reinstated, and then she was technically his boss. _Maybe she_ _’s on my side_ , he thought. But what could he do? He looked over the Lords and Ladies of the Wizengamot, took another look at Harry, and started to get an idea—perhaps even a Marauder-level idea. He knew a thing or two about Cornelius Fudge, and with the right leverage, it just might work. It would be a small price to pay, all things considered. After all, if he was Lord Black now, he certainly didn’t need the money. All he really wanted was to see his godson.

“Madam Bones,” he said sadly, his voice still rasping, but he was looking at Fudge, “That morning, I was overcome by grief at James and Lily’s deaths, and I was not thinking clearly. I felt like I was responsible, and I could only think of revenge. I should have seen to Harry instead of going after Peter. Yes, I tried to kill him—Peter, that is—but I certainly wasn’t in my right mind when I did it. When he escaped, I lost it entirely. That’s why I was laughing in the street, which I assume is why I was just presumed guilty and shipped off to Azkaban without so much as a questioning, which was not just a perversion of justice, but shoddy law enforcement work.” Crouch was glaring at him again, but Fudge was definitely starting to sweat. Good. “But from what I can tell, that was under the previous administration. I’d really rather put this all behind me and not drag it out, ma’am, so I am willing to plead guilty to a minor breach of the Statute of Secrecy, and I am also willing to waive any right to file criminal or civil charges against the Ministry for denial of rights and wrongful imprisonment in this case—that in exchange for dropping the attempted murder charge.”

“I move to accept Lord Black’s plea bargain immediately,” Andromeda said at once.

“Seconded,” said Madam Longbottom.

“I have a second,” Bones said before too much debate could start up. “All those in favour…?”

The liberals in the Wizengamot gradually raised their wands and lighted them, apparently being persuaded by Sirius’s story, though few people seemed to want to be seen as the first. A few moderates did the same, while Malfoy’s conservatives remained steadfastly motionless. But gradually, more and more wands were raised until, under the weight of the stares, Cornelius Fudge raised his, and many of the moderates followed, though Barty Crouch conspicuously didn’t.

“All opposed…?”

The conservatives and many of the moderates lit their wands. There were plenty of people who weren’t happy to see the attempted murder charge go as a political matter, even if they weren’t particularly against him personally. It would be a close vote. Sirius held his breath as he waited for the verdict.

“By a vote of thirty-two to twenty-six…” said Bones, “the motion carries.”

Sirius smiled as actual cheers erupted from his supporters and from the gallery. Hearing Peter’s interrogation must have given him some good allies—and unlikely ones—light side ones. It was good to be back, he thought for the first time.

“Lord Sirius Orion Black, you are hereby fined one hundred galleons for a minor breach of the Statute of Secrecy, and all other charges will be struck from your record,” said Bones. “I apologise deeply for the actions of this body ten years ago. You’re free to go, and may I be the first to say ‘welcome back’.”

The chains fells away from Sirius’s arms, he rose slowly, shakily to his feet, taking in another round of applause. He didn’t bother even looking at the rat as he took a few uneasy steps forward. He wanted to run to Harry, but he couldn’t run in his present state, and there were a couple things he needed to say first. He approached the podium looked Amelia Bones straight in the eye. “Madam Bones,” he said hoarsely, “I wasn’t the only one who was sent to Azkaban without trial. I think the rest of them were all Death Eaters, but you should probably check.” As the Council digested that nugget, he cast his eyes on his most aloof cousin, sitting next to her husband, and said, “Narcissa…Since _you_ _’re_ here, I take it my oh-so-loving mother is no longer with us…? I just want you to know that the next time we meet…I’ll be wanting my seat back.”

Leaving the blond couple fuming and shaken at having lost their proxy seat, probably without the slightest warning, he crossed the hall and climbed into the seats, stumbling down the aisle toward the people he most wanted to see, even though he dreaded how they might react. Remus was nearest to him. He knew he must look and smell a lot worse than the werewolf did, and that was saying something, since he didn’t look like he’d had too good of a decade himself. Harry was still being held by that Gryffindor girl’s family. Whoever they were, they at least looked like they cared for him.

But Sirius struggled to meet Remus’s eyes as he approached, after all those secrets were aired out. Remus, for his part, wore an expression of terrible regret—but why? He had no reason to think anything but what he was surely told. Finally, when he’d come within arm’s reach, Remus wordlessly grabbed him by the hand and embraced him like a brother.

Sirius slumped as his legs gave out, and he started tearing up again. Merlin, he felt like such a woman right now. “I’m so sorry, Moony,” he whispered.

“Later, Padfoot,” came the simple reply.

“Harry,” Sirius whispered again. He tried to take a step toward his godson, but Remus held him back.

“Wait.” He jerked his head toward Peter. It wasn’t over yet.

“Moving on,” Amelia Bones spoke again. “Peter Pettigrew, in light of this evidence, you are hereby charged with the following crimes: membership in a banned terrorist group, high treason, two counts of accessory to murder in the first degree of Lord James Potter and Lady Lily Evans Potter, conspiracy to commit murder in the first degree of Harry James Potter, gross breach of the Statute of Secrecy, twelve counts of murder in the second degree of…” The twelve muggles were named again. “Failure to register as an animagus, and criminal use of unregistered animagus ability. Mr. Pettigrew, how do you plead?”

Pettigrew gave his rat-like grin and a little nervous laugh as he said, “Is there any chance I could plead down as well, Madam Bones?”

Amelia Bones leaned forward and stared at the rat in the chair. “Mr. Pettigrew, you are currently facing sixteen counts that carry potential life sentences. Are you hoping to plead down to _one_ life sentence?” There was actually some laughter from the hall at that.

The nervous grin vanished from Pettigrew’s face as he launched into a distinctly rat-like tirade: “Alright then, guilty! It doesn’t matter. The Dark Lord will return, and then you’ll all get yours—”

“ _Silencio_ ,” Madam Bones cut him off personally. “Peter Pettigrew, as per your plea of “guilty,” I hereby sentence you to life imprisonment in Azkaban without the possibility of parole.” She made another loud crack with her wand. “Auror Shacklebolt, take him away.”

As Peter was yanked up from the chair and marched out of the chamber in chains, his eyes wandered back to those who had once been his family. Giving up all pretence, he was downcast under the glares of Sirius and Remus, not to mention the entire Weasley family. Harry had also recovered, more or less, and glared at him as well, but he went one step further. When Peter reached his closest point, he lunged forward, barred his teeth, and _hissed_ at the rat.

Pettigrew flinched.

Many eyes in the hall turned to Harry Potter. Sirius and Remus were duly surprised. Just what had happened with his capture last night? Sirius saw the girl roll her eyes at him. The parents’ expressions were unreadable, and, glancing around, he saw that the Weasleys, the youngest boy excepted, merely looked confused.

Meanwhile, throughout the Wizengamot, though, the Lords and Ladies regarded the boy with great interest. Even Andromeda looked a bit surprised. Here was the legendary Boy-Who-Lived, a boy who at age eleven, had apparently captured the true betrayer of his parents and cleared his godfather’s name all but singlehanded, and, Sirius would later learn, had won his first Quidditch match in the same weekend. Now, mostly to the boy’s dismay, they would add another line to the legend, as he faced down a vicious Death Eater who had murdered a dozen people and frightened the evil man simply by hissing at him. That Pettigrew was undoubtedly the most cowardly of Death Eaters would make little difference. Some might admit it only in private, but if there was any doubt that Harry Potter was going to be a major power player, it was gone now.

“Without objection, I declare this session of the Council of Magical Law closed. Chief Warlock, I yield the chair.”

As Amelia Bones stepped down, Albus Dumbledore rose from his seat and ascended back to the podium, his eyes twinkling like mad. “Does anyone have any further business before the Wizengamot?” he asked.

At this, the Minister stood up. “I would like to make a motion, Chief Warlock.”

“Minister Fudge.”

“As many of you know, Peter Pettigrew was ‘posthumously’ awarded the Order of Merlin, First Class for his assumed services to the war. In light of the revelations of today, I move that Mr. Pettigrew be stripped of this award effective immediately…” There was no doubt _that_ would carry, but Fudge wasn’t done. He seemed to look back and forth uncertainly between Lord Malfoy, Dumbledore, and Harry, as if weighing his options, but he continued, “Furthermore, today we have seen a great wrong done by the previous administration righted by the release of one of our own members from unlawful imprisonment, and the imprisonment of a mass murderer who had gone free. It was the intervention of another of our members that saw this wrong corrected. Therefore, in recognition of his service to the nation, I move that this body award the Order of Merlin, Third Class, to Lord Harry James Potter.”

Sirius smiled broadly for quite possibly the first time in ten years. Youngest Order of Merlin winner in history had a nice ring to it. James and Lily would be so proud. That Fudge didn’t think he had the political capital to include Sirius in that was irrelevant. He didn’t deserve it.

Harry, however, didn’t look too happy—displeased, in fact. He looked at the girl’s family and then back at Sirius questioningly, who smiled even wider and nodded to him. _Take it! Don_ _’t worry about me._ But Harry didn’t seem satisfied. Just before Dumbledore called the vote, the boy called out, “Chief Warlock, may I speak?”

“Of course, Lord Potter.”

The stares of the entire hall bored into the boy. No dared to make the smallest sound. He seemed tense under the pressure, and understandably so. After all, Sirius would soon learn, this was his first ever public statement aside from the earlier procedural bits. He seemed to think it over for a moment, as if choosing his words carefully and said, “I just want everyone to know that Hermione here was instrumental in the capture of Pettigrew. It—it couldn’t have happened without her.”

Sirius started wondering even more about this Hermione girl. “Harry!” she whispered up at him.

“Hush!” he whispered back. “So…so if the, uh, Wizengamot wants to honour me with this award, you should do the same for her.”

Sirius covered his mouth and doubled over with a soft, but nasty hacking sound. He was laughing for the first time in a decade. That boy was every bit the stubbornly noble and caring sort his mother always was.

“I can testify to Lord Potter’s assessment,” Dumbledore said with a twinkle. “Miss Hermione Granger did, indeed, play a vital role in the capture of Peter Pettigrew. Do I have a motion to award Lord Potter _and_ Miss Granger the Order of Merlin, Third Class for their services to the nation?”

“So moved,” Andromeda said at once.

“Seconded,” said Elphias Doge.

That vote quickly carried as well, with almost everyone but Malfoy’s faction voting in favour.

“Excellent,” said Dumbledore. “I expect the Ministry will work with the Office of Lord Potter to schedule the formal award presentation. Now, if there is no further business—and after some of the fastest decision making I have ever seen in all my years of service—without objection, I declare this Special Session adjourned.” He closed with another crack from his wand.

Slowly, the people began to file out of the Wizengamot Hall, but many were sticking around, watching what Harry would do. Andromeda quickly ran over to the group and used a trick she had picked up growing up with her sisters and conjured a thin, but dense wall of fog around the family, hiding them from view. Remus drew his own wand and cast the Muffling Charm the Marauders had copied from Snape.

“Th-thank you…C-Cousin,” Sirius stammered. He had so many things he wanted to say, and he barely knew where to start. Grasping his oldest living friend by the shoulders, he said, “I’m so sorry, Moony. I thought you were the spy. If I’d known—”

“No Padfoot, I’m sorry,” Remus replied. “I should have figured out that you’d switched. I should have come looking for you or Peter or Harry—”

“No, no, it’s all my—” Sirius stopped and laughed weakly. There was no use arguing it all day. “Look at us Remus. You’re going grey already.”

“Hey, now, you’re looking pretty ragged yourself, Sirius. Finally the flesh reflects the madness within.”

“Well, you’d know all about that, wouldn’t you?”

The two men smiled and embraced again.

Suddenly, a portal opened in the fog barrier with a whooshing sound, and a pink-haired witch bounced inside.

“Wotcher, guys, you start the party without me?”

Sirius shook his head. “I can’t believe—is this really little Nymphadora?”

“Just Dora if you know what’s good for you,” she said sternly. “Or Tonks.” Andromeda rolled her eyes. “It’s been a while since I’ve seen either of you two,” Dora deadpanned. “You come here often?”

“I’m surprised you even remember me, Dora,” Remus said.

“Well how could I forget that handsome face?” she shot back, winking at him. Sirius sniggered a little when he saw Remus blush.

But he wasn’t about to waste any more time. He approached the messy-haired boy who had been waiting patiently through this exchange and crouched down so that they were eye to eye. Somehow, he already had a stare even more piercing than Lily’s behind those glasses. The girl’s family pressed in close behind him. “Harry…” he started. He swallowed hard and blinked back tears. “I don’t know how much you’ve been told, but…I’m your godfather.”

The boy nodded with a mask of calm and muttered, “I know.” Sirius wasn’t sure if he was blinking.

“Harry, I am so sorry…I never should have trusted that rat in the first place. I should have been there for you. You shouldn’t’ve had to hear all that from him. You shouldn’t’ve had to be the one to catch him—I can’t believe you caught him yourself! How…? I’m so sorry, Harry. Can you forgive me? Can you forgive your stupid godfather for screwing everything up?”

There was an awkward silence. Harry seemed to be too emotional to speak. Sirius was only vaguely aware that he now on his knees with his hands limp in front of his chest, begging like a dog. When the silence and Harry’s staring became too much, he started babbling again: “But look at you: going to Hogwarts, now, a Gryffindor, naturally, but then, what else would you be…?”

Now, Harry finally opened his mouth: “Well, uh, sir…the Sorting Hat did consider Ravenclaw.”

Sirius barked with laughter. “Just like your mother. And please call me Sirius…if you want to, that is…”

Harry blinked once, slowly, and smiled a little. “Sirius…” he said, as if speaking the word for the first time. “I’m glad you’re not a traitor after all.”

Sirius didn’t even notice that Harry had extended a hand to him as he threw his arms around the boy and started sobbing. Harry went stiff at first, but then loosened up a bit and awkwardly patted him on the back.

“And then there’s this one,” he said, pulling away and turning to shake the hand of the bushy-haired girl. “Harry,” he said slyly, “if you’ve got yourself a girlfriend already—”

“Eww! No! She’s my sister.”

Sirius stood back up, feeling dizzy. “Sister?”

“We adopted Harry six years ago,” the girl’s father said. “My name is Daniel Granger. This is my wife, Emma, and our daughter, Hermione.”

“Adopted…” Sirius mumbled as he shook their hands as well. It was only to be expected, but he still wasn’t prepared for it.

“It’s rather a long story,” Emma added.

“And one that can wait until you’ve spent some time in recovery,” Andromeda jumped in. “Harry’s been doing very well with his new family.”

Sirius wondered why they were being so evasive all of a sudden. Merlin’s beard, Harry hadn’t gone to that awful sister of Lily’s, had he? He was getting a headache, now.

Andromeda took him by the arm. “We should get going,” she said gently. Remus took his other arm to help him stay on his feet. She dispelled the fog barrier and started to lead him toward the exit. Though when she did, she nearly ran into Mad-Eye Moody, who had apparently been keeping nosey reporters away.

“Come on,” he said gruffly. “Bones and Dumbledore want to talk to you.” With a loud clack of a wooden leg on the stone floor, he led them to the exit where the Chief Warlock and Director of Magical Law Enforcement were standing.

“Lord Potter,” Madam Bones started. “I wanted to apologise. I should have warned you more specifically what Pettigrew’s testimony would entail.”

Harry took a deep breath. “Thank you, Madam Bones…but I think I needed to hear it eventually—maybe not in public, but I guess it would have come out anyway, right?”

Bones reluctantly nodded.

“Your niece speaks very highly of you, Madam Bones,” piped up Hermione. “We really appreciate the work you’re doing.”

Amelia Bones’s face lit up. “Why thank you, Miss Granger. I’m glad Susan’s found friends in the two of you.”

 _Making connections already_ , Sirius thought with a smile as he caught his breath. Madam Bones took her leave, and then Dumbledore turned to speak to him.

“Sirius, my boy, I must also apologise to you,” the old wizard said. He looked good after those ten years, but obviously tired from the day’s excitement. “If I had been more attentive to Barty Crouch’s actions ten years ago, I could have saved you from Azkaban.”

“No, Albus…” Sirius stopped and sighed. It was doing no good arguing like this. “Everyone made mistakes here. I’m just grateful I got a chance to pick up the pieces…Harry, if your…” He couldn’t quite bring himself to say “parents.” “If your family doesn’t mind, let’s go grab lunch…or dinner…or tea, or…what time is it?”

“No, Sirius, not today,” Andromeda stopped him. “You’re going straight to St. Mungo’s.”

“Am not. I’m fine.” He felt like he was about to pass out.

“You are not. You’ve been under constant exposure to Dementors for ten years.”

“And yet I’m already speaking in complete sentences.”

She wasn’t having it. “Sirius, as a licensed Healer and your next of kin, I insist you spend at least a week in St. Mungo’s to recover from—”

“Bugger that. I want to get to know my godson.”

“You are in no condition to be—”

“And don’t I technically outrank you?”

“Ahem. I believe I may be of assistance,” Dumbledore interrupted. All eyes turned to him. “Next weekend is a Hogsmeade weekend at Hogwarts. If you approve, Mr. and Mrs. Granger, I believe we could arrange a special visit for the four of you to meet with Sirius—and you Remus, if you care to join—while the students are out, say lunch on Sunday at the Three Broomsticks? That would give Sirius a week to recover before the meeting. Remus, I believe that date is available to you as well?”

Remus nodded. The children looked to their parents eagerly. Dan and Emma exchanged a look and quickly agreed. “That sounds lovely,” Emma said. “We’ll look forward to it.”

“Alright,” Sirius said, pouting a little, not wanting to let his cousin know, even as he leaned more heavily on her and Remus for support, that his legs were about to give out. “I guess I can wait one more week. Take me away… _Cousin Andi_.” He was disappointed when he didn’t get the slightest reaction from Andromeda. That had always got a rise out of her before.

“Brace yourselves,” she muttered, and she opened the door. Sirius was blinded by camera flashes and dazed by shouted questions as the Aurors appeared to have corralled the reporters outside the hall by now. The witch in the lime green robes was front and centre. The group tried to push through, but the crush was too great, and the Minister for Magic had interposed himself in front of them.

“Lord Black, I just wanted to personally apologise to you for the small part I played in your unfortunate imprisonment,” said Cornelius Fudge, eagerly shaking his hand and obviously trying to save face. Sirius suppressed the urge to roll his eyes. If Fudge’s part in that affair was small, he was a hippogriff.

“Thank you, Minister, but I’m afraid I’ve got an appointment with a bed at St. Mungo’s at the moment,” he said shamelessly.

“Oh, of course, Lord Black.” Fudge looked only a little disappointed. “Lord Potter, I think I owe you something of an apology, as well. And congratulations to you and your sister for freeing your godfather and righting this wrong.” He shook the children’s hands for the cameras. Harry looked a bit put off and murmured an acknowledgement.

“Anything you’d like to say to the press, Lord Potter?” a wizard in the press group called out.

“Well…” Harry started. He looked to Andromeda, who sighed and nodded to him. “The thing is…it was six years ago today that my Mum and Dad and sister asked me to join their family. Even now, it’s still the happiest moment of my life. I…I never thought I’d get any closer connections to my birth parents than some distant cousins. But today I’ve met a godfather who was anything but the traitor I thought he was, plus another good friend of my parents. So…as weird as it was, I couldn’t have asked for a better anniversary day.”

There were audible awww’s from the crowd which respectfully started to back away as Harry’s newly-expanded family led him on. Sirius teared up again and wondered where this thoughtful young man had come from. He seemed to be more Lily than James. Andromeda and Dumbledore tried to escort the group through the crowd without too much additional badgering from the press, but it was a difficult route. Sirius told anyone who got close enough that he’d make a statement after he’d recovered, but just before they headed back up to the Atrium, he saw a wizard with shoulder-length white hair and bizarre rainbow-coloured robes come up on his flank. A little girl was tagging along behind him with large silver eyes and enough stringy blond hair to get lost in.

“Lord Black, Xenophilius Lovegood from the _Quibbler_ ,” said the reporter. “Is it true that you’re secretly Stubby Boardman?”

That question was strange enough to make Sirius stop in his tracks. “Stubby Boardman…? The lead singer of the Hobgoblins…?” he said, cocking his head. “I don’t remember that. I didn’t think my memory had gone that bad. Remus?”

“Sirius, you’re a terrible singer,” his friend reminded him.

“Right…Nope, it’s not me, sorry,” he said, leaving the disappointed reporter behind.


	29. Bonus: Ron

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Harry Potter will always be JK Rowling’s—or at least for life plus 70 years in the United States.
> 
> Bonus chapter! This bit didn’t really fit with the prior or following chapters, so I’m posting it separately. Enjoy!

On Monday morning, Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, and four Weasley boys walked into the Great Hall as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened. That lasted only until the arrival of the morning papers.

 

_SIRIUS BLACK INNOCENT—RELEASED FROM AZKABAN!_

_REAL TRAITOR PETER PETTIGREW CAUGHT BY HARRY POTTER!_

_AMELIA BONES: BLACK NEVER RECEIVED TRIAL!_

_FUDGE DISAVOWS, DUMBLEDORE APOLOGISES!_

_BARTY CROUCH SUSPENDED!_

_POTTER AND SISTER TO RECEIVE ORDER OF MERLIN!_

 

The previous day’s trial was so sensational that even Rita Skeeter didn’t need to fabricate anything, and her lead article was surprisingly accurate. She waxed quite purple at times and downplayed Hermione’s role, but by her standards, it was practically a gift. Even Harry’s quote to the press was reported correctly, although that may have been merely because there were dozens of witnesses.

As people started to read the headlines, there was a great commotion as people flocked to Harry to get his side of the story, and he told anyone who would listen that yes, the articles were mostly accurate, but that Hermione had helped out a lot, too. He also told Neville to thank his Gran for her support.

There was a noticeable change in tone as breakfast progressed, as people read through the articles and the chief source of noise changed from congratulations to awe to awkward comments and condolences when they got to the part where the last words of James and Lily Potter—and Harry’s reaction to them, courtesy of Rita’s quill—were reported.

Luckily, the Slytherins had the sense not to antagonise Harry after reading that article, although the entire hall heard Draco Malfoy proclaim that, “Mother always said Sirius was the white sheep of the Black Family.” He laughed at his own joke. “I guess that’s one mystery solved. He really was a blood traitor all along.”

Meanwhile, Fred and George started singing another verse of “Potter can catch anything!” about catching an evil rat. They later got detention from Snape for rhyming it with “evil bat.”

* * *

Ron Weasley was very frustrated as he had to get all the way through classes that day before he had a chance to talk to Harry and Hermione. It didn’t help that Malfoy and the other Slytherins were mocking him in the halls. It was all he could do to keep from throttling the little ponce at times. The other houses were sympathetic, but he still got tired of repeating their cover story over and over again. He barely even noticed it himself when he started embellishing his role in the affair just to feel a bit better about it.

Of course, part of him said he should consider himself lucky. The grief he was getting was nothing compared with Percy. One of the few things more embarrassing than an eleven-year-old boy finding out he’d been unwittingly sharing a bed with a thirty-one-year-old man was for it to happen to a fifteen-year-old boy, and Percy was high-strung enough as it was over the whole thing without people making rude remarks about it. Even he didn’t deserve that.

The chaos of the day also meant that it would be hard to get away from the crowds to talk to Harry and Hermione. But then again, they were very private people, so they might have something in mind. So Ron fought his way through the crush after their last class of the day and tapped them both on the shoulder.

“Hey,” he said. “Is there someplace we can talk alone?”

The two exchanged a look. “Clock tower?” Harry asked.

Hermione shook her head. “Too exposed. Let’s try to find a classroom upstairs.”

They doubled back, ducked around a corner, and climbed a couple of flights to lose the crowd. Ron wasn’t really sure where they were going, but Harry and Hermione had got pretty good by now at evading Harry’s fans, so they were soon on their own. Another couple of turns just to be sure, and they slipped inside an unused classroom, checking first to make sure Peeves wasn’t inside.

Ron eyed the strange pair over for a minute. “So…a cat, huh?” he said.

“Yeah,” Harry said.

“…How did that happen?”

“As far as we can tell, it was accidental magic. Do you remember how I said my muggle relatives didn’t really want me?”

Ron thought back and nodded.

“Well, I couldn’t stand them either. When I was five, I wanted so bad to run away that it just…happened.”

“But how’s that possible? Aren’t animagi like, really rare?”

“ _Registered_ ones are really rare,” said Hermione. “I looked up the numbers of known animagi before and after the registry was in place, and I bet there’s more unregistered ones than registered.”

“Professor McGonagall thinks there’s no real limits to accidental magic,” Harry added. “ _This_ is just really rare. The, uh…” He glanced at Hermione. “The Sorting Hat told me it’s happened twice before, but we don’t know who or when.”

“Wicked,” Ron breathed. “You’re relatives must’ve been pretty bad, though, if you turned into a cat to get away from them.”

Harry looked very uncomfortable at that. “Well…yeah, they were…” he muttered. “But please don’t mention it. It’s all been taken care of, and we don’t need people prying into it.”

“Sure thing, mate,” Ron said automatically before his thoughts turned to the thing that, rightly or not, had been increasingly bugging him about the whole affair: “I can’t believe they’re giving you both an Order of Merlin,” he grumbled a little.

“Yeah, me either,” Harry said, to Ron’s surprise. Harry sounded even more annoyed than he did.

“What?” Ron said.

“I don’t want it,” Harry said sharply.

“You don’t _want_ it?” Ron said in disbelief.

“I don’t deserve it.”

“What do you mean you don’t deserve it? You caught a Death Eater!”

“I wasn’t trying to. I was going to tell Professor McGonagall and let her take care of it. I’d never go after a Death Eater myself if I could help it. It was just bad luck the way it happened.”

Ron’s annoyance started to get the better of him. “Let me get this straight. You catch a Death Eater without even trying. Fudge gives you an Order of Merlin, and you call it _bad_ luck?”

“Unfortunately.”

“Well, then if you didn’t want it, why didn’t you just say so,” Ron said angrily.

“Ron…” Hermione chided.

“Because I knew Fudge’d never let me get out of it. I bet if he was Minister in 1981, he would’ve tried to give me a First Class for beating Voldemort.”

Ron squeaked in horror, but he quickly regained his composure when Harry and Hermione rolled their eyes at him. “Sorry. So if you didn’t want it, why’d you make them give Hermione one?”

“Because she’d tease me mercilessly about it, and I thought if I have to put up with it, then so does she.”

“Prat,” she said, whacking him in the arm.

“Besides, she deserves one as much as I do.”

“What? No I don’t,” Hermione protested.

“Sure you do. I told them I couldn’t have done it without you.”

“But Harry, that was a lie. I didn’t help catch Pettigrew.”

“Of course you did. That’s what the cover story says.”

“But you know that’s not what really happened. You did all of it.”

“No, I didn’t. I wouldn’t have gone in there at all without you backing me up. And you helped stop him from getting away, and you stopped Ron from grabbing him a couple times.”

Ron sighed at that. “And now they’re giving _both_ of you an Order of Merlin.”

“Ron, I—”

“No, I get it. I was the one screwing it up,” Ron said unhappily.

“No, _I_ was the one who screwed it up, Ron,” Harry insisted. “The plan wasn’t even to catch him. It was just to find out what he was and tell McGonagall. Anyway, it’s not your fault you didn’t know what was going on.”

“Yeah…” Ron grumbled.

“Look, if I could’ve thought of a reason to ask for one for you, I would have. I wanted to ask for one for Sirius just for putting up with ten years in Azkaban, but I didn’t think I could get the votes.”

“Sure you could. You’re Harry Potter!”

“ _No_ , I couldn’t. You saw how we barely got Sirius acquitted.”

“I bet you could have convinced them not to give you the award,” Hermione suggested.

“Hey, I’d just heard my parents’ last words!” Harry snapped. “I wasn’t thinking straight.”

No one spoke. Ron and Hermione both looked appropriately shamed by that. Harry slowly relaxed and turned away from them, cat-like, before Ron worked up the nerve to say something.

“Look, mate, I’m sorry,” he said. “I know I shouldn’t be mad. You’re a good guy—kinda strange, but still, good. But it’s kinda not fair, you know? You’re the Boy-Who-Lived, you’re rich and famous, you’re the youngest Seeker in a century, you’re an animagus, you caught a Death Eater already, _and_ they’re giving you an Order of Merlin. It’s not like I can ever top that. _Nobody_ can top that, except maybe Dumbledore.”

Harry gave him his trademark stare. Ron had never noticed until now just how cat-like he acted. “Yeah, well I don’t think that’s any more fair than you do,” he said. “I lose my parents, and suddenly, I’m this great hero, and now everybody I meet stares at my forehead. I’m okay with the Quidditch thing “cause that’s actually something I did myself. But rest of that stuff was just luck.”

“Luck? Really?” Ron asked sceptically.

“Yes, really. Boy-Who-Lived? Pure luck, or else something my parents did. Animagus? Accidental magic. Caught a Death Eater? Screwed up the plan. Order of Merlin? Blame Fudge. I know it’s hard to believe, but I actually like being a normal kid. That’s what I was in the muggle world…” He saw the look on his sister’s face. “Or tried to be?”

“Well, I don’t really get that, but alright, I guess,” Ron said. He wrestled with his next question and finally said conspiratorially, “So, you got any other secrets I should know about?”

Hermione gasped indignantly: “Ron, that’s not very polite.”

“Well, it’s just that I’m already in on the cat thing, so…”

“Sorry, but we try to keep our secrets pretty close under wraps,” Harry said. “You already know more about me than almost anybody, and it’s not like we’re not going to tell you where we live or anything like that.” He glanced at Hermione. Ron heard a strange crackling sound and saw Hermione shrug noncommittally. “I guess there’s one other thing we can tell you. It’s not super-secret like the cat bit, but we don’t really want too many people to know about it…” Ron nodded. “We can both do wandless magic.”

“You’re joking!”

“Nope.”

“But _both_ of you?”

Harry turned around and waved his hand. A book on the teacher’s desk lifted into the air. Hermione immediately followed suit.

“Bloody hell! How can you both be able to do that. I thought only really powerful wizards like Dumbledore could do wandless magic.”

“No, it doesn’t take that much power. It just takes a long time to learn,” Hermione said idly.

“It’s a lot different from using wands, though,” Harry added. “That’s why we always have trouble in Charms. Hermione’s actually better at it than I am. Probably anyone can learn it, though.”

“Wow. Can you teach me?”

“Well, we could, if you want to take the time. It took us two years to be able to do anything interesting with it.”

“Oh,” Ron said, disappointed. “Well, maybe I’ll try. Must be nice, though. I wish I had some kind of rare talent or something.”

Harry looked at his friend uncomfortably for a moment and said, “You don’t need to try to top anybody, Ron. Just do your best at whatever you’re good at.”

“But I’m not good at anything.”

“Sure you are. What about Quidditch? You’ve been helping Hermione with flying lessons, right?”

“Well, yeah…I guess I always thought I’d make a pretty good Keeper,” Ron answered hesitantly.

“So there you go. You got anything else? What else do you like to do?”

“Erm…I guess I’m good at chess, too.”

“Oh, you play?” Harry said interestedly.

Two hours later, Ron was feeling quite a bit better about himself, and Harry and Hermione looked a little shell-shocked.

“ _And_ Ron smoked us _both_ at chess,” Harry said when it was all over.

“Yep,” Hermione replied.


	30. A Meeting with the Marauders

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Mr. Squirrel and Ms. Rowling present The Accidental Animagus. All legal rights go to Ms. Rowling.

Dan and Emma Granger truly appreciated for the first time the perks of having a private Floo connection to Hogwarts. Though it was ostensibly for emergencies, there was nothing stopping Dumbledore from letting them use it for regular transport. Certainly, they could have drove up to Diagon Alley and Flooed from there into Hogsmeade, but why bother when they had a more direct route?

Dan and Emma realised as they tumbled into Dumbledore’s office that this was a very rare treat. Few magical parents ever saw Hogwarts Castle up close after they graduated, and parents of muggle-borns practically never did. Harry and Hermione were already there to help them up when they arrived and took a look around the Headmaster’s office. It was a crowded place, with portraits of previous headmasters filling the walls, books crammed in wherever they would fit, many strange silver instruments twittering non-stop on small tables, and a beautiful red and gold bird eyeing them intelligently from his perch. It was enough to make them wonder if Dumbledore had gone crazy just from living in this space all the time.

“Ah, good morning, Mr. and Mrs. Granger,” the old man said as they rejoined with Harry and Hermione. “And welcome to Hogwarts. I’m afraid I’ll have to spare you the tour, with the students out and about. I will personally escort you down to the gates. We have a private carriage reserved for you. Sirius and Remus should already be in Hogsmeade.”

“Thank you for allowing us this shortcut, Dumbledore,” Dan said.

“No trouble at all. Whenever you’re ready…” The Headmaster led them down a narrow stone staircase and past a large gargoyle out into the corridor. From there, it was a long stretch of counterintuitive stairs and hallways to reach the Entrance Hall. Dan and Emma had no idea how anyone could navigate in this place, but the students all seemed to handle it just fine.

Unfortunately, their presence did attract some unwanted attention. Seeing Harry and Hermione being escorted through the castle with two adults including a woman who looked quite a bit like Hermione herself, one of the older Slytherins put the pieces together and started yelling, “Hey, what are they doing here? Muggles can’t be in the castle!”

But the boy stopped and quailed when Dumbledore turned and sent him a harsh look. “ _All_ parents of students are welcome to visit the school at the invitation of a faculty member, Mr. Jugson,” he said warningly. The boy quailed and took a step back under his gaze. “It is not wise to leap to such rash judgements.”

Jugson turned and walked away very fast.

“My apologies,” Dumbledore said. “I believe you’ve already seen some of the unfortunate prejudices of our world.”

They continued in silence until they passed through the Viaduct and the Long Gallery and into the grounds. The rather inconvenient path to and from the carriage station was designed that way deliberately back when the castle was as much a political centre as a school. Any visitors would have to pass through the grandest parts of the castle in order to get to the important places like the Great Hall and the Headmaster’s office. In modern times, this was undermined somewhat by the fact that almost every witch and wizard in Britain lived there for seven years as a child, and the school received so few outside visitors anyway.

Sure enough, a carriage was waiting for them, set a short distance away from the other carriages that were taking the students to Hogsmeade—a carriage that apparently moved on its own, except…

“What are those things?” Dan said, stopping short.

“What are what?” Emma replied.

“Pulling the carriages.”

“Huh?” Emma, Hermione and Harry all said at once.

Emma added, “Dan, there’s nothing pulling the carriages.”

“Yes, there are. There’s these creepy horse-dragon things.”

“Thestrals, Mr. Granger.” Everyone jumped when Dumbledore spoke. “Quite unique and misunderstood creatures. They can only be seen by those who have seen death with their own eyes.” Dan’s eyes widened slightly as he ran through the relevant facts in his mind. “For this reason and because of their carnivorous diet, they are considered dangerous and unlucky by many wizards, but I assure you ours are quite tame—very much like horses.” The old man flashed a wry smile. “You may pet them if you like.”

“What, seriously?” Dan said, but he cautiously approached the carriage. Carefully sidestepping the beast’s leathery wings, he drew on his admittedly limited experience with horses and petted it on its invisible, scaly snout.

If Emma Granger didn’t know better, she would have thought her husband had gone mad, petting an animal she couldn’t see. In fact, considering her information came from Dumbledore, she wasn’t completely ready to rule it out. “There’s really something there, Dan?” she said.

“Yeah, come here,” Dan said softly. She approached, and he gently took her hand and laid it against a warm, scaly, moving surface that looked like thin air.

“Ah!” she jumped back in surprise. There was a whinnying sound as the thestral also drew back, causing Harry and Hermione to jump as well, but Dumbledore was right that the animal as quite tame. After all of the Grangers had had a turn petting the animal, they climbed into the carriage with Dumbledore and rode down the path to Hogsmeade.

The Three Broomsticks was a crowded, old-fashioned looking inn—smoky and noisy. But the crowd parted immediately for Dumbledore, even before they saw who was trailing behind him. They quickly reached the bar, and a formidable woman in furs and leather looked up and cast a friendly eye over the group.

“Morning, Headmaster, what’s up?” the woman said. “Those two look a bit young to be coming down here,” she motioned to Hermione and Harry.

“A special family gathering, my dear Rosmerta.” Dumbledore replied. “They will be taking a private room for six.”

“Oh, good, there you are.”

They turned around and saw Remus Lupin and Sirius Black standing in the doorway.

Sirius looked much better after a week in St. Mungo’s. He was still thin and leaned on Remus for support at times, but he was clean, his hair was combed, the colour had returned to his face, and the spark of life in his eyes was that much brighter. Even in his weakened state, he already looked much more handsome than he did at the trial—and much more energetic.

“Harry!” the man said as he stumbled forward to hug his godson. The boy seemed more ready for it this time, despite the public scene they were causing, but he still wound up patting Sirius awkwardly on the back. “Harry…” he repeated as he pulled away. “It’s amazing. You look so much like your dad, except—”

“With my mother’s eyes,” Harry finished at the same time as Hermione said, “With his mother’s eyes.”

Sirius looked between the two of them and let out a barking laugh. “You must get that a lot, don’t you?”

“Only from everyone who knew them,” Harry said.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Black,” Dan said, shaking the younger man’s hand.

“Please, call me Sirius. I feel old enough already with all these potions they’ve got me on.” Sirius finished reacquainting himself with the family, then looked to the bar. “Rosmerta, you still running this place?” he called.

“Why, if it isn’t the old troublemaker himself,” Rosmerta said cheekily. “I should lock up the firewhiskey. Come back for your usual, have you?”

“As much as I’d love to, I’m not sure my liver could handle it at the moment,” Sirius said regretfully. He still sounded a bit like he was tripping over his words. “Give us a lunch special for six and six-pack of butterbeer in a private room.”

“Coming right up. Down the hall, all the way to the end.”

A couple minutes later, Sirius, Remus, and the Grangers were seated around an ornate table in the back room, Rosmerta brought in the drinks, and Dumbledore took his leave for the afternoon, promising to leave the carriage to take them back.

“What is this ‘butterbeer’ stuff?” Emma asked suspiciously as she examined a bottle.

“Oh, don’t worry, it’s only two percent alcohol,” Sirius said, taking a swig. “Nobody sane drinks enough to really feel it.”

“A category that does not include him,” Remus quipped. “But it _is_ good stuff.”

“Alright, you two, just the one, then,” Emma told the children reluctantly.

“Ahh…it still seems like a dream half the time…” Sirius mused after taking another swig of butterbeer. “It seems like it was just yesterday you were terrorising the cat on your toy broom, Harry, and now you’re riding a real one, from what I hear.”

Harry grinned. The trial had largely overshadowed his Quidditch victory, but the team had congratulated him again soundly at the next practice. “That’s right,” he said.

Sirius shook his head in awe. “Boy-Who-Lived, Quidditch sensation, and an Order of Merlin coming…we have so much to catch up on…” A pained expression crossed his face. “Look, there’s one thing I need to know about first…Harry,” he said solemnly, “Andromeda told me that Dumbledore had sent you to live with your aunt and uncle after…well, at first…” He trailed off.

“She wanted to let him hear it from you,” Remus explained, “but Sirius was like a dog with a bone all week.” Sirius chuckled softly at that, and, to everyone else’s surprise, so did Harry.

“All I know about Lily’s sister is that she was a horrible human being and hated magic,” Sirius continued slowly. “I can’t imagine that was a very friendly place for you.”

Harry shook his head and softly said, “No, it wasn’t.”

“I don’t know why Dumbledore would want to send you _there_. It _was_ him, wasn’t it?”

The Grangers nodded. “Something about blood wards,” Dan said. “But they sure didn’t make the Dursley’s into nice people.”

“So they dumped you in the end?” Sirius asked Harry.

“No, I, uh…I ran away.”

“Ran away…?” Sirius said in surprise. “When you were, what, five?” Harry nodded. “Harry, did they hit you?” he said sharply.

Harry hesitated, until he realised that would give it away anyway. “Twice,” he admitted. “The second time was when I ran away.” He wouldn’t tell them about the cupboard if he could help it.

Remus looked angry enough at that, but Sirius, in his unstable state, let out an animalistic growl and said, “I’ll kill ‘em.”

“Whoa, easy, there, Sirius,” Harry said, holding up his hands. Dan and Emma made similar noises, and Hermione let out a yelp. “You just got out of prison. You don’t need to be going back into one.”

“They’re muggles, aren’t they? No one’ll ever catch me,” Sirius insisted.

“No, I mean you’d have to go _into_ a prison to do it,” Harry clarified. Sirius gave him a stunned look. “Aunt Petunia doesn’t get out for another three years. Uncle Vernon in four.”

At the man’s continued stunned look, Dan said, “I think you’ll find that _our_ legal system is quite competent, Sirius.”

Sirius started laughing again. “You already got it taken care of…” he mused. “Sorry, I got a little carried away there. None of that should ever have happened.”

“What’s done is done, Sirius,” Remus reminded him. “Andromeda told us how great Harry’s new family has been.”

Sirius took a deep breath and nodded. “I _do_ want to thank you for looking after him so well.”

“It’s our pleasure,” Emma said. “Harry’s a wonderful son.”

“I don’t doubt that,” Sirius smiled. He raised his bottle high in the air. “To family!”

“To family,” the rest of the table repeated.

“How was your week in recovery, Sirius?” asked Emma now that they were settled in.

“Quiet. Only Remus and the Tonkses to talk to. Andromeda restarted the mail forwarding to spare me getting mobbed by owls, although somehow that guy from _The Quibbler_ managed to slip a letter through to my hospital room asking if I was _sure_ I wasn’t Stubby Boardman. I don’t know what that was about.”

“I checked with Andromeda,” Remus said. “Apparently, Xenophilius Lovegood lost his wife about a year ago, and he wasn’t really all there to start with, so he hasn’t taken it very well.”

“Oh, that’s too bad,” Emma said. “Was he the one with the rainbow robes? I think he had a little girl with him.”

“Well, be that as it may, I can personally testify to Sirius’s lack of singing ability, so there shouldn’t be any more confusion.”

“Right. Now, enough about me,” Sirius said, clapping his hands. “I want to hear all about your life in the muggle world, and what you’ve been doing in Hogwarts this year.”

“Ah, well, that’s a long story,” Dan said. “It all started on the ninth of November, 1985…”

And so, Harry and his family each took turns telling his godfather and (he was told) his honorary uncle everything that had happened since he first showed up on their porch—only leaving out just what form he had first appeared in. Sirius and Remus jumped in with the occasional anecdote about their school days. After the first few minutes, Rosmerta had brought in their lunches, but the talking continued a long while after that.

“Wait a minute,” Remus said when they got to the end of 1987. “Did you say you started teaching yourselves wandless magic?”

“Yes,” Hermione said. “It took us a while, but we’ve both got pretty good at it.”

“Oh really?” replied Sirirus. “How good are we talking about?”

“Well…” she smiled, “here’s one I found last week.” Hermione closed her eyes and held out her right hand. She started whispering to herself, more and more intently, repeating an incantation under her breath. Suddenly, her eyes flew open, and she yelled out, “ _Lacarnum inflamari_!” At once, a ball of blue fire flashed into existence in her outstretched palm.

“Holy—!”

“Jesus—!”

“Bloody hell!”

“Merlin’s saggy—oof!” Remus elbowed Sirius in the side. Both wizards looked on in awe, while Dan and Emma looked a little more worried at their daughter playing with fire with her bare hands.

“Um, Hermione…?” Emma started.

“It’s the Bluebell Flame Charm,” she explained. “It feels like hot water to the touch, except the top is hot enough to boil water. And because it’s not that hot, it can burn all day without fuel. Here—” She carefully passed the little flame to her mother’s palm, who studied it like some small animal she wasn’t quite sure about.

“That is truly brilliant, Hermione,” a grinning Remus said. “I take it that shows up as accidental magic on the Trace?” Hermione nodded.

“Harry, can you do that?” asked Sirius.

“Not quite, but I’ve got most of the first year charms down.” And he proceeded to cut off a chunk of meat and pop it in his mouth, all without touching anything.

Sirius laughed. “Moony, I think I’m dreaming again. That’s amazing, Harry. Your mother taught herself some before she started school, but she was nowhere near that level.”

“Well, I think we got an early start,” Harry said with a smile.

The children started explaining about their self-imposed training regimen that had carried them through the past four years, along with the other highlights of their lives. The plates had been empty for some time by the time they got around to starting at Hogwarts and describing starting their real classes. One of those Sirius wasn’t very happy about.

“What! Snivellus is teaching!” he roared. The Grangers all jumped.

“Padfoot, down,” Remus chided. “Dumbledore hired him right after the war ended. Apparently he’d turned spy for the light. Not his most popular decision, I’ll admit.”

“Not _popular_? I can’t imagine that ‘man’ ever being fit to teach children. Harry, if he gives you any trouble, I’ve got the perfect spell—”

“Hold it,” Dan and Emma said, cutting him off.

Emma continued, “I won’t be having you telling my children to use magic against a teacher. I don’t know what little argument you’ve got with him, but would I hope we’ve taught them appropriate respect.”

“Sorry…” Sirius said, hanging his head.

“We went to school with _Severus_ Snape,” Remus explained. “He was a Slytherin, and we…got in a few fights. We didn’t like him, he didn’t like us—”

“He and James really hated each other,” added Sirius, “and I know he can hold a grudge. I don’t know if he’d actually try to hurt you, but I’d be carefully around him, Harry.”

Hermione shot Harry a look that seemed to say, _You see?_

“I don’t know, he’s never been any worse to me than the other Gryffindors,” Harry replied.

“Well, let’s hope it stays that way, but I’m sure he won’t be happy now that you’ve reconnected with us.”

“He did seem angrier than usual in class yesterday,” Hermione observed.

“That could have just been about the Quidditch match.”

“Yes, but you _know_ what happened there.”

“We still don’t know—”

“What happened at the Quidditch match?” asked Sirius.

Harry sighed and debated with himself whether to say anything. “During the Quidditch match, the control and braking charms on my broom were acting up. I kept almost crashing,” he said. The two other wizards’ eyes widened in horror. “ _Hermione_ thinks it _might_ have been Snape that did it. But I think it might have been Quirrell, the Defence Professor, or maybe a Slytherin with a dark artifact or something.”

Dan and Emma started. This was new information to them.

“I don’t know, I wouldn’t put it past Snape,” Sirius growled, “even if it was just to win the match and not to hurt you. He knew a lot about the Dark Arts, even in school.”

“But there was also that message he gave me,” Harry countered.

“What message?”

He explained about the message coded in the Language of Flowers and his speculation on its meaning.

“Lily,” Remus breathed. “It’s the only explanation. They were fond of each other for a long time, until they had a big falling out in fifth year. He tried to apologise afterwards, but he’d gone in too deep with the purebloods and Dark Arts by then. But knowing him, maybe he never got over her…”

“Harry,” Dan got them back on track. “If you think someone’s using magic against you—” Sirius nodded in agreement, but looked like he didn’t trust himself to speak.

“I’ve already got Professor McGonagall and Madam Hooch looking into it.”

“Good,” Remus said. “You might want to ask Professor Flitwick, too. But I think if you’re comfortable around Professor Snape, that’s good enough for us for the time being. Right, Sirius?”

Sirius growled again, but he said, “Just be careful around him. So what about the rest of your year?”

They told them about their friends at school and how the classes had been going. Hermione was at the top of the class in everything but Defence, where Harry edged her out, and Potions, where Draco Malfoy did. Harry was getting good marks in everything and was second in the class in Charms and Transfiguration. They had both managed to catch up with their peers in Charms by now, despite having to come at it from the opposite direction from most people and put in some extra work. Harry also mentioned the connections he had made with other children of prominent families and the growing rivalry with Nott and Malfoy. None of that surprised Sirius in the least.

“By the way, do either of you know anyone named Nicolas Flamel?” Hermione asked.

Sirius cocked his head, dog-like. “It sounds familiar, but I don’t remember where from. Why?”

“Dumbledore’s got a Cerberus penned up in the castle to guard something for someone named Nicolas Flamel.”

“Huh. That’s strange, even for him.”

“We think it’s the same thing someone tried to steal from Gringotts this summer,” said Harry.

“Well, I don’t remember anything either, sorry,” replied Remus.

The Grangers shrugged and moved on, finishing up by describing the Quidditch match in all its exciting detail.

“And the rest you know,” Hermione said afterwards.

“Harry, it does me so much good to see that you’re doing so well. I wish I could have been there to see it myself,” Sirius said wistfully.

“I can second that,” Remus added. “But we’re here, now, at least if you’ll have us.”

“Well, we could hardly turn you away,” Dan said with a smile. “And from what we’ve been told, Sirius is still technically Harry’s godfather.”

Sirius beamed. “And a damn good one from now on, I promise you. But Harry, what I want to know is how you managed to catch the Rat without knowing who he was. When Amelia Bones said _you_ found him, I was sure Remus had told you to look for him.”

“Which, of course, I hadn’t. What I want to know how you managed to scare him that much at the trial. He looked terrified of you, even by rat standards.”

Harry bit his lip and shifted uncomfortably. He really wanted to answer, but he couldn’t, for obvious reasons. Still he had a hunch it was important. He turned back to his family and whispered, “Mum, Dad, can I tell them?”

“What!” they whispered back in horror.

“Well, he is my godfather,” Harry whispered again.

“You’re not supposed to tell _anyone_ ,” Emma said.

“You already got Ron in on it,” Hermione added.

Remus, who picked up on part of the argument with his keen hearing, said, “Look, if it’s something you need to keep a secret, we understand.” Sirius reluctantly agreed.

Dan and Emma started to say that settled the argument, but Harry tried one more time. He jerked his head toward Sirius and whispered, “Please? He’s obviously one, too.”

That gave the Grangers pause. “What? Harry, are you sure?” Dan whispered.

“Positive.”

Dan looked up at the other two men. “Look, we, uh, I guess we _could_ talk about it, but this really does need to stay secret—”

At this, Sirius raised his wand and lit it, saying, “Marauder’s honour.” Remus quickly repeated the gesture.

“Uh, sorry?” Dan said.

“The Marauders,” Sirius said. “That’s what we called ourselves—the two of us, James, and the Rat. The greatest pranksters of our generation. We were all best friends back then, and no matter how many wild pranks we pulled on each other, the Marauder’s honour was always sacrosanct, at least until the Rat…anyway.”

Dan and Emma whispered to each other some more, but that seemed to be enough for them, if they would keep the secret for the sake of Harry’s birth father. They reluctantly nodded.

“Thanks Mum, thanks Dad…Here’s how.” Harry grinned and pushed himself with his hands, and a moment later, a black and white kitten had hopped up onto the table.

Remus jerked back so suddenly that his chair toppled over. “Bloody Merlin’s galloping gargoyles!” he said as he couldn’t figure out which figure of speech to use.

Sirius just sat open-mouthed for so long the Grangers thought he’d gone into shock. Then he pinched himself, snapped out of it, and started laughing hysterically, pounding the table with his fist.

It took some time for the two men to come to their senses. Harry transformed back to human and settled again into his chair.

“Harry James Potter,” Sirius stammered, “if your father could see you now, he would be so proud. How in the name of all that is magic did you manage to become an animagus at age eleven when it took us till we were fifteen?”

“Um…five, actually,” Harry said sheepishly, to more shocked looks. “We think it was accidental magic…That’s how I ran away from the Dursleys.”

“Accidental?” Remus said in disbelief. “Is that even possible?”

“Well, I did it…And the Sorting Hat said it’s seen it twice before, but it didn’t say who.”

“And here we thought you were just a famous Quidditch sensation. Actually, now that I think about it…” Sirius screwed up his face trying to remember. “Back when we were learning it, I think we came upon an obscure legend that Morgan le Fay was an animagus from birth. I doubt _that_ _’s_ true, but still, maybe she could be one of the two.”

“Maybe,” Hermione said brightly. “We’ll have to look it up. That would be great if we could find a record somewhere.”

“So, you said all four of you were animagi?” Emma asked.

“No, I’m not,” Remus said uncomfortably. “Not everyone can do it. But the other three—”

“We started learning in second year,” Sirius said. Hermione’s ears pricked up at this. “Finished in fifth year. Wormtail—that’s Peter—he’s a rat, as you know. James was a stag. We called him Prongs.” He made a gesture with his hands that looked like antlers. “And as for me—”

“You’re a dog, aren’t you?” Harry jumped in.

Sirius twitched in surprise, but he grinned, drew his legs up, and transformed into a large black dog sitting on his chair, eliciting a squeak of surprise from the Grangers. Harry managed not to flinch. He barked once and changed back. “How did you know?”

“It was kind of obvious, the way you were begging on Sunday. Plus the way you laugh like you’re barking. And that dog with a bone joke.”

“I’ll have to be more careful about that,” the dog-man replied. “I’m not registered, as I’m guessing you’re not, either. Anyway, I was Padfoot. Remus was Moony,” he added without explanation. “But you Harry, a cat! I mean, I could have hoped for a stag, but still, that is just too perfect. Harry, if you ever see that Rat again, eat him.”

“Harry, we don’t eat people,” Emma said quickly, “even if they’re evil.”

“Speak for yourself,” Sirius said. Remus looked very uncomfortable for a moment, but Sirius continued, “You know, we have to give him a Marauder name, Moony. We can’t very well keep him out now that he has an animal form, especially after he got rid of the Rat.”

“True, Padfoot,” Remus said. “What did you have in mind?”

The two men huddled together and whispered to each other for a minute, taking occasional glances at Harry. When they turned back to him, Sirius drew his wand and tapped Harry on each shoulder with it, saying, “By the power vested in me as the senior remaining Marauder, I, Mr. Padfoot, do hereby dub thee Mr. Ratsbane, Son of Prongs. May you use your power only on those deserving of mischief.”

“Let’s keep the mischief to a minimum,” Emma countermanded him. “We’ve had enough of it already for one year.”

“No harm in a little fun, Emma,” Sirius pouted.

“Besides, honestly, being Prongs’s son, I can’t imagine him not getting into something he’s not supposed to by Christmas,” Remus suggested.

“I think our children have reached their quota already,” Emma said dryly.

No one spoke for a moment, and an awkward silence started, until Dan saved them.

“We do hope we can see you at Christmas,” he said. “We’ll be in town—magically speaking, that is. We’re going to the Diagonal Theatre’s Christmas play.”

“Oh, right,” Sirius said. “Andromeda mentioned something about that. What’s all that about?”

“We’ve been talking to Lord Brocklehurst’s great-granddaughter, Mandy, and she recommended it,” Harry said. “They’re doing _The Wizard and the Hopping Pot_.”

Sirius looked perplexed. “The one where the hopping pot saves the wizard from a mob of muggles by eating them?”

“Apparently, that’s a more recent retelling,” explained Hermione. “The original is all about helping muggles. Cousin Andi’s seen the script, and she thinks it’s going to be pretty good.”

“Ah, yes, I remember now. Well in that case, I’ll be sure to be there—” He shot Remus a look. “ _We_ will.” He’d learnt over the years to trust Andromeda’s judgement.

Dan whispered something to Emma, and, after a little back and forth, she nodded happily. “You know,” she said, “Sirius—and Remus—we remember how great it was giving Harry his first real Christmas six years ago. We think it would only be fitting if we had the two of you over for Christmas this year so you can share it with Harry and Hermione. And, frankly, you both look like you’ve got a few Christmases to make up for.”

The children were quivering with excitement. Remus smiled weakly, but Sirius grinned broadly, tearing up a little. “That’s very generous of you Emma, Dan,” he said. “We’d love to join you for Christmas. Right, Moony?”

“If it’s not too much trouble,” Remus said with a very uncertain look. “I’m sure you have other family.”

“Just my parents,” Dan said. “They won’t mind. They’ll love to see more magic.”

“You told your parents…? Sorry, I’m no expert, but I don’t think you’re supposed to do that.”

“Technically, we’re not, but what the Ministry doesn’t know won’t hurt them.”

Sirius grinned melodramatically. “You rebels. So you _can_ bend the rules after all. I’m glad Harry met someone who can carry on the tradition.”

“Ha! _Bend_?” Remus quipped.

“Well, you know what I mean. Thank you all so much.”

“Our pleasure, Sirius. So we’ll see you both, then?” Emma said. “Christmas morning at eight, let’s say?”

Sirius nodded eagerly, but Remus looked reluctant.

“Is there something wrong?” Emma noticed his face. “If you have other plans—”

“No…no…It’s just…Well, it’s my…”

“Furry little problem?” Sirius suggested.

Remus glared at him for a moment, but he answered, “Yes…” and hung his head.

“I’m sorry, what’s wrong?” Emma said.

Remus hesitated again, but he nervously explained, “Well, I suppose you really do have a right to know. I’d really rather you didn’t spread this around, but…” He took a deep breath. “I suffer from a chronic illness—which is not dangerous as long as it’s managed properly, but which does require me to be confined away from other people once a month.”

The Grangers just looked at him, confused. The choice of words seemed odd. Why would he say “dangerous’ and not “contagious’?

Seeing the looks on their faces, Remus took another deep breath and said, “It’s…it’s lycanthropy.”

“Lycanthropy…?” Dan said. “You mean you’re a werewolf?”

“Yes…that’s right.” He braced himself for the inevitable reaction—even people who didn’t have a problem with werewolves on an intellectual level tended to react with fear and disgust in the actual presence of one—but it never came. Even the children wore looks of neutral appraisal.

“You mean like…full moon, silver bullets, and all that?” Dan asked. “Of course— _Moony_.”

Remus was caught between a chuckle and a groan. They apparently hadn’t read much about the subject. “The silver bit is a myth,” he said. “It doesn’t actually do anything. But, yes, on the night of the full moon each month, I unwillingly change into something like a large wolf with an insatiable desire for human flesh. And it is at that time that I—that the disease, or the curse, if you will, is contagious.

“I was bitten as a small child. It was only by extraordinary intervention on Dumbledore’s part that I was able to go to Hogwarts at all. Werewolves are considered…dangerous to be around. And during the full moon, that’s unfortunately quite correct. In the old days, I’d have to go somewhere far away from people and lock myself in.” He lowered his voice instinctively. “During our school days, that place was the Shrieking Shack at the edge of the village here. However—Sirius you won’t know this, but in 1984, a potion was invented that allows me to keep my human mind during the transformation.”

Sirius choked and spat butterbeer all over the table. “It does?” he said, coughing.

“It does.”

“Remus, that’s wonderful! That’s halfway to a cure!” he said, looking like Christmas had come early. He hugged his friend warmly.

“I can only hope,” the werewolf said with a small smile. “With the Wolfsbane Potion, I can just curl up somewhere private during the full moon. It’s much safer and less painful…when I can afford it, that is. The potion is very expensive and difficult to make.”

“Moony, you’ll never have to worry about that again,” Sirius said firmly. “I’ll pay for whatever you need.”

“You don’t—”

“Don’t you dare turn me down, Moony. Anyone with eyes can see this is the best thing that’s happened to you in the past ten years, and there’s no way I’m going to deprive you of that.”

“Alright, alright, I can tell you’re not gonna let me say no, Padfoot. Anyway, I can understand if Christmas is something of a problem,” Remus said softly.

“Well, when is the full moon—?” Dan started.

“Twenty-first of December.”

“Oh, well, that’s fine, then.”

“Really? You don’t have a problem with…?” Remus said in spite of himself.

“Why not? You said yourself that it’s only dangerous during the full moon.”

“Yes, I did. It’s just that most wizards…well, they’re afraid.”

Dan actually chuckled at that. “Remus, six years ago, we adopted a boy knowing full well that he was a target for dark wizards. By now, ‘werewolf’ barely even registers. We have no problem with you being a friend to us.”

Remus flashed a broad smile. It was so rare to find acceptance in the magical world. But of course, the one person he most wanted hear from had been watching silently through all this. “Harry…?” he stared, but his words failed him.

Harry blinked slowly, then smiled. Remus could see the feline traits showing through now that he knew what to look for. “Remus, I’m a cat, my godfather’s a dog, and my cousin’s a shape-shifter,” Harry said. “Why shouldn’t I be friends with a werewolf?”

“Not to mention,” Hermione added, “That we’ve got a friend who’s half-giant, a teacher who’s a cat, another one who’s half-goblin, and another one who’s _dead_. Dad and Harry are right. Being a werewolf shouldn’t matter at all.”

Remus shuddered and actually broke down and started crying for the first time in this whole affair. He reached over and hugged both children: “Harry, you have no idea how proud James and Lily would be. You can look past the prejudice, _and_ you found a family that can do the same. That’s truly a rare feat. And I’d love to join all of you for Christmas.”

Sensing the conversation was finally winding down as Remus collected himself, the group started picking up the plates and bottles. “Stay in touch, all of you,” Sirius commanded. “I want to hear about more great magical exploits from you, Pup—or, erm—Cub? And you too, uh…Kitten.”

Harry sniggered at the impromptu nicknames. Hermione seemed less enthused, but said nothing. “It’d be nice if we could _show_ you what we’re doing, instead,” Harry grumbled.

“Yes, it’s too bad we can’t practice with our wands outside of school,” his sister added.

“Oh, you can at my place,” said Sirius with a start. “The Ministry doesn’t police it in magical households. They can’t tell _who_ cast the spell, so they rely on parents to keep their kids in line—not that a lot of purebloods do.”

“What? But that’s not fair!” Hermione jumped in.

“That’s the point. Guess who wrote that law.”

“Well, fair or not, I’m not sure I’m comfortable with that,” Emma said. “I think we’d feel better if we could keep it above board somehow.”

“Well, if you insist, I might have an idea about that,” Sirirus said conspiratorially. “Remus, did you ever get that mastery in Defence?”

Remus grinned. “That I did.”

“Then that makes it easy. You can hire Remus as a private tutor and call it defence lessons. From what I’ve been hearing, no one will question that for the _great_ Harry Potter.” Harry rolled his eyes. “That way, the kids can demonstrate what they’re learning _and_ get some extra instruction.”

“Oh, that’d be wonderful,” exclaimed Hermione. “Please can we do that, Mum and Dad.”

“Yeah, can we? We’ve been wanting to start learning duelling,” Harry reminded them.

“I think that’s an excellent idea,” Dan told them. “We weren’t too happy that we’d have to wait five and half years to see what our children are learning, minus the wandless bit.”

“Great,” said Sirius as they left the room, rejoining the bustle of The Three Broomsticks. “In fact, why don’t you all stay at my place the week between Christmas and New Year’s. It’s the least I can do for my godson, especially after you’re opening your home to us.”

Dan and Emma wanted to remind Sirius that they were only having him and Remus over for a day, but they thought better of it. After all, the Tonkses had done the same for them, too. “I think we can make that work. Where are you staying?”

“Well, at first I thought I’d just leave everything and find my own place—get a flat in London, you know? I never wanted to set foot in my old house again after being disowned by my family. But Andromeda came and talked to me—I’m sure you know she can really drive a hard bargain—she managed to convince me that the best revenge I could get on my family was to take those seven centuries of Black dark magic and blood purity and turn it all on its head—embrace my lordship, turn the Blacks into a light side family, clean up the old house, everything. So that’s what I’m going to do…The fact that she wanted to be reinstated in the family probably had something to do with it.”

Remus snickered. Andromeda Tonks was pretty mild-mannered most of the time, but she had ways of getting what she wanted.

“I could disown Narcissa, too, but Lucius Malfoy’s richer than I am, so it won’t make much difference. I _will_ disown Bellatrix. And I’ll add Dora to the family tree, too. Having a half-blood on the Family Tapestry will have my mother rolling in her grave all by itself.” Sirius barked with laughter to the uneasy looks of the Grangers. “Anyway, it’s Twelve Grimmauld Place in London—but you won’t find it directly. It’s unplottable. Just look for Number Eleven.” Then, he turned and sized up his ragged friend. “And Moony, I insist you come and stay with me.”

Unnoticed by most, two redheaded boys sitting at the bar choked on their butterbeer and spun around whispering, “Moony?”

“Sirius, I couldn’t.”

“Nonsense. It’s no less than James would have done for you and _did_ do for me.”

That one really got to Remus, but the werewolf still looked reluctant.

“Alright, I insist you come and help me clean the place up. According to Andromeda, it’s been empty for six years, and Merlin only knows what’s breeding in there by now. I might have a heart attack if I run into a boggart, and I’m gonna need all the help I can get to have it ready for the New Year’s party.”

“New Year’s party?”

“That’s what I said.”

“Since when are you having a New Year’s party?”

“Since right now. Invite your friends,” he added to Harry and Hermione, who giggled. “So what do you say, Moony?”

“Alright, you got me, Padfoot,” he said slowly.

The two boys at the bar jumped and whispered, “Padfoot!” They started jostling each other.

“You got the map?” One said to the other. “Please tell me you’ve got the map.”

“Of course I’ve got the map,” the other boy said. “Had to bring it, just in case.” The two boys did have permission slips for Hogsmeade, but leaving the option of smuggling contraband back into the castle open called for something a little surer.

“It’s been great meeting you both, Sirius, Remus,” Dan said as the Grangers made to head out to the carriage.

“Likewise, Dan, Emma, Hermione…Harry,” Sirius responded. And after another round of handshakes, hugs, and goodbyes, the Grangers left the pub.

And as soon as they did, two rambunctious redheaded boys ran up to the two wizards.

“Excuse us, Lord Black—” the first said breathlessly.

“Mr. Lupin. We couldn’t help—” the second continued.

“Overhearing—”

“What you—”

“Were saying—”

“I take it you’re the infamous Weasley Twins?” Remus asked.

“The two and only,” the first twin said with a grin.

“We heard your little nicknames—”

“And if you’re really—”

“Moony and Padfoot—”

“You’ll know what to do with this.” The last line was delivered by both twins as they held out a large, but blank piece of parchment. The two men’s eyes widened.

“Well, would you look at that, Moony,” Sirius said. “Didn’t think I’d ever see this again.”

“I always figured Filch’d burnt it, Padfoot,” Remus replied.

“Apparently not. Since these two have it, I’m guessing it still works.”

With wide grins, the two Marauders touched their wands to the parchment and said in unison, “I solemnly swear that I am up to no good.”

Ink lines fanned out from their wand tips, spreading out of the edges of the parchment, and began to form words:

 

_Messrs. Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs_

_Purveyors of Aids to Magical Mischief-Makers_

_are proud to present_

_THE MARAUDER_ _’S MAP_

 

Fred and George immediately dropped to their knees and kowtowed to their heroes, exclaiming, “We’re not worthy! We’re not worthy!”

Sirius and Remus both howled with laughter.

“We never thought we’d get a chance to meet you,” one of the twins said.

“This map has been the secret of our success,” the other added.

“Fred Weasley—”

“And George Weasley—”

“At your service,” they said together with another bow.

Sirius laughed again. “Oh, this is great,” he said. “I’ve got to show this to Harry.” At that, he ran out the front door, calling, “Dan, Emma, could I borrow Harry for a minute?”

Sure enough, a minute later, Harry came back in the door with Sirius. They approached the Twins.

“Messrs. Weasley and Weasley,” Sirius said formally. “I would like to introduce you to Mr. Ratsbane…Son of Prongs.”

Fred’s and George’s jaws hit the floor.

“Harry, this is our greatest creation,” Remus said. “The Marauder’s Map. It shows everything that happens in the castle and all of the secret passages.”

“Wow,” Harry said as he examined the tiny dots moving about on the parchment, each marked with a tiny name.

“It’s been a brilliant help to us…Mr. Ratsbane,” Fred said.

“Indeed…” Then a look of horror crossed George’s face. “But if you’re Moony, Padfoot, and Prongs Jr,” he said astutely, “then Wormtail was…”

“Our mutual acquaintance, the Rat,” Sirius confirmed harshly.

“That is just sick!” Fred spat.

“Not worthy to attach his name to this sacred document,” George added.

“No, you’re quite right,” Sirius agreed. “Do you remember the spells to modify it, Moony?”

“I believe so, Padfoot.”

The two men waved their wands over the map, muttering an incantation, and Remus said, “Mr. Moony and Mr. Padfoot have found Mr. Wormtail to be guilty of treason of the highest order: a breach of the Marauder’s Honour, leading to the murder of Mr. Prongs. As such, Mr. Wormtail is hereby immediately and irrevocably expelled from the Marauders.”

Suddenly, the map shuddered, and the ink swirled violently. Harry could have sworn he heard a pained squeaking sound emanating from it. When it settled down again, the first line read, _Messrs. Moony, Padfoot, and Prongs._

“Much better,” Remus said.

“Agreed,” Fred and George said. They tapped their own wands to the map and wiped it with a quick, “Mischief managed.” Then they whispered to each other for a moment. “Mr. Ratsbane,” they addressed Harry.

“As much as it pains us—” Fred started.

“And it really does—”

“We think this is rightfully yours.” They handed the map to him.

“We just hope you might let us borrow it once in a while.”

“Uh, sure, thank you—” Harry started.

“Now hold, on,” Sirius stopped them, snatching up the map. “I’m the godfather here, Harry, and it would be very irresponsible of me to entrust you with this kind of power…” He grinned and handed the map over. “So don’t get caught.”


	31. Fun with Padfoot and Moony

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: JK Rowling is owned by Harry Potter—no, wait, switch that.

_Seven Days in the Life of Padfoot and Moony_

_Sunday_

The moment they walked in the doors of Number Twelve Grimmauld Place, Sirius and Remus could _feel_ the evil clinging to them. Even a normal magical household would attract quite a few magical pests after being boarded up for six years, but with so much dark magic permeating the air, it was much worse.

“Ah, home sweet home,” Sirius grumbled. “Remind me again why I came back here?”

“To tear down everything your parents worked for?” Remus suggested.

“Right…well, looks there’s a lot of tearing down that needs to be done.”

That was an understatement. Sirius shuddered as he remembered his last memory of this place: his mother chasing him out the door screaming about all the dark curses she would use on her blood traitor of a son when she caught him, with a promise that his father would do him even worse. He hadn’t thought Twelve Grimmauld Place could get any worse than that, but it had in spades. To start with, it smelled like something had died in here—probably a lot of somethings. And from the twittering and chattering, there were probably a lot of somethings _living_ in here, too: doxies, pixies, and fairies nesting all over, he was sure, chizpurfles burrowing into the magical appliances, and it would be a miracle if there weren’t bundimuns rotting the foundation, plus whatever mutants his parents had created that had run wild with exposure to dark magic.

And on top of that, the house was one big booby-trap on a good day. Paranoid and a little off their rockers even before he’d left, both Orion and Walburga Black liked to jinx things at random whenever they felt like it. And there was no accounting for their terrible taste.

“I can’t believe I really came back here,” he said. “This place is every bit as dark and ugly as I remember it, and then some.” He kicked an umbrella stand made from a troll’s leg with a loud thud.

Suddenly, a screeching voice sounded: “ _Thieves! Thieves and blood traitors! Mudbloods and filth! Begone from these hallowed halls_!”

Sirius froze in his tracks and let out a high-pitched squeak: “Mother?”

A pair of moth-eaten curtains flew apart further down the hall revealing a portrait of an irate old woman. Despite her own screaming, she seemed to have heard Sirius’s voice because she yelled even louder: “ _Yoooou! Blood traitor! Abomination! Shame of my flesh_!”

Remus was still stunned. “What the hell—” the werewolf started.

“Dammit, woman, you nearly gave me a heart attack!” Sirius yelled as he approached the painting. “But I bet you’d like that, wouldn’t you!” His weakness and recovery was momentarily forgotten, and a surge of anger he’d long forgotten he possessed came forward. “Shut up!” he grasped the picture frame and tried to lift it off the wall.

But the painting wouldn’t budge and only seemed to yell even more vile curses after the attempt. As his mother screamed out a list of his every supposed failure, he winced under the assault and tried to lift the portrait again. Nothing. It must be stuck to the wall. He drew his wand and tried to unstick it. Still nothing.

“Remus!” he yelled over the racket.

“Lemme try!”

Remus tried a bunch of advanced anti-jinx spells, but the painting remained firmly stuck to the wall. In frustration, Sirius started throwing any spells at it he could think of. Burning his mother’s face off like she had done to him sounded like a good idea, but the spell just bounced off. In fact, he soon learnt that anything useful, from unsticking spells to silencing spells, just bounced off. Maybe he was out of practice, but that painting sure seemed to be doing a good job of fighting back.

The painting started cackling at his failure. An enraged Sirirus cast enough sparks at it that he was lucky the whole hallway didn’t catch fire, but the portrait remained unharmed. He still didn’t have a clue how the spell work on the things had been done, but he did notice that the curtains surrounding the painting were flapping in a non-existent breeze in perfect time with the shouting.

Remus gave up. “What _is_ this thing?” he yelled with his hands clapped over his sensitive ears.

“Some kind of _stupid_ burglar alarm,” Sirius yelled back. Then, he lunged forward and he tried to force the curtains back together. It was as if the force of the shouting was holding them apart. “Moony, help me!”

His friend didn’t need to be told twice. With each of them grabbing one heavy curtain, and with great effort they managed to force them together, and the portrait fell silent.

“Phew, well, _that_ _’s_ better,” Remus said.

“Yeah, for now,” Sirius said as he tried to catch his breath. “I doubt it’ll stay that way for long. Let’s try not to wake her up again. We’ll have to sort it out later…Well, let’s get started. It looks like we’ve got our work cut out for us.”

The two wizards took quiet, careful steps down the dim hallway. They could hear skittering in the shadows, and they swatted at cobwebs as they walked through them. Layers of dark magic swept across them as they advanced. A pair of serpent-shaped candelabras started shooting feeble fireballs at them that probably would have been a serious threat if the charms hadn’t nearly run down. Remus stopped them with a quick flourish of his wand, but he didn’t think they’d be so lucky with the other jinxes.

They’d only advanced a few steps, though, when they heard a series of thuds and a shuffling sound accompanied by low, croaking mutterings. Something was coming down the stairs. Remus stepped in front of Sirius, putting a finger to his lips and whispering “ _Lumos_.” He jumped forward and whipped his wand toward the stairwell.

“Thieves defiling Mistress’s house? Kreacher will show them. Yes he will.”

“Kreacher?” Sirius growled. “Are you still living?”

A very old house elf with sagging skin and ears and mad, bloodshot eyes froze on the stairs, gazing at Sirius in disbelief, a continued muttering to himself. “No!” he grumbled. “Bad blood traitor Master has returned. He should not befoul Mistress’s house. Oh, what she will say. No, Kreacher is dreaming. Kreacher is having a nightmare.”

“Unfortunately for both of us, you’re not,” Sirius snapped. Even the family elf was worse than he remembered. He was filthy, dressed in nothing but a loincloth, and had obviously given up on cleaning ages ago. “I’m back, so you’re gonna have to get used to it.”

“Kreacher’s Mistress will not approve,” the elf croaked back. He started shuffling closer down the stairs. “Mistress disowned Bad Master, cast him out of the family. She will not welcome him.”

“Well, too bad for her. Your Mistress is a painting, and I’m the last of the Blacks, so I’m your master now, and you have to do what _I_ say.” Sirius cracked a slight grin at that.

“Kreacher won’t!” He started yelling. “Won’t won’t won’t! Kreacher will go to Mistress Narcissa. Kreacher won’t go to blood traitor Master Sirius. Won’t won’t won’t—”

“Good Lord, he’s gone mad,” Sirius said loudly. “Maybe I _will_ send him to Narcissa. She deserves him.”

“She won’t take him,” Remus replied. “I’m sure they’ve already got an elf.”

“Won’t, won’t, won’t, won’t—”

“Then I’ll free him. If we’re lucky, maybe the shock’ll kill him.” Kreacher was so worked up that he didn’t even seem to notice this.

“And if you’re unlucky, he’ll be free to attack you,” Remus reminded him.

“Won’t, won’t, won’t, won’t—”

“Kreacher, _shut up_!” Sirius yelled.

The elf clutched at his throat, gagging, and looked up in horror, but fell silent, though he kept mouthing insults and stamped his feet.

“Well, at least we know he’s definitely mine,” Sirius deadpanned. “So what do _you_ think I should do with him?”

“I don’t know. Try setting him cleaning for now. If we’re lucky, maybe he’ll snap out of it.”

“Fine,” he sighed. “Kreacher, I order you to help us clean up this house.”

The elf looked up with an expression of deepest loathing and, still silenced, mouthed something that was clearly meant to be, “Kreacher must do as Master wishes,” except accompanied by a few choice insults that would have made a sailor blush.

The work was slow going—and dangerous. Sirius still needed to stop and rest frequently. The magical grime was so thick here that normal cleaning spells barely had any effect, and it was only because Remus the dark creature expert was there that they were able to recognise all of the things that tried to bite them. At one point, they were attacked by three nasty chameleon ghouls at once and were forced back down the stairs before they won out. That largely put them off exploring. Even on the ground floor, they had to beat a hasty retreat from the dining room when the curtains sprang to life and tried to suffocate them, which was compounded by the swarm of pixies that flew out of them.

The surviving Marauders bedded on mats in the kitchen that night, setting up alarm charms in case Kreacher or something worse wandered too close. They also put silencing charms on the area so that Sirius’s screams wouldn’t wake anything up. Remus had sat by him a couple of nights in the hospital, and the screams were as haunting as anything. Being in this gloomy place wouldn’t help. The kitchen was actually the easiest space to clean. Even Orion and Walburga Black knew the importance of not casting too many curses around the food, and they could just junk most of what was in there. The rot had kept away all but the hardiest pests and had long since crumbled to dust itself, and most of the magical appliances were a total loss once the chizpurfles had got through with them and moved on. Sirius and Remus started a junk pile with them in the alleyway in back of the house.

The two men fell asleep that night making plans to wage war on the House of Black—plans which largely consisted of digging in at the kitchen and working their way up.

* * *

_Monday_

“Padfoot, maybe we should get some professional help with this.”

“Come on, Moony, we fought Voldemort together. I think we can handle my house.”

“I’m not so sure.”

The kitchen needed quite a bit more cleaning even after making it safe enough to sleep in, not to mention that rats and tarantulas kept wandering in from other parts of the house. Sirius was still so jumpy around rats that he made a mess of them every time he saw one. Kreacher seemed to have shacked up in the boiler room and resisted all serious attempts to do anything with that. The pantry was cleaned out of everything that was past its use-by date, which included about half of Kreacher’s meagre food supply, which already seemed like it was barely enough to keep the elf alive. Sirius had swallowed his pride and allowed Remus to escort him to the grocery store. (“I don’t think it’s safe for _anyone_ to be in that house alone,” he’d said.)

The Floo in the kitchen was so choked with ash and dust that it was quite possibly an explosion hazard, and they would need to have a workman come in to have it reconnected. And the small toilet off the kitchen was truly frightening in ways that the pair could not fully describe. Something had repeatedly sprung a leak and then become disgustingly gunked up, and there were varieties of fungus in there that Remus had never even heard of, some of which proved to be carnivorous. Sirius’s preferred solution of “Oh, dear sweet Merlin, kill it! Kill it with fire!” proved to be ill-advised, since they were in the basement, the ventilation wasn’t working right, and Remus was pretty sure there was something toxic in the resulting smoke.

“You almost landed back in the hospital, and it’s only the second day,” he chided.

“So I’m out of practice. It can’t get much worse.”

Remus groaned loudly. That was the one thing not to say in this situation.

* * *

_Tuesday_

“Padfoot, I’m not going to be able to stay here on Thursday, and I don’t think you should either. It’s dangerous enough with two of us here.”

The dining room had been _much_ worse than the kitchen. Practically everything seemed to be infested, booby-trapped or both. The one bright spot was that they rooted out that nest of giant tarantulas. On the other hand, they got pummelled by heavy bolts shooting out of an old grandfather clock. They also woke up the portrait of Walburga Black multiple times.

“Why? What’s on Thursday?” Sirius asked as he nursed a bruise on his forehead.

“The full moon, remember?”

“Oh, right. But what about your potion?”

“I didn’t start it early enough this month. I’ll only be partially tamed. I won’t be able to stay in a populated area.”

“Ah…well…we’ll have to do something about that, won’t we. What do you say we go to the Shrieking Shack for old times’ sake? I hear the people in Hogsmeade are starting to question whether it’s really haunted.”

Remus sighed. “Fine. If it’ll get you out of this death trap for a day, I’m game.”

“No, you’re a hunter.”

Remus chuckled. That was one he hadn’t heard in a long time—and cleverer than usual, especially given his friend’s current state.

They were interrupted from their work by a hooting from the window, where they saw a beautiful snowy owl looking into the dining room disapprovingly.

“Who’d be writing you _here_ ,” Remus wondered.

Sirius shrugged and took the note from the owl. He opened it, saw two types of handwriting interspersed, and glanced down at the bottom. “Oh, it’s from the cubs,” he said, perking up. He read the letter aloud, his voice cracking slightly:

 

_Dear Sirius (and Remus if you_ _’re there),_

_We hope you_ _’re feeling better. You still looked a little under the weather on Saturday. And we hope the cleaning isn’t giving you too much trouble. Professor Quirrell told us about all the magical pests that can congregate when a magical house is abandoned._

_Things are settling back down in the castle. It was pretty crazy last week right after the trial, but now, it_ _’s mostly just back to classes. We’ve been watching the Map a little. It’s really neat, but Hermione doesn’t want to use it to sneak out._

_Maybe we can use it to avoid Harry_ _’s fans the next time he catches a Death Eater._

_Ha ha, Hermione._

_Sirius, Cousin Andi sent some charmed, eyes-only Wizengamot stationery keyed to her and to our parents so we can send messages about our secrets—you know which. Could you please send us some that_ _’s keyed to you? We’ll be getting some keyed to us over Christmas hols. Then we’ll be able to write more freely. Thanks._

_Love from Harry and Hermione_

“Nice of them to write so soon,” Sirius said cheerfully.

“Of course, when they want something,” Remus said wryly.

“Who cares? I can probably send them some stationery this week. Actually, I think the mirrors are around here somewhere. Those would be more secure. Keep an eye out for them. We can give them one for Christmas.”

“I think they’d like that. I’ll—”

They were interrupted by the curtains springing to life again.

“Back! Back I say!” Sirius barked. Then he changed into Padfoot and started chewing on them.

* * *

_Wednesday_

“Padfoot, this isn’t going to work.”

“What’s wrong, Moony? I thought we were doing pretty well. No serious injuries today. I think we’re getting the hang of this cleaning thing.”

“Yes, I know we _can_ clean the place by ourselves,” an exasperated Remus said, “but we’re still not going to finish the dining room today, and there’s no way we’ll have the whole place safe for guests by Christmas.”

“Hmpf,” Sirius pouted. “Thanks for the vote of confidence.”

The two men glared at each other in a dog-like dominance contest. In the old days, Sirius would usually win those, but with his recovering health, he broke first. “Fine,” he grumbled. “I know. I’ll ask Andromeda to come and help. She was always great at household spells. I’ll drop her a line now and ask if she can stop by tomorrow.”

“We’re going to be away tomorrow,” Remus growled.

“Well, maybe just a consultation, then,” Sirius told the werewolf sheepishly. ( _There_ was a joke he hadn’t used in a while.)

“And if she says we need professional help, you’ll hire someone?”

“Sure, you win, Moony.”

* * *

_Thursday_

It took Andromeda all of twenty minutes to say, “You two are going to need professional help.” In retrospect, she was probably just stringing them along after the first five.

* * *

_Friday_

In all honesty, it hadn’t been that hard for Sirius to walk into the magical cleaning company in Diagon Alley and ask them to come out for an estimate. It was only his pride that slowed him down.

When the witch came out to inspect the premises the next day, he started to wonder if he’d been mistaken to wait so long, as a tall, attractive woman with a round face and golden hair in soft curls stood at the door. But even more surprising was the fact that she looked very familiar.

“Vicky?” Sirius cried in disbelief.

“Sirius Orion Black,” Vicki said with a smile. “What is it, Lord of the House of Black, now? And to think I thought you were cool for getting _out_ of this pigsty.”

It was her, alright: Victoria McKinnon, last of the McKinnons, Marlene’s cousin who had been out of the country when the Death Eaters came calling on a post-graduation trip with some friends. She’d been three years behind the Marauders at Hogwarts, and Sirius still remembered her as the little girl who always tagged behind Marlene, Lily, and Mary like a lost puppy.

“Victoria?” Remus asked breathlessly, leaning against the wall after his ordeal the previous night.

“Hello, Remus,” she waved to him. “Still hanging around with this lunatic?”

“Hey, I resemble that. Vicky, when the hell did you grow up so much?” Sirius stammered. She definitely wasn’t so little anymore, he thought. She looked a lot like Marlene, in fact, and she seemed to have become just as snarky.

“Well, you’ve been out of the loop for a while,” she said. “Sorry about that by the way. I’d always wondered why you’d supposedly turned evil…Well, are you just gonna stand there looking stupid, or are you going to invite me in?”

That got Sirius moving. Unfortunately, he tripped and woke up his mother. To her credit, Vicky didn’t run away when the portrait started screaming at him for bringing more blood traitors and “impure” women into the house, nor when they gave her a tour and showed her the full extent of the filth. In fact, she seemed to get more and more gleeful as time went on, seeing the house as both a challenge and a huge moneymaker.

“And that’s the whole thing,” Sirius said when they were done. “What do you think? Can you do it?”

“Of course, we can do it,” she snapped. “But, hoo, boy, this is gonna cost yeh. We’re gonna need everybody, _and_ some contractors. Let’s see…overtime, hazard pay…How do you plan on paying for this?” she grinned.

“I assume _large_ piles of galleons are still tender,” Sirius deadpanned. “Unless you’d like to negotiate something _different_ ,” he added.

Remus elbowed him in the ribs.

“Galleons will do fine,” Vicky said primly. “And you want this done right away?”

“The sooner the better.”

“Great. I’ll get the crew and come back in an hour.”

“I look forward to it.”

Vicky walked out the front door and apparated away. Sirius grinned dreamily after her.

“You were staring, Sirius,” Remus said.

“So?”

“You should be careful about letting your emotions run away from you so soon after Azkaban,” he advised him.

Sirius ignored him.

Sure enough, Vicky came back an hour later leading a team of no fewer than twelve witches and wizards, all of them specifically trained in household charms and one of them in actual curse-breaking, and they proceeded to attack Number Twelve Grimmauld Place with the speed and skill of Aurors in battle. Sirius and Remus tried to help, but they were mostly left in the dust by the professionals. Kreacher just stood around staring dumbly for a while, then started making increasingly vile comments whilst trying to stop Sirius from throwing anything away. He eventually caused so much trouble that Sirius banished him to his den in the basement.

In the meantime, the Marauders watched, amazed, as the cleaning crew made another pass and got what was left of the kitchen looking spotless, if still dreary, and finished cleaning the dining room as well that day, with an estimate to finish the whole house in another week or so. With a generous overtime payment from Sirius, they were even convinced to come in the next day to start in on the drawing room on the first floor.

Meanwhile, Sirius also received a _very_ interesting letter that day:

 

_Dear Sirius,_

_Thank you for the stationery. I_ _’m using it now because I had a very private question to ask you. You see, ever since I first met Harry, I’ve wanted to become an animagus myself. It seems like a really useful skill to have. I know I probably won’t be a cat, but I still want to learn the transformation. Professor McGonagall told me that she would be willing to help if I had a good enough reason—like my brother being a target for dark wizards—but I think she’s stalling. I think she thinks it’s more appropriate for a N.E.W.T.-level student. But since I’ve learnt so much wandless magic already, I really think I could do it sooner._

_Before you ask, yes, our parents are okay with this—with my learning the transformation, anyway. I_ _’m sure they’d prefer that I learn it from Professor McGonagall, but since you and Harry’s birth father learnt it in school on your own without getting hurt, I was wondering if you would be willing to teach me. I don’t really know how that would work since we’re not in the same place most of the time, but I’d really appreciate it if you could help me learn it._

_Good luck with the cleaning. Cousin Andi told us you_ _’re getting professional help, and I think that’s a very good idea._

_Love from Hermione_

 

Sirius smiled broadly. It seemed there was more to little Hermione than met the eye. And with her wandless magic skills, he had no doubt she would be a quick study. He wondered for an embarrassingly long time how he might be able to pull off teaching her before he remembered the mirrors, and then he got his trademark Marauder’s grin that struck fear into the hearts of first-years and Snivellus. Yes, that would be the perfect thing to surprise her with at Christmas.

* * *

_Saturday_

“We need the biggest bottle of doxycide we’ve got up here!”

“Where are all these rats coming from?”

“Ahhhhh!”

“It’s a boggart! _Riddikulus_!”

“What the hell? Biting tweezers?”

The drawing room turned out to be even worse than the dining room. That’s where the greatest number of dark artifacts were (everyone hoped), proudly displayed in glass cabinets, so that was naturally the room that attracted the most trouble. The drawing room alone, they soon realised, would be a full day’s job.

Despite this being much faster than he and Remus could have hoped to do, Sirius was not in a good mood. This may have had something to do with the fact that he had to sign off on every dark artifact that was taken away for purification or disposal.

“Can’t you just pitch all that stuff?” he asked Vicky when there was a lull in the work.

“Sorry, company policy. Can’t pitch anything that’s not obvious trash without checking with the owner.”

Or it might have been the fact that that ugly tapestry proved as impossible to remove as his mother’s portrait. And repair charms wouldn’t even fix it either. He’d probably have to call a proper enchanter to be able to modify it.

He was contemplating his options grimly when the curse-breaker came up to him with yet another dark artifact, a heavy silver locket with a large “S’ on the front. “I’m not sure what’s up with this one,” he said. “I can’t get it open. It’s definitely got dark magic on it, but it’s not active, and I can’t even figure out the activation condition. Could it be a family heirloom, family spells, anything like that?”

“Hmm, I don’t recognise it. I don’t remember ever seeing it when I lived here.”

“I has an “S’ on it,” Remus said, wandering up behind him. “Is that any of your ancestors?”

“Not for the past couple of generations. Maybe they bought it. Well, I sure don’t have any use for it. You can toss it with the others.”

“Sorry, but I’m not comfortable leaving dark magic lying around that I can’t identify,” the curse-breaker said. “Do you have anywhere safe you can store it? Or someone who can dispose of it safely?”

“Oh, I’m sure I can find _something_ ,” Sirius grumbled. He grabbed the locket with one hand, but when he did, he felt a small twinge of magic. Dark magic.

Most dark objects did a pretty good job of hiding their magic. After all, a curse wasn’t much good if the victim could sense it coming. But for people with a keen sense of magic, like someone who had practised a lot at wandless magic, or an animagus, or a werewolf, one could often pick up on the fact that there was something not right about it.

And there was something very not right about this locket.

“Whoa, Remus, check this out.” He handed the locket to his friend.

“Yeah, I feel it, too,” he said after a moment. “It’s not strong—pretty weak in fact. Most people wouldn’t notice it unless they wore it all day. But it’s really…twisted.”

“That’s what I thought,” Sirius said, for once living up to his name. “Let’s take it down to the kitchen and get a closer look,” he said pointedly, then to the curse-breaker, “Thanks for your help. We’ll take care of this.”

The pair shut themselves in the basement. They didn’t know what this was, but they’d done more than their share of dealing with dark objects in the war. Under a standard dark detection spell, courtesy of Sirius, the locket glowed a sickly, but unidentifiable green.

“Well, it’s definitely dark magic,” he said sarcastically. “Moony, why don’t you put that mastery of yours to good use?”

The other man nodded. Sirius set the locket on the table, and Remus cast one of his strongest dark detection spells on it. An aura of black cloud briefly surrounded it.

The two Marauders looked at each other in horror and both took one large step backwards.

“This is _really_ dark magic,” Remus said.

“Yeah,” Sirius replied, “like let-Dumbledore-handle-it dark.” He smiled a little. “He owes me a favour, anyway.”

Remus smirked at that. “True, but he’ll want as much information as we can give him for something like this…whatever this is. We _need_ to know where this came from.”

“Well, I have no clue. I never saw it before.”

“Someone in your family must have brought it in here,” Remus observed. “Probably after you left—Maybe Kreacher knows.”

Sirius groaned. Spending the past week in his presence had only strengthened his determination that he did _not_ want to need that deranged elf for anything. He even insisted on him and Remus making all the meals in case Kreacher tried to poison him. But he had to admit Remus had a point. “Kreacher! He yelled. Get out here!”

Slowly, the door to the boiler room creaked open. Sirius was pretty sure Kreacher carried out all of his orders extra slowly out of spite whilst claiming it was his age.

“What does Master want?” Kreacher said mechanically as he shuffled out, then muttered under his breath, “Nasty ungrateful swine. If Kreacher’s Mistress knew…”

“I want you to answer my questions fully and truthfully,” Sirius snapped and pointed to the locket. “Do you know anything about this locket?”

The elf’s eyes grew wide with horror and, with more energy than he had shown all week (and that was saying something), started shouting, “ _Master Regulus_ _’s locket! Kreacher did wrong! Kreacher failed in his orders_!” He ran to the fireplace and grabbed a poker.

“ _Kreacher stop_!” Sirius yelled, and when he didn’t, he lunged for him and grabbed it out of his grip. “Punish yourself later, Kreacher. Answer my questions now. Where did this locket come from?”

But to Sirius’s and Remus’s surprise, Kreacher started crying, and for once with sadness rather than anger. “Master Regulus ordered Kreacher not to tell,” the elf whimpered, wrapping his arms around himself and shivering.

“Regulus? This was his,” the name finally registered. “This is could be a Death Eater item. Now we _definitely_ need to know. Kreacher, I order you to tell me where it came from.”

“Master said not to tell…”

Sirius growled at his servant. “I’m your master now, Kreacher, and I outrank Regulus, so I order you to tell me where this locket came from.”

Kreacher whined and shook so violently that Sirius thought he might drop dead to get out of his dilemma, but he finally finished whatever internal battle he was fighting and began to speak.

It was a story that Sirius never could have imagined. The Dark Lord—Voldemort himself—had borrowed Kreacher from Regulus the Death Eater, taken him to an underground cavern so horrible that the very description reeked of dark magic, forced him to drink some sort of foul poison…and then left him there to die.

The elf shook, rocking back and forth as he sat on the floor, and then began wailing as if he’d been thrown into some kind of flashback: _“Master Regulus! Mistress! Help Kreacher! Please help Kreacher!”_

 _Please?_ Sirius didn’t think he’d ever heard Kreacher say “please” in his life. His chest tightened upon hearing the elf’s screams. Even two weeks later, he was still having nightmares of Azkaban that, from the sounds of it, weren’t much worse than this. Remus simply looked on in horror at the tale.

And then, Kreacher let out a high, sibilant laugh in imitation of someone else’s voice that chilled both men to the bone: _“Your master will be rewarded for his loyalty.”_

Kreacher was trembling harder than ever as he came to his senses and continued his tale. Left alone and half dead, he’d tried to drink from the underground lake, only to be dragged in by what must have been inferi. It was only by luck that Regulus had specifically ordered him to come home afterwards and that Voldemort didn’t think to block him from popping away that he didn’t drown. “Master Regulus was too kind to Kreacher,” he said. “Master Regulus nursed him back to health…”

Regulus had always had an inexplicable soft spot for the elf, Sirius thought. He’d never understood it.

“He asked Kreacher…” The elf shuddered into another flashback, and Sirius jumped and whined like a dog as he performed a better imitation of Regulus Black’s voice than he would have thought the croaking elf was capable of: _“Kreacher, what did the Dark Lord do?”_ And from there, the tale grew even stranger. As Sirius listened in awe, he learnt that Regulus had not merely got cold feet. He had turned around and actively fought against Voldemort, somehow copying the locket and telling Kreacher to take him back to the underground lake under strict orders of secrecy. And then…

“Kreacher would have drunk the potion again for Master Regulus, but Master Regulus would not let him.” Kreacher shuddered violently as another flashback hit: _“Kreacher, I order you to make me drink all of the potion until we get the locket out. This order overrides any order I may give you while I’m under its influence. Do you understand?”_

_“Yes, Master Regulus.”_

Kreacher was weeping heavily. Sirius found himself tearing up in spite of himself and mentally blamed it on his recovery from Azkaban. His brother had been a proud Slytherin, a pureblood supremacist, and a bloody _Death Eater_ —and yet he’d _loved_ that elf like family. Loved him enough to do something as Gryffindor-ish as drinking a bowl full of Voldemort’s poison. And, as much as it galled him to admit it, Kreacher had returned that love with loyalty such as he had never shown Sirius. He could practically see the scene himself as Kreacher finished his tale:

_“Water…need…water…” Regulus cried, creeping toward the water’s edge._

_“No, Master Regulus! Do not touch the water! Bad things in the water! Bad hands to drag Master in!”_

_But Kreacher must not had been fast enough because the moment Regulus_ _’s hand touched the surface, the inferi’s arms shot out and began to pull him in—first an arm, then a leg, until he clung to the shore, his eyes filled with horror as the inferi reached up around his collar to finish the job._

_“Master! Kreacher will get you out. Kreacher will!” the elf wailed, but even elf magic was powerless against that kind of enemy._

_“No!” Regulus pushed him away and thrust the locket into his hands. “There’s too many, Kreacher. Save yourself. Take the locket. Destroy it, Kreacher! Destroy it!” And with that last command, Regulus lost his grip and was dragged to the depths of the underground lake._

“But no matter how hard Kreacher tried he could not do it. He could not open it or even leave a mark on it. He could not obey Master Regulus’s last order…” He broke off into incoherent wails.

What happened next was probably the last thing Kreacher expected as a sobbing Sirius picked the elf up and hugged him. “My brother…my own brother…” he muttered over and over again. Moony came over and pat him on the back.

“House elves really have a knack for surprising you, don’t they,” Moony said knowingly.

Sirius nodded. Moony had always had an affinity for creatures of all sorts. _Oh, what the hell,_ he thought, _maybe it won_ _’t kill me to be a little nicer to this cretin_.

“Kreacher…” he stammered. “I…thank you.” The elf’s head snapped up with a look that clearly said he thought one of the two of them had gone mad. _If I_ _’m lucky, maybe the shock’ll kill him_. “I never would have known that Regulus was…was a good man…in the end. I don’t know what this locket is, but it must have been important to…to be worth all that. I’m going to take it to Albus Dumbledore—I know you don’t like him, but…but he owes me a favour, so I’m going to take it to him and make sure he destroys it.”

Kreacher’s eyes grew wide, and tears filled his eyes again. “Master Sirius will do that for Kreacher?”

“Yes, Kreacher, I’m going to finish what my brother started.”

Kreacher stared at him for a moment, and then cried for a little longer before walking off, holding his head a little higher and muttering, “The blood traitor finally remembers his family…” Coming from Kreacher, Sirius supposed he should take that as a compliment.

* * *

“Ah, Sirius, my boy. And Remus,” Albus Dumbledore said jovially. “Good evening to you both. What seems to be the trouble? You said it was urgent.”

Sirius and Remus sat down across the headmaster’s desk, feeling very much like the mischief-making teenagers who had been called in here so many times. But this matter was far more important. Sirius opened the box they had stored the locket in and carefully laid it on the desk. Remus demonstrated the dark detection spell, and Sirius, through tears, related Kreacher’s tale about his brother, Regulus.

And through the story, Dumbledore looked more and more _happy_ as he heard Voldemort’s part in it. He then proceeded to cast some detection spells of his own on the locket, and when he saw the results, he seemed positively gleeful.

 _He looks seriously scary when he gets like that_ , Sirius thought.

“My condolences, Sirius,” Dumbledore said more calmly when the story was finished. “But at least it seems your brother was a good man in the end—despite appearances,” he added pointedly.

“Thank you,” Sirius said. “So do you want to tell us what’s so exciting about this locket?”

“Well, that is something of a sensitive point,” the old man said. “How much Occlumency do the two of you know?”

“Occlumency?” Remus said in surprise. “Enough to guard against casual intrusion. We never got great at it.”

“Then I would suggest you resume your studies when you can. There may yet be dangerous times ahead unless I can find a way to destroy this object safely. Even the knowledge that it exists, and of where it is, could be dangerous. But since I now have it in custody, if you are on your guard, I think it will be safe enough if you keep this to yourselves. However, it must not leave this office…” Then Dumbledore smiled broadly. “I cannot thank you enough for bringing this to me. I believe I owe you an even greater debt for this.”

Both men leaned in closer, on the edge of their seats. “What are you on about?” Sirius demanded.

“You have no doubt heard by now my assertion that Lord Voldemort is not truly dead. That the Dark Mark remains on Severus’s arm is evidence of this.” Sirius and Remus shared a disgusted look, but nodded. “Even before his apparent death I had begun researching ways in which he might be able to endure beyond it. Until now, I had no solid leads. But now, I believe you may have given me the key to destroying Voldemort once and for all.”

“What!”

“ _What_ is in this locket?” Remus demanded.

“Ah, that is the delicate point…have either of you two heard of a horcrux?”

“Horcrux?” Sirius breathed. He screwed up his face and thought back. “I think I’ve heard the word. But it must be awfully dark. Even in my family, I think it was spoken of only in hushed whispers. Moony?”

“The same here,” Remus confirmed. “Even in the darkest of books, only mentions, no descriptions.”

“I thought as much,” Dumbledore said. He told them what that word meant: a piece of one’s soul, carved out by an act of ritual murder, and stored in a nigh-indestructible vessel to stave off death for as long as it lasted. Both men edged away from the locket, and Sirius felt like he might throw up.

“Y-y-you’re telling us that…that half of V-Voldemort’s soul is in that…thing?” Remus stuttered fearfully.

“Yes,” the old man said solemnly. “Locked behind whatever spells have sealed the locket.”

“And…and if it’s destroyed?” Sirius whispered.

“If Voldemort remains in spirit form, he will be killed. This time permanently.”

“Then what are we waiting for?” Sirius leapt to his feet and drew his wand.

“No, Sirius! Simple spells will not affect a horcrux. I will have to investigate how to dispose of it. Rest assured that it will be done as quickly as possible.”

Sirius settled back down, and the two Marauders reluctantly nodded.

“And now, I think you have both had a very taxing day,” Dumbledore said with that cheerful advisory tone of his. “I think it would be best if you were to go home and rest. I promise you that I have everything in hand here.”

Sirius sighed, but he couldn’t think of any other reason to stay. Both men rose to their feet and left the office. _Maybe we can say hello to Harry and Hermione on the way out_ , Sirius thought. _Though on the other hand, how would we explain our presence in the castle?_

Dumbledore was also pondering this new turn of events as they left. _Voldemort_ _’s horcrux_ , he thought. _I never would have believed it, but the spells don_ _’t lie. It’s a truly miraculous stroke of luck—or prophecy. And if this luck holds, our troubles could all be over by the summer, at least if young Harry’s part goes through alright. I may not have been certain about that before, but with the horcrux in hand, it’s the perfect opportunity._

_The trouble is how to destroy it. The Killing Curse would probably work, but I can_ _’t trust myself with that spell, and I can’t ask anyone else to cast it. I’ll have to double check what else can work. Dementor? Also can’t be trusted. Fiendfyre? Only if it’s an emergency. Basilisk venom? If I recall correctly, that could work. Except it’ll be tremendously difficult to get a hold of. I doubt there’s a live basilisk being kept legally anywhere in the world. I suppose I could look up how to breed one myself, but then there’s the matter of getting rid of it when I’m done. And anyway, I can see there’s some kind of additional protection on the locket. I might have to figure out how to open it before I can try any of those._

Albus Dumbledore went up into his apartments to consult his stash of confiscated books and embark on his new line of research.

* * *

_One Week Later_

Sirius and Remus didn’t know how Vicky and the other cleaners had managed it, but Number Twelve Grimmauld Place was habitable again. Sirius was so grateful that he invited all of them to the New Years’ Party. And he was delighted when Vicky gave him her address and said, “When you get back on your feet, send me an owl.”

Both men had moved into actual bedrooms and fully stocked the pantry. Sirius had even got someone to come in a repair the tapestry, to which he’d promptly added the Tonkses and removed Bellatrix, along with putting Narcissa on probation, not that it would help.

The one thing that no one had been able to do anything about was that awful portrait on Walburga Black in the entrance hall. Remus had been trying to figure out what dark spells were empowering it all week, to no avail. When everything else was said and done, they opened the curtains to try to confront the problem one more time. They just barely got a Silencing Charm on it, and that wouldn’t hold for long. Walburga didn’t even seem to notice it.

“Well, this is the last thing to be cleaned up,” Sirius said. “We need to do _something_ about it. I’m not about to bring muggles in here with this thing around. You find anything, Moony?”

“Sorry, Padfoot,” the werewolf replied. “I still can’t even get a reading on what spells are sticking this thing to the wall. It’s almost like it wasn’t normal magic that did it.”

They looked at each other with wide eyes as they each made the connection.

“You don’t think—” Remus started.

“I’ll find out—Kreacher!”

The elf popped into existence and grumbled, “Master…?” The elf was slowly becoming less unfriendly with Sirius and Remus, but it was a long process, and they all doubted they’d ever be truly comfortable around each other.

“Kreacher, did you stick this painting to the wall?”

Krecher grumbled again and got that uncomfortable look he got whenever he didn’t want to answer something.

“You know what, never mind. I don’t care. Kreacher, if you can unstick this painting from the wall, you may keep it in the boiler room. If not, we’re ripping out the entire wall, and damn the consequences.” That was quite a dire threat, since that particular wall was shared with Number Eleven, but he made it clear he meant it.

Kreacher’s eye grew wide, and he made a reluctant snap of his fingers. At once, the portrait slid down from the wall with a thud. Sirius and Remus were feeling generous and helped Kreacher levitate the painting down the stairs, though that was mostly to see the horrified look on Walburga’s face at being hung up in the boiler room.


	32. Sirius in a Santa Suit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Harry Potter is owned by JK Rowling. The Wizard and the Hopping Pot is owned by Beedle the Bard, who is owned by JK Rowling.
> 
> I hereby release my own interpretation of Beedle the Bard’s The Wizard and the Hopping Pot to the community. If anyone feels inclined to write the full version, either in prose or stage-play format, feel free. Just send me a PM so I can read it myself.

The last month of the fall term wound down, decorations were hung, goodbyes were said, and the Hogwarts Express made it back to London without incident. The Weasleys would pretty much have Gryffindor Tower to themselves over break. Harry and Hermione weren’t sure whether to feel sorry for them or worry about what Fred and George would do to the place.

Grandma and Grandpa arrived on the twenty-third, as usual, but this time, they had been told to expect unusual company: Harry’s godfather had just been released after spending ten years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit, and his best friend was having a rough time due to an unspecified chronic illness. That made them understandably nervous, but they were assured that both of them loved Harry and that Remus could keep Sirius in line.

Of course, if the Marauders were good at one thing, it was making an impression.

“Ho ho ho, Merry Christmas!” Sirius Black in a Santa suit with a large bag of presents on his back was one of the stranger sights the Granger Family had seen lately, especially considering it wasn’t actively magical. Harry and Hermione ran over to hug their guests.

“Sirius, Remus, good to see you,” Emma said warmly. “You’re looking better.” Indeed, Sirius had already gained some weight and was walking more steadily, and Remus, while not looking as festive, was at least wearing new clothes.

“Thanks. Happy Christmas, everyone,” Remus said with a smile. “So you know, we had to register this visit with the Ministry so we could do magic here without setting off any alarms. Actually, the kids could, too, and no one would know better.”

“Well, I think we’ll have them stick to their wandless magic for now,” Emma said. Granted, even that was pretty impressive by muggle standards. Hermione had put on quite a show last night by lighting all the candles in the room with cool blue flames.

“Welcome, gentlemen,” Dan told the men. “I’d like to introduce my parents, Robert and Vera.”

“Pleased to meet you,” the Marauders said.

In spite of his concern last night, Robert Granger was all smiles this morning for an unrelated reason. He stepped forward and shook Sirius’s hand vigorously. “Good to meet you, sir. Good to meet you. You’ve heard the news?” he said.

Sirius and Remus each cocked an eyebrow.

“Haven’t you heard the news?” he exclaimed. “Gorbachev resigned!”

“Who?” said Sirius.

“Who? Don’t you read the papers? Mikhail Gorbachev, President of the Soviet Union. He stepped down this morning. The Soviet Union’s coming down! Communism’s falling!” he said gleefully.

“Oh, yeah, I’ve been hearing something about that,” Remus said. “I’m afraid wizards don’t pay that much attention to the muggle media.”

“Well, this bit’s important,” Robert said in an explanatory tone that the family most often heard from Hermione. “After all, the Russians _do_ have the world’s largest nuclear weapons stockpile.”

Sirius and Remus both nodded in recognition. Even wizards knew what nuclear weapons were—most of them, anyway.

“Yes,” Emma said dryly, “now we don’t have to worry about nuclear war. We only have to worry about dark wizards.”

“Well, actually, that _is_ a pretty big deal, Emma,” Remus said. “Even in the most conservative families, the wizard version of ‘duck and cover’ was “apparate as far away from anything as humanly possible.’”

“Yeah, and I think I remember something about Dumbledore adding a ward at Hogwarts to make bombs fail or go off course,” Sirius said.

“Oh, that would be nice,” Robert said. “Any chance he can do that for the rest of the country?”

“Sorry, not even Dumbledore has that kind of power,” Remus said. “Still, if the Soviet Union’s collapsing, I wonder what that’ll mean for Jugashvili.”

“Who?” the Grangers said.

“Jugashvili?” said Sirius. “Is he still around.”

“Yes,” Remus explained. “Konstantin Jugashvili, the Dark Lord of Leningrad. He’s a very powerful wizard who made a name for himself in Grindelwald’s War. He was propping up the Soviets for years, but the muggle government suddenly withdrew its support in 1986. He’s the one who’s been causing all that trouble in the Caucasus.”

Robert’s eyebrows shot up. “That’s a magical war?”

“Yeah, yeah, we cause a lot of trouble,” Sirius jumped in. “What are we doing wasting time talking politics on Christmas? Come on, we’ve got presents to open.”

The family eagerly sat down, and Sirius emptied his large bag. Dozens of presents spilt out.

“My, that’s…certainly a lot of gifts,” Dan said as the bag was upturned.

“Well, I’ve got ten years’ worth of Christmases to make up for,” Sirius said. He drew his wand and levitated each gift to its recipient. It was soon clear that he had brought no fewer than eleven presents for Harry and, so as not to show favouritism, had also brought an equal number for Hermione, hence the overflowing bag. Not to be outdone, Harry and Hermione wandlessly levitated the other gifts out from under the tree, and they went around the circle and started tearing into them.

It turned out that Sirius had taken his mandate to make up for the last ten Christmases literally, since many of the boxes contained magical toys meant for very young children. He laughed as each one was opened. Most of the other gifts, of course, were typical muggle presents, disproportionately books. The Grangers did give some gifts to Sirius and Remus. Dan and Emma didn’t have much clue what kind of gifts one got for wizards, but in the end, the family decided to give Sirius some books on recent history to help him catch up on the last ten years, and Remus received a book on muggle civil rights movements, ostensibly to pique his interest in history.

“Thank you.” Remus said. “Okay, can we be serious, now?” he added, since they’d got through all of the joke gifts.

“I’m always Sirius,” his friend shot back with a grin as the Grangers laughed at that joke for what could well be the only time—not that he wouldn’t keep trying. In the old days, it had usually been James who set him up like that, so he was grateful Remus was willing to take up the slack.

Remus chuckled and said, “And I hope you’ll forgive me for not joining in his foolishness, but I happen to believe that quality is preferably to quantity.” He produced two long, thin boxes and handed them to the two children.

Harry and Hermione opened the gifts, and their eyes grew wide. Inside each box was a something like short scabbard made of fine leather with three straps attached.

“Those are quick-draw, wrist-mounted, duelling wand holsters,” Remus said. “They’re preferred by most duelling champions and many Aurors. You can keep your wand close at hand, and they let you draw with a snap of your fingers. They have a wand strap that will protect against a moderate Disarming Charm, and they’re dragon hide, so they’ll resist spells to interfere with them.”

“These are wonderful,” Hermione said.

“Yeah, thanks, Remus,” Harry added.

“You’re quite welcome. You said you wanted to start learn duelling next week, so I thought you should really do it properly.”

“Duelling? Like wizards’ duels?” Vera said nervously.

“More like sparring in karate, Vera,” Emma clarified.

“But, uh, aren’t those holsters smaller than the wands?” Robert observed. And it was true—they were a little more than half the length so that they could fit on a small adult’s or an average eleven-year-old’s forearm.

Remus just smiled and said, “That’s why they’re magic.”

Sirius still had a small pile of gifts waiting by his side. “Now, I’ve still got something for all of you,” he said. “First, to Dan and Emma, who have been so generous in letting Remus and me into their home and into their lives—and to Robert and Vera, for putting up with us at Christmas…” Sirius handed them four small boxes. When they opened them, Dan and Emma gasped to see two anniversary rings studded with large emeralds. Vera received a similarly ornate necklace, and Robert a gold watch. “They belonged to my parents,” Sirius said. “They’ve been certified curse-free, and I can think of no better fate for them than to be worn by a family of muggles.”

The Grangers still looked a little uncomfortable at the allusion to his dysfunctional family, but Sirius moved on. He handed Harry and Hermione each a present roughly the size of a paperback book, although these weren’t quite the same size and shape. “Go on, Kitten,” he said.

Hermione tore open the package and smiled when she saw that it was a new diary with a lock on it. But unlike most muggle diaries of that type that had only a tiny skeleton key attached, this lock went all the way through the book and went with a full-sized key that Hermione could feel was charmed. “It’s a magic lock?” she said.

“Naturally,” Sirius said. “It’s not unbreakable, but it should keep your secrets safe from nosy roommates.”

“Or brothers?”

“Hey!”

Sirius gave Harry a critical look. “For now,” he said. “But you’d better keep an eye on him. And make sure he doesn’t get that key.”

Hermione giggled. “Thank you, Sirius.”

On cue, Harry opened his gift. But this one wasn’t a book. It was a mirror. He held it up and looked into it sceptically.

“Harry Potter,” Sirius’s voice sounded. Harry jumped as his godfather’s grinning face appeared in the mirror.

“Whoa!”

“That’s a two-way mirror,” Sirius said. “Your dad and I used to use them to talk to each other when we were in separate detentions. Just say my name, and you’ll be able to talk to me anytime. And the communication is impossible to intercept, so it’s very secure. We’ll see about getting you another pair,” he added to Hermione, Dan, and Emma, “but they’re really hard to make and almost as hard to come by.”

“Well, this is great,” Harry said. “It’s like a magical telephone. Thanks, Sirius.”

“Yeah, that’ll be especially useful if anything…unusual comes up,” said Dan. “You know, you could make a fortune if you could sell those.”

“Not a much as you might think,” Remus said. “We looked into it, and it would be great for students, but most people can just talk by Floo call.”

At that point, with the presents all opened and things settling down, an aged, brown, long-haired tabby padded up stiffly and sniffed at Sirius’s and Remus’s feet, meowing in what Harry knew to be recognition.

“Well, that’s a friendly cat,” Remus said, looking down. “Most cats don’t like us much—you know…” From the look of her, Rowena didn’t seem to like Sirius much herself.

“You know, it’s funny, Harry,” Sirius said. “Your parents had a cat that looked a lot like that—she didn’t like me much either.”

The Grangers all giggled. Even the grandparents.

Remus quickly picked up the cat and discretely smelled it. “Padfoot, I think this _is_ James and Lily’s cat.”

“You’re joking!”

The children giggled again. “She is,” Harry confirmed. “We found her in Godric’s Hollow five years ago, and, uh, _Professor McGonagall_ figured out whose she was.” Harry winked at them.

“Mm hmm,” Hermione added. “But she didn’t know her name, so we called her Rowena.”

“That’s fitting,” Remus said. “I think Lily named her Hypatia.” By whatever name, the cat had turned and was now in a staring match with Sirius.

“I should’ve known _you_ _’d_ make it out of there, then,” Sirius said. “Well, at least you got the family back together.”

The morning wound down, and everyone started to clear away the wrapping paper, until Emma stopped them: “Oh, wait, Harry, I think you missed one.”

Harry turned and saw one more parcel that he hadn’t noticed before. It was lumpy and very light and wrapped in silver paper.

“That’s not one of ours. Did you bring it?” Emma asked.

“No, not us,” said Remus.

Harry looked the present over and saw a note attached in a loopy script that he was only partially sure of the identity of: “ _Your father left this in my possession before he died._ _It is time it was returned to you._ _Use it well._ _A Very Merry Christmas to you_ …It’s not signed,” he said.

“Let me see that, Cub,” Sirius said quickly. Harry handed it over, and he started waving his wand over it. Remus leaned over and added his wand to the testing. “Well, there’s no obvious jinxes,” Sirius said. “And this is Dumbledore’s handwriting. I wonder…” He tore open the end of the package and pulled out a corner of slippery, silvery cloth. “Moony…” he said downright reverently, “it’s the _cloak_.”

“The what?” everyone else said.

Sirius gently handed the gift back to Harry. “This was your father’s most prized possession, Cub. Go ahead, put it on.”

Harry looked confused as the liquid silver cloth slithered out of the paper and onto the floor, but Hermione’s eye lit up with recognition. He stood up and wrapped the cloak around himself.

There was a loud gasp from the rest of the family. Harry looked down and found that he couldn’t see his feet: “Ah! My body’s gone!” He spun around, trying to figure out what was going on.

“It’s an invisibility cloak,” Hermione said in awe. Dan and Emma exchanged a nervous look.

“Not just any invisibility cloak,” said Sirius gleefully. “It’s the best invisibility cloak I’ve ever seen—ever _heard_ of. Most of those things, the charms wear off after ten years or so, but that cloak’s been in the Potter Family for generations.”

Harry made the connection and pulled the cloak over his head, vanishing entirely.

“I wonder why Dumbledore would give it back to him so soon,” Remus suggested.

“Are you kidding?” Dan said, laying a hand to his forehead. “This is _exactly_ the kind of thing Dumbledore would do.”

“And if you’re planning on taking that thing to school, we’re gonna have to have a long talk about how you are and aren’t going use it,” Emma said loudly.

“Oh come on, Emma, let them have their fun.” Sirius started.

There was a yelp and a loud crash, and assorted pieces of Harry suddenly appeared on the floor. Hermione seemed to have grabbed him by the foot and pulled his legs out from under him.

“How’d you do that?” Harry said indignantly.

Hermione shot him an eye roll. “I could see your footprints in the carpet, Harry.”

Sirius barked with laughter. “Besides, something tells me our Kitten’s gonna keep him in line just fine.”

“Okay, well, we can deal with this later,” Emma said. “It’s time for Christmas dinner.”

Everyone could get behind that.

“Excellent cooking, all of you,” Remus said as they dug into the Christmas ham. Sirius grunted his agreement as he took a far too dog-like bite. “Neither of us has…erm…had much opportunity to learn the craft, so I’m afraid we haven’t had the best fare, even at Padfoot’s pad.”

Sirius chuckled and then swallowed. A thought came to him: “I wonder if Andromeda would help with cooking for the party.”

“What, and pass up the chance to let you flounder?” Remus said.

Sirius stuck out his tongue at his friend. “Oh, but that reminds me,” he turned to the Grangers. “Andromeda tells me the Wizengamot’s scheduled the award presentation for Saturday.”

“Yes, we heard,” Dan said. “We’ll just be Flooing from your place, right? It shouldn’t be that much trouble getting in and out.”

“No, but it’ll be long and boring,” Sirius complained. “It’s the last regular meeting of the year—they always meet the last Saturday of the month—so there’ll be bills to debate and budgets to approve and all that annoying political stuff. Seriously, I considered appointing Remus as my proxy after last month’s meeting. He was always better at that book work stuff.”

Remus stuck out his tongue at Sirius, to the surprise of some of the other guests.

“And on that note,” Sirius continued, “I took my seat at the November meeting, but I didn’t really do anything. I think it’s time we shook things up a bit. How does a formal alliance between the House of Black and the House of Potter sound?”

The Grangers stopped eating, except for Grandma and Grandpa, who looked mildly bemused. Cousin Andi had told them that alliances were major political manoeuvres.

“I know it’s a big move, but I agree with Sirius on this—for once,” Remus said. “It’s nothing really binding. It’s just a notice that the House of Black and the House of Potter are aligned and will usually vote together.”

“And of course, I’m your godfather, so it’s already there in all but name,” Sirius added, “but the looks on the faces of those conservative purebloods at officially losing a Most Ancient House will be priceless. In fact, the Malfoys will be the only Most Ancient House left among the conservatives. The others all died out.” He grinned wistfully at the thought that the Malfoys might, too, in another couple generations.

“Hmm…” Dan said. “What do you think Harry?”

Harry shrugged. “Sounds good to me.” He also gave a small smile as he imagined the look on Draco Malfoy’s face at the move.

“Well, we’ll check with Cousin Andi, but if she doesn’t object, I don’t see a problem,” Dan said.

Emma spoke up, now: “While we’re on the subject, Sirius, we had some business of our own to discuss.”

Sirius raised an eyebrow.

“Right now, we’ve got Cousin Andi down for both the kids’ magical guardian, since we wanted…a more personal hand for it than Dumbledore’s,” she said tactfully, “but we understand Harry’s guardianship automatically reverted to you when you were freed.”

Sirius frowned and lowered his head like a dog. “Is…is that a problem?” he said timidly.

“We discussed that,” Dan started.

“We _did_ have concerns,” Emma continued. “Particularly because…”

“Of my school reputation?” Sirius said.

“I was going to say because you’re facing a lengthy recovery if the stories we’ve heard about Azkaban are true.” _But yes._

“But Harry really likes you, and we all know Harry’s a very good judge of character,” assured Dan.

Sirius perked up at that. A cat was equal to a dog in that regard—maybe better since they weren’t blinded by pack instincts. And after all, Harry had caught the Rat when Sirius himself had never suspected him.

“So as we were discussing it, Harry asked us to take a leap of faith, and, eventually, we decided to go along with it,” Dan continued. “Now, with all due respect to you, Remus, for convenience’s sake, this is something that we should probably keep to just Sirius.” Remus nodded. Dan was polite enough not to bring up the restrictions due to his condition. “Sirius, we would like to ask if you would be the magical guardian and godfather…to _both_ of our children.”

Remus stopped and stared as Daniel Granger accomplished a rare feat: striking Sirius Black speechless. Padfoot’s mouth was hanging open at the request as tears welled in his eyes. This really was a leap of faith given that this was Sirius. In fact, if it had been anyone but James, Remus would have said it was a leap of faith with Harry the first time around.

“Happy Christmas,” Emma told the dazed Marauder.

Remus reached over and closed Sirius’s mouth with one finger under his chin, snapping him out of it.

“I…I’d be honoured…” he stammered, then turned to Hermione. “You want to do this, Kitten?”

Hermione nodded, if a little uncertainly. “It _would_ be nice to have a godparent,” she said. “And closer ties with a powerful pureblood family couldn’t hurt. Plus Harry kept nagging me till I said yes.”

Sirius chuckled and cried a little at the same time. “You’re too good to me, Cub. I couldn’t have thought of a better gift if I tried.”

Harry grinned and repeated, “Happy Christmas, Sirius. Maybe between the two of us, we can teach Mione to lighten up.”

“Prat.” Hermione smacked him in the arm.

“You know, Lily always said he should have more female influence to keep him in line,” Remus chuckled.

Everyone laughed.

* * *

_Dear Ron,_

_Both of us and Sirius still felt kind of bad about losing you your_ _“pet,” and we decided to make it up to you. You told us you’d like to have your own owl. He’s kind of hyper, but you can always sic him on one of your brothers to annoy them._

_Happy Christmas,_

_Harry and Hermione_

_P.S. Don_ _’t worry, Harry checked, and he’s definitely an owl._

 

 _Could have fooled me_ , Ron thought as the tiny scops owl zoomed around the empty dorm, hooting madly. _Looks like a crazed squirrel with wings._ He held out his hand and managed to coax the owl down to him.

“Ouch!” The bird nipped his finger in what was probably supposed to be an affectionate way and took off again when he shook it off.

 _Ginny will probably think he_ _’s adorable._ Ron wasn’t sure why Harry would think he wanted an owl this hyper. Maybe it was the only owl in the shop that was too fast for him to catch in cat form.

Ron smirked at that. _Yeah, Harry_ _’s off his rocker, alright. But he’s a good guy._

* * *

“We’re sorry to have to leave you for the evening, Mum and Dad, but this is a fairly important event in the magical world, and it’s unfortunately not really open to grandparents.”

“Oh, don’t worry about us,” Grandpa said. “Go have your fun. We can see how complicated this two worlds thing is, so we understand.”

“I want to thank all of you,” Sirius said. “This is the best Christmas I’ve had since before Harry was born. And I know he won’t admit it, but I’m sure it is for Moony, too.”

Remus imitated Hermione and smacked him in the arm.

They said their goodbyes and headed out to the cars. (Remus had rented one for the Marauders. “I _had_ a flying motorcycle,” Sirius grumbled, “but Andromeda won’t give it back until I convince her I can ride it without killing myself.”) But as they left, Sirius pulled Hermione aside for a moment.

“Hermione, I couldn’t tell you until we were alone, but I have another gift for you,” he said. He pulled out a book-sized parcel wrapped in plain brown paper and handed it to her.

Hermione unwrapped the strange gift and found that it was an ancient-looking notebook, already filled with notes on…animal transfiguration?

Sirius grinned: “These are all of our notes on becoming an animagus.”

Hermione’s eyes widened, and she gasped with joy. “Thank you, thank you, thank you! This is perfect!” she cried, though not too loudly, rewarding her new godfather with an enthusiastic hug.

“I thought you’d like it. _But_ there’s one very important rule, Hermione: you have to promise not to practice without an actual animagus watching, or Dumbledore, if you let him in on it. And Harry doesn’t count when you get to the actual transformation. That’s the other half of what the mirror’s for. You’ll do a lot better with someone who’s learnt the transformation themselves, so I’m going to teach you.”

Hermione smiled even wider. “Sirius, that’s great! Although I didn’t expect _you_ to be the responsible one.”

“Hey, you’re my goddaughter, now. I have to be responsible _some_ of the time. Happy Christmas, Kitten.”

“Happy Christmas, Padfoot,” she indulged him.

About an hour later, Harry Potter and his extended family walked down Diagon Alley and up to the Diagonal Theatre for the premier of _Beedle the Bard_ _’s The Wizard and the Hopping Pot_. It wasn’t exactly a red carpet affair, given that it was such a small country, but the number of witches and wizards in formal dress, including the Grangers, made it clear that this was the social function of the year.

This, of course, meant that they were likely to run into people they disliked, and not just the reporters that the Tonkses were scrupulously keeping away from them.

“Good evening, Lord Potter…Lord Black,” an acidic voice sounded.

“Lord Malfoy,” Sirius replied guardedly as Lucius Malfoy, leaning on his magical cane with wife and son in tow, approached the group. Draco fixed his eyes on Harry suspiciously. All of them were conspicuously not looking at Dan and Emma, who didn’t look too thrilled themselves.

“I wasn’t expecting to see you here,” Sirius continued, bristling at the man who everyone pretended wasn’t a Death Eater, “what with the… _scandalous_ rumours about the performance tonight.”

“Now, then, Lord Black, I think we can agree that it’s a fine thing to be a patron of the arts,” Lucius said as Draco smirked beside him. Narcissa simply kept up her haughty expression. The tone of the comment made it clear just what and how Lucius would be patronising if he didn’t approve of the show.

“I guess there’s a few things we can agree on,” said Sirius.

“Harry Potter!” The tension broke as an overexcited blond girl in a blue dress rushed over to the group. “Thank you so much for coming. It really means a lot to us. And you too, Lord Black.”

“Alright, Mandy?” Harry said. “We wouldn’t’ve missed it with the endorsement you gave us.”

Mandy giggled profusely, then collected herself and shook the guests’ hands. The Malfoys scrunched up their noses and walked away when she shook Dan’s and Emma’s hands. “Good evening,” she said formally. “I’m Amanda Brocklehurst. Welcome to the Theatre. If you don’t mind, my Great-Granddad would like to meet you after the show.”

“How do you do, Amanda. We’ve heard about you from the children. I think we can make some time after the show,” Emma said graciously, doing her best to ignore the camera flashes around them.

“Thank you, thank you—” Mandy took a deep breath and continued on to the next guests, and the Grangers went in to take their seats.

While the Christmas Play wasn’t a musical or opera or any such thing, it did have some great orchestral backing, beginning with a dark, sweeping overture. In fact, the music was so well done that Hermione and Harry wondered if Mandy’s Great-Granddad had looked to muggle films for inspiration. According to the program, one of the songs had actually been commissioned from Professor Flitwick. It was called “Something Wicked This Way Comes,” and when it was played as the old wizard’s wicked son first walked on stage, it left no doubt as to where this story was going.

Beedle’s original story of the Hopping Pot was quite short, but it had been expanded upon greatly. The wizard, who was named for the old French dark lord Atlantes, made it clear even before his father’s death that he considered muggles worthless, and helping muggles, as his father liked to do, was beneath him. Atlantes justified this by repeatedly warning his father about the fanatical witch-hunter John Hale, who wanted nothing more than to burn both of them at the stake. But while rumours of witch-burnings—a few of them were even successful—filtered into the village from distant lands, Atlantes’ father had long lived in peace with the muggles, hiding his powers by claiming they came from his “lucky cooking pot,” and no one ever listened to John Hale.

Then, Atlantes’ father died of old age, and the young wizard stopped giving aid to his muggle neighbours. An old woman whose granddaughter was afflicted with warts, a peddler who had lost his donkey to sell his wares, and a young mother whose baby was ill each came to him for help in turn, and each time he slammed the door in their faces. Unlike in Beedle’s tale, his father’s Hopping Pot was slower and more subtle in its efforts to persuade Atlantes to help, and Atlantes’ attempts to silence it were partially successful, but they never seemed to stick and always failed at the worst possible moment, resulting in several hilarious situations for the amusement of the children (and adults) in the audience.

Meanwhile, the villagers were growing disgruntled with Atlantes’ refusal to help them, and as the curtain descended on Act I, John Hale was taking the opportunity to turn them against the wizard. Only Alcina, a young muggle widow who knew about magic and had herself been trying to persuade Atlantes to help her neighbours, would stand up for him, as she was trying to bring back the peace and harmony they had had during his father’s life.

This led to what Andromeda had called a brilliant move of incorporating the modern tale’s crowd-pleasing account of the Hopping Pot eating muggles, as Atlantes tried to bewitch the pot to do his bidding and fend off first the muggles who were annoying him, and then the inevitable angry mob. But even this eventually backfired on him horribly.

Finally, in the climactic scene, Alcina stood in Atlantes’ doorway and forced him to choose between helping the muggle villagers and going through her—with the Hopping Pot backing her up—to carry out his plan of escaping town.

“You think we’re worthless?” the actress cried over the rising sound of the pot’s clanging. “You think we’re weak? Look at who’s chasing whom out of this village! And the only reason they’re chasing you is because you provoked them. We all loved your father. We even protected him from the witch-hunters. Do you know how many of us told them all his cures were caused by miracles or herbal remedies or favourable weather—to our own risk if we were found out? And isn’t it we who grow your food, tailor your clothes, and built your house? Maybe if you took a moment to look at us as people and not as thorns in your side, you’d realise that you need us just as much as we need you!”

And at that pronouncement, Atlantes raised his wand at the defiant woman, no doubt to cast a terrible curse on her to get her out of his way, and there was a loud scream, but it came not from her, but preemptively from the Hopping Pot. And when he heard it, Atlantes lowered his wand, for he could not bear to curse the woman he had come to—not admire, but respect for her courage and persistence. Then, he grudgingly began helping all the muggles with their problems. The young mother’s dying baby was saved, the donkey was found, the girl’s warts were cured, and all the others, too. Even John Hale called off his attack when Alcina stood in his way so that Atlantes could save the life of his son, who had been wounded in the fight, and peace was restored in the village, to the cheers of the audience.

The Grangers’ worry—and Andi’s, too, though the Grangers had a keener sense for it—was that even if the play was “pro-muggle,” if would be very easy to come off as patronising: “Oh, the poor muggles need our help.” Not only would that be demeaning, but the Statute of Secrecy would undermine the message in the eyes of a modern audience (something that was not lost on Beedle, either, hence the “lucky pot” device.) But instead, the muggles were shown helping Atlantes and doing a decent job at helping each other, and the real story was one of friendship and mutual assistance, even through the veil of secrecy.

Better yet, the Grangers (certainly Emma and Hermione) thought that Alcina was the real star of the show—a strong female lead who could stand up to the wrong on both sides. While the play stopped short of implying a romantic relationship between her and Atlantes, most of the audience seemed to all but forget that she was a muggle character and applauded her just as loudly at curtain call. And for such a small talent pool of writers and actors, it had certainly exceeded their expectations.

After the show, Mandy again intercepted the family and led them to a meeting room, where they were met by three generations of men and several woman, the oldest very wrinkled, with only an uncut rime of white hair around the sides of his head.

“Lord Ethelred Brocklehurst,” the old man said, standing as straight as he could. “It’s an honour, Lord Potter, and well met, Lord Black. I hope the performance was satisfactory?”

“Very much so,” Andromeda Tonks said. “As good as I’d hoped and then some.”

“Never thought I’d see the day that story got told in public,” Sirius mused. “I couldn’t believe my ears the first time James told me the original version.”

“That was a lot better than the book, sir,” Harry said as the eyes increasingly turned to him.

“And we don’t just say that about any play,” Dan added with a smile. The rest of the family chuckled.

“It was a very good play, sir,” Hermione added.

“I’m glad to hear that,” Ethelred Brocklehurst replied. “My project of restoring our lost cultural heritage has not been without its detractors.”

“Well, you’ll hear no complaints from us on this one,” Sirius said. “Anything that can stick it to my relatives is good in my book—present company excluded—and you can quote me on that.”

“That goes double for me,” Dora jumped in from the back of the group.

Andromeda sighed. When she’d said restore the House of Black, she hadn’t meant into a house of troublemakers, and now he’d roped Dora into it, too. But then, she should have known, shouldn’t she.

“Excellent,” the elder Brocklehurst said. “Now, since you’ve been so good as to meet with me, there is a young woman here whom I would like you all to meet.” Suddenly, they noticed the young woman who had played Alcina step out of the shadows in the back of the room.

“Of course,” Emma said excitedly. “It’s Cassandra, isn’t it? You were brilliant out there.”

“Really brilliant,” Hermione added.

“Thank you so much,” Cassandra said. “This was my first professional show, and I was really nervous.”

“Your first show?” Hermione said in surprise.

“Yes, you see, I’m not even an official member of the Company yet.”

“You’re not?” said Emma.

“No, there were special circumstances. You see, my full name is Cassandra Clearwater.” The Grangers had noticed that Alcina was credited as “Cassandra C.,” one of the few (though not the only) roles not credited by their full names. “My sister, Penelope, is Mandy’s prefect at Hogwarts…but I myself am a muggle.”

A gasp followed by a contagious smile circled the room, and Sirius and Remus both barked out laughing. “You cast a muggle in a muggle role?” Sirius gasped in amazement to Brocklehurst. “You’re a _genius!_ This is the best prank I’ve seen since I got out of Azkaban! When are you going to tell everyone?”

“The day after tomorrow, after the reviews run,” the old man answered. “We wanted them to be unbiased. But given Lord Potter’s unique circumstances, I thought he should have an early notice.”

“That’s very generous of you, sir—Lord Brocklehurst. Thank you,” Harry spoke up.

The family left the meeting smiling. It was a brilliant manoeuvre, to be sure, and Cassandra Clearwater really was a great actress. And while the pending Wizengamot bill itself had not been mentioned, Lord Brocklehurst’s vote seemed pretty well assured. Andromeda and Sirius conferred with Harry for a few minutes to refine the public statement that he was bound to be asked to give, and walked out the front doors of the Theatre. Sure enough, within moments, a blond witch in magenta furs came close enough to ask a question: “Mr. Potter, Rita Skeeter from the _Daily Prophet_. Might I ask you a tiny question?” Rita paled a bit at the resulting glare from Andromeda, but stood her ground. “As someone with experience in both the muggle and magical worlds, how did you feel about the play?”

Harry slowed to a stop and did his best to answer respectfully—no reason to give Skeeter extra incentive to go after him. “There’s other people with more experience with that than me, like my Cousin Ted, but we all really liked it. _Both_ of my families have always supported muggle rights and fair treatment, and we’re excited to see art that upholds our values and our magical cultural heritage.”

And before Rita could get another question in, the Tonkses had hurried them along.

“That really was a bold move considering the Theatre has to cater disproportionately to rich purebloods,” Remus said. “And it is nice to see any kind of movement on civil rights.”

“And hopefully more than that with the Muggle Protection Act,” Andromeda replied.

“And you think a simple play will make a difference?” A surly, disgruntled-looking family with a dark-haired boy came up to them on the way out of the Alley.

“Lord Nott,” Sirius said stiffly.

“Lord Black.”

Almost at the same time, Theodore Nott faced Harry with a curt “Potter.”

“Nott,” Harry replied.

But to everyone’s surprise, Emma stepped forward before anyone could speak further and said, “Excuse me, Charles Nott, is it? We’ve heard a _lot_ about you. I think you’ll be surprised what a good work of literature can do.”

“I didn’t ask you, muggle!” the elder Nott snapped.

Harry started to step in front of his mother, but Andromeda quickly stepped in front of both of them. “That ‘muggle’ happens to be Lord Potter’s legal mother,” she said, “and a well-read student of literature.”

“If you can call that literature.” Emma and Harry both fought down a growl at that. “But then why should a…blood traitor know any better?” Charles Nott’s eyes turned to Ted, clearly evaluating just how strong of a slur he could get away with.

“Why don’t you say what you mean, Nott?” Andromeda demanded, her hand inching toward her wand.

“Hmm? Why, I believe you’ve misread me, _Tonks_.” He spat the last word as if it were a curse as vile as any. “I was merely suggesting that your point of view might not be as accurate as you think. Come along, Theo.”

Theo Nott had by now got into a stare-down with Harry in which he seemed to be about to crack. But he snapped out of it and followed his parents, making a rude gesture as he did that only Harry noticed.

“Don’t mind him,” Andromeda said in annoyance before Sirius could do anything rash. “Nott’s had it in for me for years. Malfoy’s been using him as his attack dog, in case you couldn’t tell. Nice job standing up to him, Emma.”

“Well, you know, I’ve always said respect needs to be earned,” she replied uneasily.

“Grrr. I can believe Malfoy got off, but _him_?” Sirius grumbled. “One of these days, someone ought to just check his arm for the hell of it.”

“Yeah, well I’ll let _you_ sponsor that one, Siri,” Andromeda said.

“I _told_ you not to call me that.”


	33. The New Year's Party

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Ph’nglui mglw’nafh JK Rowling R’lyeh wgah’nagl fhtagn.

“Oh my God, I’m an idiot!”

Grandma and Grandpa had just left, and the Grangers were packing up themselves for a week at Sirius’s house—or they were supposed to be.

“Hermione?” Harry said.

“Hermione, what’s wrong?” their mother asked worriedly as the family converged on her room.

“Harry, look at this,” she said, holding out a piece of paper and sounding very annoyed.

Harry took the paper. It was from their inventory of Harry’s Gringotts vault.

“My rare book list?” he said.

“ _Read_ it.”

Harry read over the list until his eyes settled on one name and grew to the size of saucers. “Nicolas Flamel,” he breathed.

“Flamel?” Mum and Dad both said.

“I remember it, now. It’s an old alchemy book—centuries old. It was in there right next to Paracelsus.”

“This is the thing with the guard dog?” Dad asked.

“Yes. I should have figured it out ages ago. Flamel was a well-known alchemist, but not a modern one. I only thought to look here “cause we’re going to be in London for a week, so I wanted to look at the list again to see if there was anything worth getting out of the vault.”

“Well, I think this is,” Harry said. “So why did Hagrid say the thing the dog was guarding was between Dumbledore and Nicolas Flamel?” suggested Harry.

“I don’t know. We need to see the book.”

Mum and Dad chuckled slightly. Hermione would probably have said that either way.

* * *

“Yes, I thought it might be in here,” Hermione said.

They had picked up Flamel’s _Livre des figures hi_ _éroglyphiques_ at Gringotts—the original version, not the seventeenth century redaction that the muggles knew about—and clued in Sirius and Remus to what they had found once they arrived at Twelve Grimmauld Place. The French was pretty antiquated, but Hermione could muddle through it.

Sirius was mostly glad of the fact that Harry and his family declared his house a nice place. Considering this was the ancestral home of the Black Family, that was pretty close to a miracle. There was barely even a word about it being dark and grim.

“What did you find?” asked Dan.

“The Philosopher’s Stone,” Hermione said excitedly. “It doesn’t say how to make it, but it describes its properties, and they’re just what the muggle literature says: it can transmute base metals into gold and produce the Elixir of Life, which stops ageing, and can save the drinker from certain death.”

“Wow…” Harry said. “I bet that’s—”

“Wait a minute!” Dan and Emma yelled in unison. The children turned to see both their parents bristling with anger. “You’re saying that wizards have the formula for _immortality_ , and they’re not _using_ it?” Dan growled.

Hermione’s eyebrows disappeared  into her hair, and she started frantically scanning the pages. Sirius and Remus looked confused by this show of outrage, but, slowly, understanding started to spread across their faces. “Well, that’s…” Remus started. “I never really thought of it that way, but I guess that _doesn_ _’t_ make sense. There must be some kind of…cost? A penalty?”

“Maybe just a limit on its power?” Sirius suggested.

Hermione kept flipping pages and started muttering in French: “ _Limitation, compte, d_ _épense, peine_ …”

“There’s all kinds of costs that can come with very powerful magic,” said Remus. “Maybe it’s higher than most people are willing to pay.”

“Aha!” Hermione said triumphantly. “Listen to this: “The Philosopher’s Stone’s power, while very great, is limited. A single Stone can produce the Elixir of Life, but only enough for a single family.” It’s not clear how many people that is. “Furthermore, the amount of magic required to make a Stone increases with each one that is made in proportion with…” Well, there’s a lot of antiquated algebra-speak. I think it’s exponential…Yeah, a ways down, he says that it would be impossible for more than seven Philosopher’s Stones to exist in the world at the same time…So it’s probably a good thing that they’re not using it, really. Can you imagine if a few dozen rich, immortal lords ran the magical world?”

“Ugh,” Emma said. “It’s bad enough already with the Wizengamot.” Sirius visibly shuddered at the thought and nodded.

“There’s more,” Hermione said. “It says the Elixir of Life _permanently_ displaces the water in the body. You could maybe use small amounts for medical emergencies, but not for anti-ageing because but once you’d drunk…oh three or four litres of it, you’d have to keep drinking it, or…well…” She bit her lip nervously.

“You’d die of dehydration,” Dan said darkly. All of the Grangers shuddered at that part.

“So now we know why they don’t use it for anything,” Emma agreed.

“But I bet that’s what Fluffy’s guarding,” Harry said. “And if Flamel made the Philosopher’s Stone and figured out how it worked, he could still be alive, and that’s how Dumbledore could know him.”

“Well of course he is,” Sirius said. The Grangers all looked at him like he had two heads. “Dumbledore studied alchemy under Flamel. Everybody knows that. It’s on his Chocolate Frog Card…Come on, Moony, back me up here.”

“Sorry, we haven’t got that deep into those,” Harry said.

“Oh…well…” Sirius said, disappointed. “Anyway, when I was a kid, the rumour was Flamel was living in an unplottable manor somewhere in Devon.”

“But the real question is, is it really a good idea to keep something like that in a school?” said Emma. “I mean, we know it wasn’t safe in the bank, and we know someone’s after it.”

“Dumbledore thinks it’s safe,” Remus observed.

“That’s what I’m afraid of.”

* * *

They got to work after that. Remus gave the children a brief “review” of wanded spells and potion making for Dan’s and Emma’s benefit, then got on with the first duelling lesson. The parents didn’t look as enthused with this lesson as the children, but they wore a look of resigned determination. After all, they had wanted their children trained in self-defence from the ages of five and six, and this was just the next step.

“Good. So Andromeda taught you the ceremonial forms, just in case you were unfortunate enough to be challenged.” _Or be like James and issue a challenge_ , Remus thought. “Now, in a tactical sense, a duel is basically a fight with rules. And there are more rules than you might think—a lot of them are usually implied, like “Don’t cast until the start is called,” “Stay inside the duelling area,” and “Only cast at your opponent.” More explicitly, the standard rules are, “Don’t kill or permanently injure your opponent,” “Don’t physically touch your opponent,” and “Stop when your opponent is disarmed or incapacitated.” Mind you, in a real fight, _none_ of these rules applies, although “No Unforgivable Curses’ still does.

“But I know that your natural style is quite a bit different from this, so we’ll start there. Now, I’m sure that you quarrel at home from time to time?” he said wryly, looking to Dan and Emma.

The kids’ parents nodded and rolled their eyes. Emma mouthed, “ _Ohhh,_ yes.”

“Well, I’m about to give you a legitimate outlet for that. We’re going to start this off the way you would do it at home—no wands. You may use wandless magic, or any kind of physical skills. Just don’t cause any serious injuries on each other, alright?”

Harry and Hermione both nodded to Remus and then grinned evilly at each other. Magic was already crackling around their fingertips. During the week of cleaning, Sirius had moved everything he wanted to keep from the attic into his Gringotts vault and turned the space into a magical training room in which the children were now paced off, something that they would soon realised was a very good idea.

“I’ll count you off—on three. One…two… _three_!”

The children sprang into action. While they had quarrelled and roughhoused in the past, they had never really had a chance to go all out at home. Hermione, being better with magic, shot off a precise volley of faintly glowing spells from her hands and tried to dance around Harry’s clumsier spells. Since Harry’s strength was karate, he was trying to close the distance between them, but it was difficult with so many of what looked like Stinging Jinxes in the air, along with the occasional streams of conjured sparks for distraction and something that didn’t look like a proper spell, but was similar to a _Flipendo_ , to try to knock him down.

Both of them were fast for their age—not professional level, but wandless spells were undoubtedly quicker to cast than wanded ones, and that fact that they _were_ doing this wandlessly—and mostly wordlessly—was what made it look so dazzling to wizard eyes.

And they also had no way to disarm each other.

Harry fought his way to Hermione and started using karate strikes, and Sirius and Remus both gasped. Neither of them was used to seeing witches and wizards fight hand to hand. They were about to intervene to stop Harry from beating up a girl, but they were even more amazed when they saw how well Hermione was fighting back. Stinging Jinxes were still flashing between them in addition to karate moves, but Harry was more advanced in karate and had more upper body strength, and he managed to knock her to the ground. In karate, this was about as far as things would go, but here, the goal was to incapacitate, so he jumped on her and tried to pin her with improvised wrestling moves.

Hermione responded with a pair of point-blank Stinging Jinxes to his chest, and, when that didn’t work, managed to get a hand on Harry’s face and screamed out, “ _Mucus ad nauseum_!”

Harry’s grip loosened as he went into a nasty sneezing fit and nearly gagged on mucus. Hermione then slammed her hands to his chest with her _Flipendo_ -like attack, causing him to flip off of her and land on his back. Before he could come to his senses, she leaped up, flipped him over, and pinned his hands behind his back, being careful to point his palms down.

“Say it!” she ordered.

“Aagh!” Harry sputtered.

“Say it!” She tightened her grip.

“Aaaah! All Hail Queen Hermione!”

“Okay, then,” she said cheerfully. She climbed off of her brother and helped him up.

Dan and Emma stared at their children in horror, and they flinched and looked down at their feet under their gazes. Both of them looked like they’d come off the worse in a fight against a hornet’s nest. Hermione’s hair was sticking out at every possible angle, Harry had bogies running down his shirt, and both of them were panting heavily.

“Oookay…and _this_ is why duels usually don’t allow physical contact,” Remus said. “You don’t get hurt so much when you’re not up in each other’s faces and have more opportunity to dodge. Now, that was that ‘karate’ you were talking about?”

“Well…part of it,” Harry admitted.

“Wow, and I thought James and I could get rough,” said Sirius. “Remind me not to get on _your_ bad sides. That Curse of the Bogies to the face was a nice touch, Hermione.”

“Thank you,” Hermione said as Harry was still loudly trying to clear his sinuses.

“Well, come on, let’s get you two patched up,” Remus said, leading them to the first aid station. The spells were easy enough to dispel, but the stings would fade better with the help of a cream, and they had both taken a couple of bruises from the roughhousing. “I think we’ll lay off the physical contact for now…I think you’ve got that part down. We’ll start with some of the simple duelling spells: Disarming Charm, Knockback Jinx, Sumerian Strike Hex, maybe the Simple Block Charm—”

“I remember the Sumerian Strike Hex,” Sirius said wistfully. “That was really popular in our second year.”

“And who was behind that? Anyway, most of them are second-year spells, but I don’t expect you’ll have much trouble with them—probably even wandlessly at the rate you’re going. The important thing will be to teach you how to have an informal duel without hurting each other.”

“Yes. Not hurting each other we can definitely use,” Emma agreed.

* * *

Remus called a halt to the lessons for the day, but the following day, he started Harry and Hermione learning the Disarming Charm, which was the first one that duellists usually learnt. Harry was elated and Hermione dismayed to find that it was one of the few spells that he learnt faster than she did, although neither of them had it down consistently. And the need for supervision soon became apparent—a miscast _Expelliarmus_ could knock one’s opponent down, make their hair stand on end as if electrified (Hermione was not amused), or even set their sleeves on fire, not to mention that their aim was a bit patchy. Still, Remus was delighted by their progress by the end of the day.

The next day, they had to put the lessons on hold because of the Wizengamot meeting. This was certainly going to be major event, and the Grangers were dressed in their Sunday best for the award presentation. But from the minute they Flooed into the Ministry, they could tell this wasn’t the only big story on people’s minds. The Christmas production of _The Wizard and the Hopping Pot_ had people talking about muggle issues like little else had in years, and the revelation of the true identity of the woman who had portrayed Alcina in the play was making waves, drawing sharp criticism from conservative quarters and praise from liberal voices. The _Daily Prophet_ sputtered over it, but the positive reviews had already run, so the worst they could say was that the Diagonal Theatre couldn’t find a proper witch to play a muggle role.

The meeting itself, as Sirius had warned, was long and boring. Harry could tell Hermione would much rather be curled up with a good book than sitting through long-winded debates on budget allocations, but it wouldn’t do to be disrespectful, especially today. For that matter, Harry would rather be just about anywhere but here, too, but no, there were end of year reports to approve, committee assignments to renew, and a small, but vocal group arguing, as they did every year, for lifting the ban on flying carpets.

One of the few bright spots had come during Albus Dumbledore’s opening call for family announcements, when Sirius stood up and said, “I, Lord Sirius Orion Black do hereby declare an alliance between the House of Black and the House of Potter.”

Harry then carried out his part by responding, “I, Lord Harry James Potter, accept an alliance with the House of Black.” None of this had been unexpected, of course, but the looks on the faces of the entire conservative wing of the Wizengamot—looking as if they had collectively bit into a bunch of lemons—were priceless.

The other bright spot came nearer the end of the meeting, when the Wizengamot took up the ongoing issue of the Muggle Protection Act. This act would not be a simple vote, Andromeda had explained, and would likely take months to reach a final decision. In true Parliamentary fashion, many provisions would be tested by individual votes, and all amendments would have to be approved separately before making it into the final bill. The Christmas play was certainly colouring the debate, though not altogether for good.

“I think that Lord Brocklehurst’s company makes a good point,” said a sympathetic old wizard named Tiberius Ogden. “Most of the food we eat comes from muggle markets, and the muggle infrastructure supports the magical one in various other ways as well, such as the Knight Bus, Hogwarts Express, and Magical Orient Express in transportation, and so forth.”

“It would seem to me that this makes the case for increasing our self-sufficiency,” Lucius Malfoy drawled shrewdly. Without the Black Seat, Narcissa and Draco were relegated to the spectators’ section. They could be seen sitting in front, directly across from the Grangers. Narcissa looked more generally disgusted than usual, and Draco and Harry spent a large part of the meeting glaring at each other.

“Self-sufficiency? Pshaw!” Ethelred Brocklehurst spoke up. “Any student of history could tell you that self-sufficiency is a fantasy and always has been. The magical population has never been large enough to achieve it.”

“And why not now?” Malfoy replied. “Why, with the advancements in the field of magical automation in recent years, not to mention herbology, why shouldn’t it be a reasonable goal?”

“It hardly seems necessary,” said a Lord Denbright. “We have coexisted with muggles—for the most part peaceably—for centuries, both with and without the Statute of Secrecy. And even during the worse persecutions, at no time was our material sufficiency a problem. Why devote the resources when they could be better spent elsewhere?”

The debate continued for a while in this vein, not really getting back to the fundamental issue of the merits of granting equal rights to sentient beings. Still, there were a couple of new votes that seemed to be leaning toward the liberals’ camp, so it they play did seem to be having an effect, although the most important one, Lord Greengrass, continued to play it close to his vest.

Another important issue at the meeting was the departmental end of year reports, and one in particular gave the Grangers some cause for concern as Amelia Bones rose and said, “I would like to bring to the attention of the Wizengamot the continued short-staffing of the Auror Office, which is becoming increasingly hamstrung by the small size of our applicant pool. Since the end of the war, we’ve only been able to accept five new Aurors and trainees, which is only half of what is needed to maintain the force, let alone make up the for the losses in the war.”

“I hardly think the Ministry can be blamed for the poor standards of the Auror applicant pool,” Cornelius Fudge objected. “It’s only natural that people would be more reticent to join after seeing the horrors of the war.”

“The problem is not just with the Aurors, Minister,” said Hippocrates Smethwyck. “The shortage of incoming Healers at St. Mungo’s has become so bad that we recently began offering remedial training to try to expand our applicant pool. However, we’ve found the most common qualification that potential trainees lack is Potions, and a great many of them have reported being turned off by a strong dislike of the subject. I suspect this is the same problem afflicting the Auror Corps.”

“But once again, this is not the Ministry’s fault,” Fudge said. “The educational authority falls almost entirely to the Hogwarts Board of Governors. Now, if you think the Ministry should be taking a firmer hand in matters of education…”

“Preposterous!” Elphias Doge roared. “Hogwarts has been independent from the government for a thousand years.”

An ancient-looking witch named Griselda Marchbanks stood shakily on her feet and said, “If I may…I have noticed that the number of N.E.W.T.s attempted and awarded in Potions each year has been markedly lower since the end of the war, while other key subjects have remained steady, the unpredictable nature of Defence Against the Dark Art excepted, of course. This would seem to be the source of the problem, and it is an issue that I have raised for the past several years with the Board, but no action has been taken. Perhaps they ought to take a closer look now that these concerns have been raised.” She sent a sharp look at Dumbledore, and then at Malfoy. Everyone in the hall whose children had been through Hogwarts in the past decade knew precisely what action she was implying ought to be taken.

“I suppose we ought to look into it,” Malfoy drawled. “I’m sure we can find a number of…changes that would improve the school.”

Dumbledore gave the Board’s Chairman a suspicious look, but moved on, since there was little else that could be said here on the matter. “Now, I believe the final order of business for this year is a special presentation of awards,” he said with a twinkle. “Minister Fudge, if you will?”

Cornelius Fudge stepped down into the middle of the chamber. He looked much more collected that he had at the trial, now that he had managed to spin things more or less his way. An aide carried a box containing the awards. “Lord Harry James Potter…Miss Hermione Jean Granger…please step forward,” he said.

Harry and Hermione rose from their seats and met Fudge in the centre of the floor.

“These two young people have distinguished themselves among the witches and wizards of Britain by their great deeds,” Fudge intoned. “Lord Potter and Miss Granger, upon noticing a suspicious individual in their presence, took it upon themselves to bring said individual into custody, at no small personal risk. Their actions have led to the capture of a Death Eater and mass murderer who had gone free for ten years, and the exoneration of a member of this body who, tragically, had been imprisoned for the same. For these actions, the Wizengamot is pleased to award Lord Potter and Miss Granger with the Order of Merlin, Third Class.”

The ascription was over the top, but since it was a formal award citation, they let it slide. There was silence as Fudge shook their hands fastened a bronze star encircle by a wreath around each of their necks with a yellow ribbon, and then the hall broke into applause. Harry and Hermione each forced a smile as the Minister was all too happy to finally get his photo op with the Boy-Who-Lived.

Getting out of the Ministry was even more difficult than last time. There was a long line of people waiting to congratulate Harry and Hermione—though mostly Harry. A smiling wizard in lilac robes who was also wearing a Third Class medal wrapped an arm around Harry’s shoulder for another photo op and promised to send him a signed copy of the picture, but the Grangers didn’t really listen to what he had to say, since Charles Nott was also horning in on the conversation.

Cousin Andi was ready for him, though. “What was that you said about a play not making a difference, Lord Nott?” she asked.

“Two or three votes, _Madam_ Tonks?” he replied smugly. “Hardly a…what did you call it…cultural shift? In fact, by my count, you’re still eight votes short.”

“And _you_ _’re_ seven short. And remember, the letters from the public haven’t started coming in, yet.”

“Do I look like the sort of man who would be intimidated by a few letters?” Nott demanded.

“Of course not,” Andi said, smiling. “But there are those among our number who _are_ sympathetic to the will of the people.”

“ _Our_ number! You think a blood traitor like you with no title and no family name deserves to be counted among these Lords and Ladies?”

Andi hissed softly and drew herself up to respond to that insult, but Sirius, who had been silent so far, spoke first. “In case you haven’t noticed, Lord Nott,” he growled, “she _does_ have a family name, now. I’m _sure_ you still read the notices on your grandfather’s directory.”

“Reinstated by someone who was disowned himself hardly counts, _Lord_ Black,” Nott said, though Sirius, unlike Andi, seemed to make him a little nervous. “But then, when have the Potters ever cared for the old traditions? Good day.” He glared at Harry and then at Andi again, both of whom glared back, but he walked away before Sirius could do something rash.

The Grangers calmed down as they left the Ministry building and returned to their car, so Dan and Emma were able to focus on a more immediate matter.

“So the problem with getting qualified Aurors and healers is that not enough people are passing Potions, or they don’t like it, and from what we’ve heard, it sounds like both of those are Professor Snape’s fault,” Dan summarised.

“Unfortunately, yes,” Andi said. She had complained to the Grangers about the healer shortage before. “I don’t know what Dumbledore’s playing at, keeping him on, but almost everyone under the age of thirty complains about him.”

“He doesn’t really even try,” Hermione piped up. “He just tells us to follow the textbook.”

“But he’s putting the entire country at risk, isn’t he?” said Emma. “If you don’t have enough Aurors or healers…”

“That’s we’ve been telling Dumbledore the past several years.”

“I guess that’s how it works when there’s only one school,” Dan suggested. “In a small, isolated community like this, one man can have an awful lot of power.”

“Well something needs to be done,” Emma griped. “I wonder if we can put enough public pressure on the Board, they’d do something.”

“With Malfoy chairing it?” said Andi. “Good luck.”

But Dan and Emma weren’t about to back down. It was their children who had to put up with Snape, now. It was time they took some action.

* * *

Two days after the Wizengamot meeting, two shady figures met in a darkened corner of Knockturn Alley. The first strode forward confidently, if conservatively, in the fading light, while the other merely scuttled out from around a corner.

“Well, then, Mr. Malfoy,” the woman said, staunchly refusing to use titles when addressing even the most powerful, “I did receive your letter. So what interest might you have in my services this fine evening?”

“I’ve admired your coverage of Harry Potter’s return to the wizarding world, Ms. Skeeter,” said Lucius Malfoy softly. “It’s good to see that someone can ask the hard questions, even when such a…well-liked figure is involved.”

“Well, that’s what they pay me for, Mr. Malfoy.”

 _Truly, and that sword cuts both ways_ , Lucius thought. _But it will cut_ my _way with the right sort of persuasion_. “Of course. However, I noted that there has been a significant omission in your coverage.”

Rita Skeeter’s face hardened a bit. “And what might that be?”

“Potter’s family. So little is known about the _muggles_ who have cared for the Boy-Who-Lived for so long. I should think the people have a right to know about them.”

The reporter’s face rose again. “I should certainly say so. Why all this secretiveness the entire time? I’ve been writing that Dumbledore needs to open up for months now.”

“You’ll hear no complaints from me on that point. But what about the family themselves? I can see they’ve been well-hidden. You haven’t found out anything new about them? Nothing that is, as you say, fit to print?”

“No. Not yet.” But Rita looked quite determined to do so. “Their location appears to have been hidden with magic—nothing so strong as a _Fidelius Charm_ , but it looks like Dumbledore’s made their records especially difficult to access. Owl post is certainly no help, all the Ministry files have been sealed, and there are far too many muggle records to sift through quickly.”

“Perhaps you are looking in the wrong place, Ms. Skeeter,” Malfoy drawled.

“And why would you say that, Mr. Malfoy?” she replied impatiently.

Malfoy turned from her and half-seemed to shift gears, inspecting his fingernails intently. “It intrigues me why Potter was moved away from his blood relatives several years after being placed with them.”

“Obviously some elaborate scheme of Dumbledore’s.”

“Perhaps. But my son, Draco, has noticed that Potter doesn’t seem to be very close with Dumbledore—not what you would expect if the old man were running his life.”

“Oh? A falling out of some sort, perhaps?” Rita said. “ _That_ would be quite a story.”

“It certainly would. And if you could find any hard evidence of such a thing, it would be quite valuable. But, returning to the original point, it may well be that since Potter no longer lives with his blood relatives, _their_ records may be easier to access. Whatever unusual circumstances there are around Potter, it looks as if this adoption is the key. If you could discover the reason that it happened…” He let the reporter consider this avenue.

“Oh, that could well be the story of the year,” Rita said shrewdly. “But I’m afraid it would be a very difficult one to research, and I _do_ have other demands on my time, Mr. Malfoy.”

“I understand, Ms. Skeeter. I know you’re a busy witch. But perhaps if you had the financial resources to conduct an extended undercover investigation—say, three or four months…”

Rita got a greedy look in her eyes and sweetly said, “I’m listening.”

* * *

New Year’s Eve at Twelve Grimmauld Place was an all-out affair. The basement, ground floor, and first floor were all decked out in colourfully festive decorations overlaid on a wintry theme, and all three floors were packed with witches and wizards from the more liberal quarters of society. The Weasleys sent their regrets, but most of the first year Gryffindors and their families were there, along with the Brocklehursts, Boneses, and even the Greengrasses, and some of Sirius’s and Remus’s school friends. Sirius had also invited Victoria McKinnon and spent a large part of the party trying to chat her up. She spent a lot of the party laughing at him. Albus Dumbledore was milling about jovially in glittering silver robes, and Minerva McGonagall and Filius Flitwick were entertaining the guests with shows of magical skill. Even Hagrid fit in comfortably under the high ceiling.

The Grangers were all enjoying themselves, milling about and meeting the other magical families. Neville Longbottom seemed to spend a lot of time tagging along in his grandmother’s shadow, and the Greengrasses were very standoffish, but Amelia Bones turned out to be quite friendly in person, and Dan spent some quality time commiserating with Seamus Finnegan’s muggle father.

Harry was listening to Seamus describe the new broomstick his mother had bought him for Christmas when a very fat old man with an outrageous walrus moustache and an elaborate paisley suit waddled up and clapped him hard on the shoulder.

“Harry, my boy,” the man said. “A pleasure to finally meet you.”

Harry sighed inwardly. This wasn’t the first time this had happened this evening, though this was the most overly friendly introduction so far. “Uh, likewise, Mister…”

“Why, Slughorn, of course. Horace Slughorn, former Potions Master at Hogwarts.”

“Er, right.”

Across the room Sirius turned to Remus and said, “Did you invite him?”

“No, I thought you invited him.”

Eventually, Hermione had to save her brother from Horace Slughorn as he sang his parents’ praises. True, Harry thought, it was better than the Boy-Who-Lived nonsense, but still…

Harry briefly thought that Horace Slughorn was the strangest person he would meet that New Year’s Eve, but he was soon proven wrong, as he and his sister ran into a little girl, probably about a year younger than them, with a large amount of blond hair that clashed with her shockingly bright green dress. The girl walked up to them with a glass of punch in her hand and a dreamy look on her face and stared unblinkingly at Harry. Neither he nor Hermione knew what to say.

“Hello, Harry Potter,” the girl finally said. She had a high, squeaky voice that made her sound a year or two younger than she looked.

“Um…hi,” Harry said, staring back at those disconcerting silver eyes.

The girl turned and stared at Hermione just long enough to say, “You’re Hermione Granger.” She turned back to Harry before Hermione could respond.

“Uh, yeah. Yes I am.”

“And who are you?” Harry said as they continued staring at each other.

“My name is Luna Lovegood,” she replied. “Your godfather was very nice to invite Daddy and me.” And then, she blinked at Harry once. Slowly.

It was then that Harry realised that, unlike almost everyone else he had met that night, Luna Lovegood’s eyes had not once darted up to his scar. She actually seemed to understand him. He smiled and gave her a slow blink in return without even registering what he was doing. Hermione looked nervously between the two of them.

“Thanks. I’ll pass that along,” Harry said.

Luna nodded. She still wasn’t blinking very much, another habit of Harry’s that he hardly ever thought about anymore. Then, for no apparent reason, she looked up at the ceiling and said, “You should be careful around that, Harry.”

Harry looked up, and his eyes went wide as he saw that he was standing directly under a sprig of mistletoe. He jumped out of the way. There were already too many over-enthusiastic young witches here for his eleven-year-old self’s comfort. “Thank you, Luna,” he said sincerely. “I’ll have to watch out for those.”

“Mm hmm. It could be infested with nargles.”

Harry shared a confused look with Hermione. “Um…nargles?”

“Oh, yes. They’re very sneaky. They steal your socks from the wash. You should get a charm to ward them off, like this one.” She indicated her corsage, which appeared to be made out of a radish plant. Then, before the other children could respond, she took a sip from her glass and walked on.

Hermione and Harry both stood open mouthed for a moment, not sure what part of that strange conversation to discuss first.

“Well, she seems nice,” Harry said.

“She seems strange,” Hermione retorted, “and did she just _blink_ at you?” she whispered.

Harry tensed up at the realisation, but he forced the thought down. “I think that might just be how she is. Hmm…nargles…you don’t think?”

“I’ve never heard of them…” A look of mixed nervousness and amusement crossed Hermione’s face. “But then it _would_ explain where all those socks go…”

“Ahem! Excuse me—Listen up!” Everyone turned to see a grinning Sirius standing up on a makeshift stage that had been set up at one end of the large basement kitchen. “Thank you all for coming,” he said loudly. “Thank you for helping me to really break in the brand spankin’ new House of Black. It has come time for the entertainment for the evening. After some suggestions from a certain correspondent, I wrote some letters and got hold of someone who should be very familiar to my generation, who agreed to come here for his first public performance in eleven years. So without further ado, put your hands together for…Stubby Boardman!”

There was a lot of applause from the guests who were around Dan’s and Emma’s age as a man who really did look quite a bit like Sirius walked onto the stage with a two-necked guitar. Albus Dumbledore also seemed surprisingly enthusiastic about the entertainment. But everyone turned when they heard a loud shriek of laughter and a thud. Xenophilius Lovegood was standing open-mouthed in shock at seeing Sirius Black and Stubby Boardman at the same party. Next to him, a pair of small feet were kicking in the air, as Luna seemed to have laughed so hard that she knocked her chair over backwards.

* * *

“ _Tsimpima! Tsimpima! Tsimpima_!”

“ _Flipendo_!”

“ _Locomotor Mortis_!”

“ _Mahasu! Colloshoo_!”

The Shoe-Sticking Jinx caught Hermione in one leg as she dodged, causing her to stumble and land with her back to Harry, twisting her ankle. Both children had made great progress over the course of the week at learning the rudiments of proper wanded duelling, though Remus warned them that they probably weren’t up to the level of pureblood children who had got an early start in the subject. Hermione dispelled the jinx and staggered to her feet.

“ _Expelliarmus_!” Harry yelled. He was getting frighteningly good at that spell.

Hermione didn’t have time to turn around and see it. She just took her best guess and ducked away from that prickling sensation that was fast approaching on the back of her neck. The bolt of red light zoomed over her head.

Sirius and Remus gasped, and Remus cried, “Hold!”

Both children lowered their wands and turned to their tutor.

“Good job, again,” Remus said. “Hermione, how did your know which way to duck from that Disarmer?”

“I’m not sure…” she replied. “I sort of felt where it was going.”

“You used your magic sense?” Sirius exclaimed. “That’s Masters-level Defence.”

“So’s wandless casting, usually,” said Remus. “I guess if you start early enough, you learn a whole different skill set…Now that actually gives me an idea. Padfoot, help me reinforce the duelling wards. There’s a special drill I’d like to try with you that gets used once in a while in Masters level, Auror training, and so forth. It helps you learn how to fight at night, or if you’ve been hit with a Conjunctivitis Curse or some such. I would like you to try to duel each other…blindfolded.”

“What!” all the Grangers said.

“It’s not really any more dangerous—unless you run into each other. We just need to make sure the wards can handle the stray spells. Obviously, it’s much harder than normal duelling. You have to rely on sound and the feel of the magic to figure out where your opponent is and when to dodge, but it’s a good skill to have in a pinch, even a little bit, and I suspect the two of you will have an aptitude for it.”

The Grangers could see the merit in that, and so, a few minutes later, Harry and Hermione faced off, blindfolded, behind the reinforced duelling wards, raising their wands in each other’s general directions.

“On three,” Remus said. “One…two… _three_.”

“ _Expelliarmus_!” Harry yelled and then immediately dodged to the side to avoid giving away his position. Hermione felt the Disarmer whiz past her on her left and immediately fired off a Shoe-Sticking Jinx right at where Harry had been a moment earlier. Harry took aim at the sound of her voice and shot a Sumerian Strike Hex at her (which didn’t do anything but feel like a punch in the nose), but whilst blindfolded, she found she could sense it coming with surprising clarity and dodged to her right.

The duel was much slower and clumsier than their usual performance. Dan and Emma flinched as a lot of their spells went wide and splashed off the wards. The children stood around, listening and feeling for their opponents, shot spells intermittently, and didn’t move more than they had to, but they were definitely still able to dodge. Both of them soon switched over to their more limited repertoire of nonverbal spells to give each other fewer sounds to aim at.

Finally, Harry threw a volley of Stinging Jinxes at Hermione and then got lucky and managed to connect with an underpowered silent Disarmer. Her wrist strap kept her from losing her wand entirely, but her squeak of surprise allowed him to nail her with a Shoe-Sticking Jinx while she fumbled with her holster.

“ _Flipendo! Flipendo_!” she yelled before trying to cancel the jinx.

“ _Expelliarmus_!” Harry shouted. This verbal disarmer was enough to knock Hermione’s wand completely out of her wrist strap before she could unstick her shoes. But she didn’t give up just yet, pulling her feet out of her shoes, whilst firing as many wandless Stinging Jinxes in Harry’s direction as she could. Harry was pushed back under the assault, but she was lighting herself up as a target. It wasn’t long before he hit her with a “ _Bracchium Wibbly!_ ,” making it impossible for her to aim.

“And, hold!” Remus called. “Harry wins. That was very impressive,” he said as he took down the wards. Hermione reached up with a pair of arms that had horrible tremors running through them and managed to slide off her blindfold. Remus cancelled the spells on her while Harry took off his own blindfold and levitated her wand to her. “I don’t think either of you will have any trouble acing your Defence Exams when the time comes. But keep in mind, all of this will be a lot harder with more advanced spells. You’ll need a lot more practice with those that we’ve done this week.”

“I think we can count that as a good thing,” Emma suggested. “It’s a little scary how far they’ve come this week.”

“We’re proud of you kids,” Dan added. “Just take it easy and don’t start hexing people at school—including each other.” Harry and Hermione dutifully agreed.


	34. Improbable Politics

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: JK Rowling dormiens nunquam titillandus.

The train ride back to Hogwarts put Harry and Hermione back into their normal routine: saying hi to their friends, exchanging a few meaningless sarcastic remarks with Draco Malfoy, and enduring the stares at the Boy-Who-Lived-And-Caught-A-Death-Eater-At-Age-Eleven, although luckily, people really weren’t staring at Harry so much anymore.

The one new addition, which the children were happy to see, was that people were catching up with each other and intensely discussing the Christmas play.

“So that really _was_ the original version?”

“I never would have thought anything from Beedle the Bard would—well, look at Babbity Rabbity.”

“That was a dirty trick casting a muggle as a muggle and not telling anyone.”

“I thought that was really brilliant at the end. It didn’t even matter who she was. I just wanted _someone_ to tell of Atlantes.”

“Well, I’m a half-blood, and lots of people have muggle parents or grandparents, and we can all tell you that muggles are smarter than a lot of wizards think.”

The response was mostly positive, which was good, along with quite a lot of surprise, which was, if a bit sad, even better in practical terms. As a member of a Noble House being very prominently raised by muggles, Harry was subject to a lot of questions about the play and the general idea behind it, to which he responded that muggles were just people like everyone else, and they had been a wonderful family to him, and why shouldn’t they have equal rights?

After saying hello to half the train, they finally found the people they were looking for. The two Slytherin girls had, conveniently, got a compartment by themselves.

“Good afternoon, Miss Greengrass, Miss Davis,” Harry said formally. “We’re sorry we didn’t get much chance to speak with you at New Year’s. How were your holidays?”

“Quite pleasant,” Daphne Greengrass replied primly. “I trust yours were as well, Mr. Potter, Miss Granger?” They both nodded. “You know, we were wondering when you’d come around to see us.”

“Yes, it’s about time for another debate, isn’t it?” Tracey Davis added.

Harry and Hermione both sighed inwardly. It was too bad they couldn’t talk to these two without it being about politics—although that was just as much their own fault. “We’re sorry,” Hermione said. “If we’re interrupting something…”

But Daphne and Tracey actually seemed to be enjoying making the two of them sweat. “No, you know what? Sit down, you two,” Daphne said. “Shut the door. We’ve been wanting to talk to you, too.”

Harry and Hermione didn’t need to be told twice.

“So…how long have you known about the Christmas play?” Daphne asked intensely.

“Ah,” Harry said, briefly surprised at the line of discussion. “Well, Mandy first tipped us off about the basic plot in September. My proxy got an advance look at the script in mid-November. It would have been earlier, but we had the trial.”

“Ugh, don’t remind me,” Daphne said. “My parents had a fit over how much that scrambled at the Wizengamot.”

“Er, right. So we had a pretty good idea what was going on by the time anything ran in the paper.”

“We’d actually never heard of the original version of that story until Mandy told us about it, though,” Hermione offered.

“Yeah, I hear the Brocklehursts are already making a bundle reprinting the original _Tales of Beedle the Bard_ ,” said Tracey. “I even got a copy. It’s amazing how much has changed.”

Daphne got a rather sour look on her face at her friend’s enthusiasm. “What about that muggle actress?” she asked. “Did you know about her?”

“No, not until opening night,” Harry said. “That was really a surprise move—She was good, though.”

“Surprise is an understatement. The conservatives are in an uproar because now they can’t take back what they said in their reviews.”

“Well why would they have given good reviews in the first place?” Hermione said. “Considering the political subject?”

“Not good so much, but a lot of them were fair reviews before they knew better. The House of Greengrass has enough integrity to give them fair reviews anyway, so I can say she’s definitely a good actress—wherever they found her—”

“Her sister is a Ravenclaw prefect.”

“Oh. Makes sense. Anyway, even some people who are okay with muggles don’t like the break from tradition—they think the theatre should be wizards only, that sort of thing. But the point is, we want to know how much you were planning with them.”

Harry and Hermione exchanged a nervous look. “Honestly, we weren’t,” Harry said. “We got a early look and made sure to be there, recommended it to a few people, but that’s all.”

Daphne and Tracey exchanged a far more appraising look. “So that was all the Brocklehursts, like everyone thinks it was?”

The two Gryffindors nodded.

“So Lord Brocklehurst was on the pro-muggle side all along.”

“Mandy would probably talk to you about it,” Hermione said.

“Oh, don’t worry. We’ll talk to her, too,” Tracey replied. “But I actually thought it was a brilliant play.”

“Yeah, mostly just because you get to see me sweat over it,” her friend admonished.

“So how _did_ you like the play, Daphne?” asked Hermione.

“What is there to say?” the blond girl said. “Well-performed, entertaining story, and, yes, Tracey, I really did feel for the muggles by the end of it. It really threw Grandfather for a loop, though. I’ve told you how he feels. We didn’t expect a pro-muggle story to be so…“compelling,” he said.”

“Hey, it’s a good story. Why not?” Tracey suggested.

“I can admit it’s a good story, Tracey, but you know it’s making a lot of waves. Grandfather’s taking it slow until things settle down and he can see which way the wind’s blowing—So there’s your answer if you were looking for it,” she told Harry and Hermione pointedly.

“Well, uh, thanks,” Harry said. He was never going to get used to this political stuff, he thought. Fortunately, the Slytherin girls _were_ capable of talking about other things, as Hermione managed to pull them into a conversation about classes. (Daphne and Tracey were both high achievers themselves—“Putting that Slytherin ambition to good use,” Tracey said.) The rest of the train ride was reasonably pleasant.

* * *

Upon returning to school, the students were thrown right back into their classes, but with the addition that many professors were handing back midterm exam grades. Hermione received top marks across the board, except Potions, and Harry also did very well, including a high O in Defence, but neither of them thought much of it until just before dinner when they heard shouting coming from the staffroom on their way to dinner.

“This is an outrage!”

Draco Malfoy sounded even angrier than usual. Hermione and Harry quietly approached and were surprised to see a number of Slytherins from various years had cornered Professor Quirrell outside the staffroom, including Daphne Greengrass. The two Gryffindors snuck closer to hear what could have got her working together with Malfoy. One of the older students looked in their direction, but they ducked behind a nearby corner and listened intently.

“Whatever do you mean, Mr. Malfoy?” Quirrell said smoothly.

“We mean these exam results, Professor,” an older boy said. “We’re not stupid, you know, we can compare with the other houses.”

Hermione gave Harry a surprised look. It sounded as if the Slytherins had got significantly lower grades than the other houses on the Defence midterm exam. Maybe Professor Snape wasn’t the only one to play favourites at Hogwarts.

“I fail to see anything wrong with those results, Mr. Jugson,” Quirrell said.

“Flint flunked?” Malfoy demanded. “And Higgs? Crabbe and Goyle I can understand, but beyond that, hardly any O’s in all of Slytherin? Greengrass and myself, the heirs of two Most Ancient Houses, both received mere E’s?”

“Mr. Malfoy, are you under the impression that your family name should entitle you to special treatment?”

Harry and Hermione giggled softly. Malfoy sputtered a bit, but he was no dummy. “I’m under the impression that we Malfoys know our Defence Against the Dark Arts, Professor,” he said sharply. “And we know unfair grades when we see them.”

“And why should the grades I have assigned be unfair?” Quirrell insisted. “If you are not satisfied, perhaps you should spend more time studying and less time gallivanting around the grounds and pawing at each other in broom cupboards.”

There was a loud sound of grumbling and murmuring as the Slytherins fumed at that. Every single one of them knew full well that these were nearly word for word the same arguments that Professor Snape used to justify his own favouritism. Hermione’s mouth dropped open. Quirrell was actually calling Snape out?

“You _do_ know that you serve in this post at the pleasure of the Board of Governors, don’t you Professor?” Malfoy said. “My father will hear about this.”

Harry mouthed the words in time with him from the second syllable, causing Hermione to laugh loudly enough that they had to make a break for it. They just managed to catch Quirrell replying with “I believe I serve on a one-year contract, Mr. Malfoy…” before they were out of earshot.

* * *

“I’m just saying that with the cloak _and_ the map, there’s no way we’d get caught. We could stay far away from the patrols.”

Harry had been anxious the whole first week back to try out his new Christmas present, but Hermione was less easy to convince. True, he could sneak out past her, but he was hoping he could manage to corrupt her a little bit.

“So you say,” Hermione admonished her brother. “What if Professor Dumbledore has something like the map?”

“Fred and George never got caught—well, almost never. And Dumbledore gave me the cloak. _And_ he said, “Use it well.” He must want me to use it for something.”

“He probably just wants you to have it for safety.”

“But where’s the fun in that?”

“I think there are safer ways of having fun. You know, less likely to get you expelled.”

“But we’re only in trouble if we get caught,” Harry insisted. He brandished the Marauder’s Map again.

“And what if I tell Mum and Dad?” Hermione said. “They told you not to use that cloak to cause trouble.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“Yes, I would.”

“Come on, sis, live a little. Sirius will be very disappointed if I don’t get you to break the rules at least once this year.”

“What? You are just…you’re asking for it, brother. You’re _really_ asking for it.” She let a bit of magic crackle around her fingers.

Harry took a step back, but he said, “You know you can’t stop me forever.”

“I can try. Besides, why do you want to go out so bad? Where do you even think you’re going to go?”

“I don’t know. Maybe just explore for a while—see if anything’s different at night.”

“I doubt anything’s _that_ different. And if that’s all you’re doing, what’s the point?”

Harry shrugged. “What if we say it’s good practice in case of emergencies?”

Hermione stared and tried to think of a good retort before deciding it wasn’t worth the trouble. So that was how, late that night, an invisible pair of children slipped out of the portrait hole from Gryffindor Tower.

“I cannot believe I let you talk me into this.”

“Come on, you know you wanted to come all along.”

Hermione was huddled with Harry under the invisibility cloak, looking out at the darkened castle as if through a veil, her eyes periodically darting down to the Marauder’s Map to make sure no one else was nearby.

They were wandering about on the third floor, though far away from Fluffy, not looking for anything in particular. Harry wondered if it might help Hermione’s mood to find out if the cloak could help them sneak into the library at night.

“Oh no. Look,” Hermione hissed suddenly. Harry looked where she was pointing. Another dot had just turned off the staircase he had been climbing and was approaching their location. It was labelled “Albus Dumbledore.”

“What’s he doing up?” she whispered worriedly.

“He’s Dumbledore. Does he need a reason?” Harry whispered back.

“What do we do?”

“Don’t panic. We’ll just hide in one of the classrooms till he leaves.”

They dashed into a nearby room as quietly as they could and looked around as they waited for Dumbledore to pass. It was just another unused classroom, like many in the castle, with chairs and desks stacked against the walls, except…

“What’s that?” Hermione whispered. Harry looked over and saw one thing in the room that didn’t belong: a large, baroque-style mirror propped against the wall.

“Huh, that’s odd. I wonder why it’s in here?” he whispered back.

“I don’t know.” Hermione slipped out from under the cloak and approached the mirror. “Weird. I don’t see anything…” she said. She stepped closer and jumped back in surprise. “Oh! Mum?” she squeaked too loudly, Dumbledore all but forgotten. “No, that’s…is that me?”

“What? What is it?” Harry said.

“It doesn’t show a normal reflection…I see me, but I’m older—like in my twenties…Ahh!” She whirled around and scanned the room fearfully.

“What!”

Hermione turned back toward the mirror. “It’s Dumbledore…He’s in the reflection, but he’s not out here. He’s…he’s giving me something…” She leaned forward and squinted in the low light. “Holy cricket! It’s a Doctor of Wizardry.”

“What? Let me see,” Harry said in disbelief. He came closer and stood next to his sister. Then he gasped.

“You see it.”

“No,” he breathed. “I see…I see my parents.”

“What?”

“I…see us, like we are now, and Mum and Dad are behind us…and so are my birth parents.”

“But how…?”

“I don’t know. There’s more people in the background. I think I see Sirius and Remus.”

“But that doesn’t make any sense,” Hermione said. “I see something that looks like the future—or could be. And you see something…” _Which isn_ _’t real_ , but she couldn’t bring herself to say it. “What kind of mirror is this?”

Harry said nothing, but he tore his eyes away from the image and looked around the frame. “Look.” He pointed up toward the top. There was an inscription there that read, “ _Erised stra ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on wohsi_.”

“What language is that?” he said.

“I don’t know,” replied Hermione. “It doesn’t look like anything I’ve ever seen…” She tried to sound out some of the words: “Erised…oyt…oyt on…wohsi.” Her voice took on a strange sort of accent as she stared back into the mirror, and something clicked in her mind. “Of course, it’s backwards. I show no…no, I show not you…not your face…but your hearts…desire. Oh, so it just shows what you want to see, then.” She sounded disappointed.

“Your heart’s desire,” Harry repeated slowly. “So your heart’s desire is to earn a Doctor of Wizardry.” Hermione didn’t respond. “And mine is…”

“Your family alive and…and friends with…mine,” she said reverently. There was an awkward silence. Hermione couldn’t remember the last time either of them had talked about her blood family as being just hers. Her own heart’s desire seemed a little shortsighted now. She looked again and let out a too-loud “Oh!”

“What?”

“It changed.”

“It changed? How?”

“Well, Dumbledore and I are still there, but now you’re there too, and so’s Mum and Dad and your birth parents.”

“But why did it change?”

“I don’t know. I was thinking about your desire and…hmm, I guess your heart’s desire can change with your mood.”

“Huh. Maybe…”

Both children fell silent. They stared into the mirror for long minutes, entranced by the visions within. Like a magical photo, the figures just stood there, gesturing occasionally, but never speaking. But it seemed much harder to look away, and both children slowly inched closer to the mirror without noticing. It was only when Hermione heard the soft thunk of Harry’s hands pressing against the glass that she snapped out of it, looking around and realising she had no idea how much time had passed.

She gently laid a hand on her brother’s shoulder. “Harry, I think we should go.”

“Go? Why?”

“Something feels funny about this mirror…I don’t think it’s healthy, staring at something that just shows you what you want to see. I think we should just let it be.”

Harry kept staring and seemed in danger of slipping back into the fantasy, but he reluctantly tore his eyes away from the vision. “Yeah, you’re probably right, sis,” he admitted. “Let’s see if Dumbledore’s gone yet. We can mirror-call Sirius about this when we get back to the Tower.”

Outside the classroom, Albus Dumbledore smiled as he cancelled his Supersensory Charm and walked on. It was very fortunate, he thought. Harry’s sister seemed to be just the right kind of good influence on him: willing to go along with his nighttime excursions, but also keeping his head level. At this rate, his plan should go very well.

* * *

A few days into the term, Cousin Andi’s eagle owl delivered a fancy-looking rolled up parcel to Harry at breakfast, much to his surprise.

“Were you expecting something?” Hermione asked.

“No, I would’ve told you. Hang on, there’s a note.”

 

_Dear Harry,_

_This came to your office addressed to you, and it was a real job convincing the owl to give it to me instead. I was going to throw it out, but I thought you might want it if any of your friends are Lockhart fans._

_Cousin Andi_

 

“Lockhart?” Harry asked.

“Oh, my Mum’s read all his books,” Ron said. “But what’s he sending you something for?”

“I don’t know.” He took the parcel from the owl and unrolled it. There was a moving colour photo of himself with a tall blond wizard with a supernaturally white smile and lilac robes wrapping an arm around his shoulder. Both of them were wearing bronze Order of Merlin medals. The Harry in the picture was fighting to get away. At the bottom, the photo was signed in flourishing script: “Gilderoy Lockhart.”

“Oh, it’s that guy,” Harry groaned. “He cornered me at the meeting.”

“Oh, yeah,” Neville said, leaning over. “Lockhart’s had his picture taken with most of the Wizengamot. He came after my Gran once, but she snapped a mousetrap on his nose.”

Everyone nearby burst out laughing.

“A mousetrap?” Hermione asked between giggles.

“Long story.”

The laughter had drawn additional attention, and several people crowded around to see what Harry was looking at. “Oh my God, you got your picture taken with Gilderoy Lockhart!” Lavender brown squealed.

“I guess,” Harry said. “Who is he, anyway?”

“Who’s Gilderoy Lockhart?” Lavender sounded scandalised. “He’s only the best dark creature hunter in the _world_!”

“And _really_ handsome, too.” Parvati Patil added.

“He’s won _Witch Weekly_ _’s_ Most Charming Smile Award four years running.”

“I can see that,” Hermione said interestedly, examining the photo closely. Harry scoffed.

“But he’s brilliant, though,” Ron said. He started counting on his fingers. “He’s fought banshees, ghouls, hags, trolls, vampires, werewolves, and yeti.”

“And all without ruining his smile,” Parvati gushed.

“I don’t know,” Harry smirked. “I’m not sure it’s healthy for it to be that white.”

Hermione smacked him in the arm.

Harry decided to stash the photo in his trunk before they went to Charms class so he couldn’t catch any more flak for it. By now, he and Hermione had pretty well learnt how to learn new spells in Charms, even with their non-standard control of magic. It was the favourite subject of both of them, now (as it was for most of the first years, since it involved the most actual spellcasting). Today, though, there was more to it: after ninety minutes of learning the basic Mending Charm, they approached Professor Flitwick in the empty classroom.

“Ah, Mr. Potter, Miss Granger,” the little man squeaked. “I must say I’ve been very impressed with your progress this year. I think your self-study will serve you well, now that you’ve got used to it.”

“Thank you Professor,” Harry replied, blushing a little. “We actually wanted to talk to you about something else.”

“Of course.”

“A family friend taught us some basic duelling over break,” Harry said. “Remus Lupin—you might remember him.”

“Oh yes, of course I remember Lupin,” Flitwick reminisced. “Gryffindor prefect, excellent at Charms and Defence, would have made a great addition to the DMLE if it weren’t for…well…”

“We know about the restrictions, Professor,” Hermione said softly.

“Oh, I see. So, the two of you are interested in the way of the duellist. I wonder if I might perhaps have a demonstration of what you have learnt?”

“What? Here?” Hermione said in surprise.

“Why not?” Flitwick waved his wand a few times, causing the door to shut, and the desks to clear a space in the middle of the room. “I wasn’t the 1968 Western Europe Conference Duelling Champion for nothing, you know.” He changed his casting to the pattern that Hermione and Harry recognised from Remus’s duelling wards. When he was finished, he said, “Now, you both know the forms, I hope?”

Harry nodded and snapped his fingers. His wand shot forward into his hand. Hermione did the same, and they moved to take their places inside the narrow wards.

“Ah, duelling holsters. Excellent,” Flitwick said excitedly. “Now, bow…and on three. One…two… _three_!”

The two children started casting spells at each other and dodging as best they could. With the duelling holsters, even a couple of Disarmers couldn’t stop them, and the spells continued to fly for some time. But finally, Hermione got Harry’s wand away from him. He started casting wandlessly, much to Professor Flitwick’s delight, but he couldn’t keep up, and the duel soon ended when Hermione landed a Full Body Bind on him, and he toppled to the floor, stiff as a board.

“Marvellous,” Flitwick said, taking down the wards as Hermione helped her brother up. “Ten points to Gryffindor. If I didn’t know better, I’d have said that was a couple of second years duelling. My compliments to Mr. Lupin.”

“Thank you, sir,” Hermione said as Harry caught his breath.

“Yeah,” Harry added. “Professor, we were wondering, since duelling isn’t really covered much in the Defence curriculum, would be possible to start a duelling club here?”

“A club!” Flitwick squeaked. “Why, that would be grand. There hasn’t been Duelling Club here since the 1960s—it’s that awful curse on the Defence Professorship. Of course, I was club president back when I was in school. Yes, I think that would be an excellent idea.”

Harry and Hermione grinned.

“Now, unfortunately, I’m afraid I wouldn’t be able to do it on my own,” he continued. “I’m very busy with the Frog Choir, and there’s not really enough time to set it up this spring, anyway. But I will talk to the other teachers about helping out, and I think we will be able to start it straight away next September or October. And, if I may say so, Mr. Potter, I think that with your involvement, it will be a great success.”

“I…thank you, sir,” Harry said. “We’re looking forward to it.”


	35. Firelegs Safety Training

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Always treat Harry Potter as if he is owned by JK Rowling. Never point Harry Potter at anything you are not willing to Expelliarmus. Keep your fingers off Harry Potter until you have written the disclaimer.

The spring term at was about as normal as things ever were at Hogwarts. There were occasional hexes flying between the Gryffindors and Slytherins—Neville got nailed by a nasty Leg-Locker Curse from Malfoy. Homework was as tough as ever, and the heavy December snow had been replaced by an endless, driving January rain, which was a little odd because January was supposed to be the biggest month for snow. Hermione speculated that there might be some kind of weather modification magic around the castle, since even the Highlands weren’t supposed to get as much snow in December as they’d got last month. That, or maybe they were just having an odd year.

It was about a month before the next Quidditch match against Hufflepuff that Oliver Wood dropped the bombshell that Professor Snape would be refereeing the match instead of Madam Hooch. Harry and the rest of the team were understandably dismayed, but Hermione was very nervous.

“Oh, Harry, what are you going to do?” she said, hugging him tight.

“I have to play, Mione,” he told her. “There’s no reserve Seeker, and if I back out, the Slytherins will just think I’m afraid of Snape.”

“Well, maybe you should be. After what happened at the first match—”

“We still don’t have any evidence it was Snape who did that,” Harry insisted. “And the teachers checked my broom and couldn’t find anything wrong with it.”

“That’s because he had to keep casting the curse to make it stick.”

“But what else am I supposed to do? I can’t let the team down just because Snape’s refereeing.”

Hermione sighed. Was there any way to get through to her brother? Wait, maybe there was. She knew at least one person who shared her suspicions about Snape. “We could ask Sirius about it,” she suggested. “He’s our godfather. He should be able to give us some decent advice.”

“He doesn’t like Snape either,” Harry observed.

Hermione stared him down—no easy task given his feline tendencies, but years of practice had honed her skills.

“I guess we can try,” he admitted. “I’ll go get the mirror.” A few minutes later, Harry brought down his two-way mirror, and the two siblings edged to an isolated spot at the side of the Common Room. “Sirius Black,” he said.

A minute later their godfather’s grinning face appeared in the mirror, saying, “Hey there, cubs, what’s up?”

“Well,” Harry started, glancing at Hermione. “We think Professor Snape might be up to something.”

Sirius got a suspicious look on his face. “Why? What’s he doing?”

“He’s refereeing our next Quidditch match.”

“What!” The response came in stereo as Remus’s face popped into view. Harry turned the mirror sideways so they could see them both better.

“Isn’t that a conflict of interest?” Remus said.

“It should be,” Hermione groused. “He’ll probably just pass it off that Slytherin’s not playing. But more importantly, what about the fact that I’m pretty sure he was jinxing Harry’s broom in the first match?”

“ _She_ _’s_ pretty sure,” Harry emphasised.

“I don’t know, there, Cub,” Sirius replied darkly. “I don’t like the sound of it. Having him up in the air with you would be a perfect opportunity for him to try something.”

“But why? He’s never given me that much trouble.”

“Do you remember when I told you how much he hated your father?”

“Yeah, but he ought to know that I’m not my father. And even if Snape does hate me that much, they say he barely got out of Azkaban after the war. I don’t think he’d risk everything by trying to kill me.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure,” said Sirius. “After that little incident in our sixth year…”

“What incident?”

“Sirius pulled an especially mean and dangerous trick that nearly got Snape killed, except James had the sense to stop him.” Remus said.

“He was asking for it! Snooping around, trying to follow us and get you in trouble, Moony.”

“And he never would have found out anything if you hadn’t tipped him off.”

“What happened?” said Hermione.

“Alright, alright,” Sirius said. “The thing is, Snape was always trying to follow us when we snuck off at the full moon. He thought he could get us all expelled if he caught us, and I wasn’t about to have that, so one month, I…well, I kind of tried to feed him to Moony.”

“What!” Harry and Hermione gasped.

“Yeah, I was young and angry, and it was mean and stupid, and I probably would’ve gone to Azkaban legitimately if it had worked,” Sirius admitted. “Luckily, James found out and had the sense to stop him. But Snape hated all of us even more after that, including James. I don’t know if he thought James was in on it and got cold feet, or he just couldn’t stand being indebted to someone he hated so much. Probably both. Anyway, that’s why I said I wouldn’t be surprised if Snape held a grudge against you, Harry. And between the two Quidditch matches, it’s starting to look pretty suspicious.”

“Well it doesn’t matter, does it? There’s no reserve Seeker. I still have to play,” Harry replied.

Sirius hemmed and hawed, but reluctantly nodded. “No use getting between a Potter and Quidditch. Just be careful out there.”

“Don’t worry, I will, Padfoot.”

“I still don’t like this, Harry,” Hermione jumped in. “I think you should talk to Professor Dumbledore. If Snape’s out on the pitch, there’s no telling what he could do.”

“That’s a good idea,” Remus agreed. “I don’t know why or how Snape managed to get to referee, but if you ask Dumbledore, you can probably at least get an explanation.”

“Fine, I’ll do that,” Harry agreed. “We’ll see you later.”

“Love you, cubs,” Sirius said.

“Love you, too,” Harry replied. “Mirror off.”

Harry eventually did go to Dumbledore, in response to his sister’s continued nagging. However the only answer he got was, “I trust Professor Snape, Harry, and you should as well.”

* * *

The weather slowly improved. It was still dreadfully cloudy, but the ground finally dried out for the first time all year. Then one day, while most of the older students were obsessing about the upcoming Valentine’s Day Hogsmeade weekend, Professor Quirrell strode into their double Defence period, his turban bobbing, to give what would soon prove to be a very different kind of lesson.

“This year,” he began, “as you should all know by now, we have been concerned mainly with self-defence in the muggle world. A competent student should, at the end of their first year, be able to defend themselves for long enough to escape from a muggle attacking with fists, knives, blunt objects, an attack dog, and so forth.

“ _However_ , these are not the only weapons muggles use. Who can tell me what other weapons muggle are known for…? Yes, Mr. Smith?”

“I believe they’re called “firelegs,” Professor,” Zacharias Smith answered.

All the muggle-raised students giggled.

“It would seem we have some disagreement in the class,” Quirrell said. He zeroed in on Dean Thomas, who grew nervous under his gaze. “Do you have something to say, Mr. Thomas?”

“Th-they’re called fire- _arms_ , Professor,” he said. “But we usually just say guns.”

“Yes, _guns_ ,” Quirrell intoned deeply. “Muggles have quite the fondness for _guns_. Mind you, when it comes to weapons of war, this only scratches the surface. Over the past century, muggles have become very, _very_ adept at killing each other…” And here, Quirrell went into what could only be described as an anti-muggle fits. These had been growing more common and more obvious as the months passed. They came on suddenly and passed just as quickly, and they seemed to grow more unsettling each time. His face contorted with anger as he listed off the muggle weapons of war: “There are things called ‘cannons,’ which are guns so large that they can blast through buildings, ‘machine guns,’ which can mow down an entire line of enemies in seconds, poison gas, which condemns the victim to a painful death as it eats away their lungs, ‘tanks’—rolling instruments of death with armour tougher than dragon hide that crush everything in their path, ‘blockbuster bombs’ dropped from aeroplanes, powerful enough to destroy an entire street full of buildings, ‘missiles’—like fireworks, but with huge bombs attached to them, and of course, the “atomic bombs,” which are so powerful that they can destroy an entire city in one blast! Yes, muggles are so fond of killing each other that they invent new and better ways of doing it every year, and it is too often _we_ who get caught in the crossfire!”

Suddenly, Quirrell staggered and clutched at his chest a little. His health seemed to have taken a turn for the worse, too, in the spring term. But he kept his feet, and his face softened. “In any case, muggle civilians do _not_ use these weapons. They use ordinary guns—weapons so old fashioned that they’re hardly even _used_ in war anymore, but still very deadly…

“But perhaps some of you don’t believe me?” he said, a little mockingly, looking from one pureblood face to the next. “After all, how could muggles possess that kind of power…? Show of hands: how many of you have ever seen a muggle firearm?”

About half the class had their hands raised, including all of the muggle-raised students.

“Very good. Now, how many of you have ever _fired_ a muggle firearm?”

Only Harry, Hermione, and Justin Finch-Fletchley raised their hands.

“Three of you. Not too bad. It just so happens that I have a firearm here.”

The class leaned forward with interest. Quirrell reached under his desk and pulled out what any firearm aficionado could instantly recognise as a double-barrel 12-gauge shotgun. “This—” He held the gun high. “—is called a “shotgun.” It is one of the most common firearms that British muggles will use.” He came back around the desk, casually swinging the barrels back and forth across the classroom. At that, all of the muggle-raised student flinched. Hermione and Justin both yelped out loud, but Harry had the strongest reaction. Quick as a wink, he pushed his chair back hard and ducked under his desk whilst hissing loudly. After all, Quirrell’s finger was _on the trigger_.

The magical-raised children in the classroom watch this with wide eyes. What was so terrifying that it could frighten the Boy-Who-Lived?

“Trouble, Mr. P-Potter?” Quirrell said in an overly-friendly tone, still stuttering on his name. Harry was starting to wonder if he did that on purpose. He swept the barrels across the room again.

Hermione yelped a second time and pushed back to duck herself. “Professor!” she cried. Wasn’t Quirrell supposed to have been the Muggle Studies teacher? Shouldn’t he know about this?

“Do you have a problem, Miss Granger?” the professor said serenely.

Hermione peaked over her desk to respond, but as Quirrell swept the barrels across the room a third time, it was Justin who yelled out, “Take your finger outside the trigger guard, man!”

Quirrell made a very false-looking expression of surprise. “Oh, you mean like this?” he said innocently, and he did remove his finger from the trigger guard.

“Thank you,” Justin said. “Now, will you kindly point that thing at something that’s not us?”

Half the class thought Justin was about to get in trouble for that kind of backtalk, but Quirrell swung the shotgun off to the side without a word and then turned to Harry. “Mr. P-Potter, would you perhaps like to explain to your classmates what I was doing wrong?”

“Doing wrong?” Harry yelled. “ _Hello_ , you were ignoring all three basic rules of gun safety: treat every gun as if it’s loaded, don’t point it at anything you don’t want to _die_ , and for God’s sake, _keep your finger off the trigger until you_ _’re ready to fire_!”

All eyes were now on Harry Potter. Most of the class had never seen him this agitated before. They’d seen him fly like a maniac on a broom. They’d heard about him wheedling points out of Snape. They’d heard about him catching a Death Eater all but single-handed. About half of them had heard him speak You-Know-Who’s name without flinching. And now he was completely freaking out over what? A muggle weapon?

But Quirrell softly laid the gun down on his desk and proceeded to remind the class of what he had said on the first day: “Notice how strongly all of your muggle-raised classmates reacted. No one dives for cover like that when someone waves a wand around. Just what is so frightening about this shotgun…Miss Granger?”

Hermione paled even more than she had already. This was the first time she had to really question Professor Quirrell’s methods. “It’s a deadly weapon, sir,” she said softly. “I mean, it’s specifically designed to kill people and animals.”

“True enough,” Quirrell replied casually, leaning against his desk. He took out his wand and started waving it around. “But is not a wand _also_ a deadly weapon? After all, many more wizards have been killed with wands than with guns.”

“Yes, but…” She actually hadn’t really thought about that before. “But it’s a lot easier to kill someone by accident with a gun. You have to cast a spell to kill with a wand, and you can see the spell coming, too. With a gun, a slip of a finger can kill faster than anyone can react.”

The purebloods in the class stared at that. Killing too fast to react? Zacharias Smith scoffed at the very idea.

“It’s true,” Hermione said to the sounds of disbelief.

“Indeed,” Quirrell added. “Don’t believe it, Mr. Smith? Perhaps a demonstration is in order.” The class tensed up. “As it happens…” He picked up the shotgun again and broke open the breech. “…this gun is not loaded. “But I happen to have a couple of shells, here.” He removed them from his pocket and grinned a bit evilly at Harry. “Mr. P-Potter, perhaps I set up a target, and you could demonstrate how this weapon works?”

“Not indoors, Professor,” Harry said, only partially keeping the strain out of his voice.

“Prudent as ever, Mr. P-Potter. Very well, everyone follow me, please.” With that, Quirrell moved to the door and led the class outside to the Training Grounds. Set up near the castle walls was a new piece of equipment that the shooters in the class recognised as a skeet thrower.

“Here we are, Mr. P-Potter,” Quirrell said in a condescending tone, as if he didn’t care for Harry’s silly little safety rules. “A nice, wide, open space with nothing and no one beyond it for a good long way. I’ve even provided ear protection.” He held up a pair of fuzzy pink earmuffs. “Can you shoot skeet, Mr. P-Potter?”

“Yes, sir.” In fact, the Grangers had only been shooting a few times, just so they knew their way around a gun. But Harry, with his cat-like reflexes, had a natural talent for it.

“Excellent.” He faced the class and said, “You can think of a shotgun as being a little like a wand—except that this wand only fires Reductor Curses, and it fires them very, very fast. There are other types of guns called “pistols’ and “rifles,” which are like wands that only fire Piercing Hexes, again, very, very fast. Mr. P-Potter will now demonstrate the power and speed of this weapon on these clay targets.” He held up two bright orange clay pigeons and loaded them into the thrower.

Harry resignedly donned the fuzzy earmuffs, which turned out to cancel all noise, and Quirrell handed him the shotgun and two shells, which he loaded, and he stepped into position. Hermione and Justin each took a few steps back and motioned for the rest of the class to do the same.

When he was sure everyone was in a safe position, Harry readied the gun on his shoulder and yelled, “Pull!” Two orange disks flew out across the Training Grounds and then…

There were two deafening booms that made the purebloods jump and scream. Both of the clay pigeons vanished into clouds of orange dust—a fairly lucky pair of shots, even for him.

Harry turned around and saw the purebloods staring in horror at how fast the shotgun had obliterated the targets. He groaned inwardly. Somehow, some way, this was probably going to wind up being added to the Harry Potter legend.

Quirrell waved at him to take off the earmuffs, then said, “I think that proves the point nicely. Muggle firearms are not to be trifled with. Their power should be respected, even by wizards…On the other hand, a competent wizard should not fear them blindly. After all, there are a number of spells that can be used to neutralise the threat. For example…” He drew his wand. “ _Conprimo Armum_.”

There was a strange clicking sound, and Harry looked down and tried to work the gun again. “It’s jammed,” he said.

“Correct. It will not fire again without working at it for a minute, which would give an enemy time to retaliate or escape. And if you should encounter a firearm, and you are not able to cast such a specialised spell, there is always… _Expelliarmus_.”

The gun flew out of Harry’s hands and landed in Quirrell’s. Harry’s wand also flew out of its holster, but it caught on the wrist strap. No one seemed to notice this.

“Of course, given the speed advantage of the shotgun, it would be to your great advantage to learn to cast that spell silently,” Quirrell instructed the class sternly. “Pay attention to your surroundings, be aware what your opponent is capable of, and know how to counter it. And now, Miss Granger and Mr. Finch-Fletchley, how would you rate your own shooting skills?” He flashed what Harry was sure was an angry look at him before unjamming the gun and moving on.

Hermione politely declined, but Justin proved to be as adept with gunfire as with regular fire and also managed to obliterate two clay pigeons, to the awe of the Hufflepuffs.

But at the moment he did, just as the gun boomed across the grounds, a sharp pain pierced Harry’s scar, making him stagger as he clapped his hand to his forehead.

“Harry!” Hermione whispered, rushing to support him.

But the spasm had already passed. “I’m fine,” he said.

“Was that your—”

“Later,” he hissed.

“I’ll hold you to that,” Hermione muttered.

* * *

“Okay, that’s it,” Harry said when they got to lunch. “I’m filing a complaint against Quirrell. He’ll be out at the end of the term anyway if the curse is true, but still, you can’t just go waving a shotgun at the class, right, Mione?”

“I know, Harry,” his sister conceded. “He had a good point, but yeah, that was a stupid way to do it, even by wizard standards. I’m surprised a former Muggle Studies professor would do that.”

“Maybe it’s because he’s out to get me,” Harry replied, absently rubbing his forehead again.

“I don’t know about that. I still don’t think he’s that bad a professor. Maybe it _is_ the curse. Maybe it’s messing with his head—And you are _going_ to see Madam Pomfrey about your scar.”

“Yeah, fine, after classes are over,” he said irritably.

“Is it true, Potter?” The Gryffindors whirled around to see Draco Malfoy leading a group of five Slytherins up to the Gryffindor table. “Were you _actually_ hiding under your desk from Quirrell?” The other Slytherins sniggered. Whispers sure did travel fast at Hogwarts.

“What if I was, Malfoy?” Harry grumbled. “You would have too if you knew half as much about guns as I do.”

“I _think_ I would be a little more collected around a simple muggle weapon,” Malfoy replied.

Harry stood up and tried to take a formal pose. It wasn’t easy. “You know, you should really reserve your judgement until after you see the lesson for yourself, Mr. Malfoy,” he said. “Don’t worry; I’m sure Quirrell will give you the same one this afternoon.”

“And I’ll be sure to stay calm when someone’s waving some muggle wand around, Potter.”

“Carelessly waving a gun around is a lot more dangerous than waving a wand around, Malfoy,” Harry snapped. “I’d put it just a little below Voldemort himself waving his wand at me.”

The Slytherins all gasped, and Malfoy turned pale. “You dare to speak that name, Potter?” he said.

“Yes, I dare. The only people who ought to fear saying his name are the ones he has power over, and the last I checked, I _beat_ Voldemort.”

“Harry—” Hermione admonished while even the Gryffindors gasped. Malfoy couldn’t even seem to think of a threatening comeback.

“Oh, come on, do you really have to keep doing that whenever I say “Voldemort’?”

“Harry, will you stop that?” Ron whimpered.

“It’s just a name, Ron. It’s not like he’s going to appear if you say his name three times…” He got a curious look on his face. “Voldemort, Voldemort, Voldemort!” He looked around. “Nope, nothing.”

Well, it wasn’t quite nothing. Neville nearly fainted at that display, Ron whimpered loudly, Lavender and Parvati actually jumped up and ran away, and the Slytherins all started backing off as if Harry were some kind of dangerous lunatic.

“Harry, I think that’s enough,” Hermione said.

“Potter!” Professor Snape approached the table. “Ten points from Gryffindor for disrupting lunch. Now sit down.” Harry grumbled and sat. “I think that will be all, Mr. Malfoy,” Snape added smoothly. “Mr. Potter is clearly…disturbed at the moment.”

Malfoy probably would have laughed at that as he walked away, except that, Harry noted with some pride, he still seemed rather disturbed himself.

* * *

“Well, Mr. Potter,” said Madam Pomfrey once Hermione managed to drag him to the Hospital Wing, “I’ve heard some interesting things about your exploits today.”

“Yeah, I hid under a desk from Quirrell,” Harry grumbled. “He was acting like a nutter with a gun. Plenty of muggles would have reacted the same.”

“Yes, I do know a little about guns. But I was actually referring to your terrifying half the school at lunch. Are you feeling quite alright?”

“Oh…that. Yeah, sorry, I guess Quirrell’s lesson really shook me up,” Harry said lamely.

“Oh,” Pomfrey replied. “So is that _not_ why you’re here?”

“No, ma’am…” Hermione said. “Harry, tell her.”

Harry sighed. “Madam Pomfrey, during the Defence lesson today, I got this weird pain in my scar.”

Pomfrey stopped short. “Your _scar_?” she asked nervously.

“Yeah, right here.” He traced the jagged line with his finger.

“Hmm…” the nurse took out her wand and started muttering incantations. “What sort of pain.”

“Just a short, sharp pain. It only lasted a few seconds. I only came here because it’s kind of strange—I mean, old scars aren’t supposed to hurt—well, non-magical ones, anyway.”

“And has your scar ever hurt before?”

“Just once that I can remember. The same thing happened back at the Welcome Feast, but never before that.”

“Hmm…very strange. Well, Mr. Potter, I don’t see anything wrong with you. You’re in very good shape for your age. I suspect it was just a random pain, but do come back if it becomes a regular occurrence.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

* * *

People stared at Harry more for a few days after that incident. A few of the more sensitive students started avoiding him in the corridors, in case he did something as mad as shouting Voldemort’s name again. But the stares and whispers soon subsided as Valentine’s Day approached.

Valentine’s Day at Hogwarts was marked by third years and up fawning all over each other, pining over unrequited affections, and frantically planning Hogsmeade dates for the next day. What was not expected (at least by the unfortunate recipient) was that half a dozen or so owls would make their way to the Gryffindor table and drop letters on Harry Potter’s plate, most of them in red or pink envelopes.

“What’s all this?” he demanded in surprise.

All the girls around him started giggling uncontrollably, including Hermione, and the boys sniggered at Harry’s expense.

“Well, Harry,” Hermione said between giggles, “it looks like you’ve got some admirers.”

“What! I’m only eleven, though!”

“Like that’s gonna stop ‘em,” Ron said. “Every girl’s gonna want the Boy-Who-Lived to be their valentine.”

Harry groaned. “But why would they be coming here? All my mail gets forwarded.”

“Internal messages don’t,” Neville explained. “These’ll just be the ones sent from inside Hogwarts. The thing is, no one ever bothers to send letters inside Hogwarts except for valentines and Fred and George’s jokes.”

“So how many will I have from outside Hogwarts?” Harry wondered. “Don’t answer that. Well, might as well take a look.” He picked up the first letter.

“Oh, you should be careful opening those, Harry,” Neville warned. “If any of them smell funny, put ‘em down. They’re probably fine, but I wouldn’t put it past some of the older girls to douse them with love potions.”

“What!” Harry and Hermione both demanded, and Hermione added, “Is that even legal?”

“It is except for the really strong ones. And anyway, you can’t get much just from a letter, but better safe than sorry.”

Harry sighed heavily and carefully went to the letters, but on the third one, he did a double take: “Hang on, this one’s not internal. It has a return address. It’s from…Ginny Weasley?”

“Oh, no,” Ron groaned, turning as red as the envelope his sister had sent and burying his face in his hands. Of course, mail from his family wouldn’t be forwarded.

Upon seeing Ron’s reaction, Harry bravely said, “Well it can’t be that bad,” and read the note aloud, on the grounds that it would be more embarrassing to his friend than to himself: “‘Dear Harry—’”

“Stop! Stop!” Ron whined.

“‘Thank you again for saving us all from that Rat. You’re my hero. I hope we can be friends next year. Happy Valentine’s Day, Ginevra Molly Weasley…” Signed in very flowery script.”

“Oh, well, I guess it’s not _too_ bad,” Ron admitted. “At least she didn’t try to write a poem.”

“I think it’s very sweet,” Hermione cooed, to more giggles from the other girls.

“Yeah, sweet—I got a valentine from a girl who got most of what she knows about me from those _Harry Potter Adventure_ books.”

“Well, you _are_ Harry Potter. You’ve got to learn to deal with it,” Hermione said, giggling again.

But her giggles were cut short, and she turned bright magenta when an owl dropped a valentine on her own plate.

“Well, well, well,” Harry grinned. “It looks like ‘Harry Potter’s sister’ has some currency, too.”

Hermione shot him a dirty look and opened the envelope. Then she sighed with relief. “Oh, it’s just a family courtesy note from Sullivan Fawley. Darn, I should have got him one.” She waved to her cousin from across the hall and made a mental note to send him a reply the next day.


	36. Curiouser and Curiouser

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Second Harry Potter to the right, and straight on till JK Rowling.

With the Quidditch match against Hufflepuff fast approaching, all of the Gryffindors were getting increasingly nervous. Even Hermione, who wasn’t a big sports fan, was getting very worried because of Professor Snape’s involvement, and everyone else thought that Snape would find some way to force a Hufflepuff win and knock Gryffindor out of the running for the Quidditch Cup. Even Harry couldn’t think of a better explanation, so the day before the match, he decided to take action: he stayed after class in Potions.

“Professor,” he said as he approached the front of the room, ignoring Hermione’s frantic waving for him to stop, “may I ask you something?”

Professor Snape looked down at him condescendingly. “You may _ask_ ,” he replied.

“Why are you refereeing the Quidditch match tomorrow?”

A trembling Hermione edged up behind Harry, her fingers poised to snap and draw her wand from her holster.

Snape raised an eyebrow suspiciously. “Is there a problem with my refereeing the match, Mr. Potter?”

“Well, sir…it’s just that…many of us in Gryffindor are concerned that it’s a conflict of interest.”

Snape was surprised, though he didn’t show it. That was more restrained than he would have expected from the boy. Perhaps he should string him along a little further to see what happened: “And why should it be a conflict of interest? Slytherin will not be playing tomorrow.”

Harry took a deep breath. “But as a head of house you _are_ a team sponsor, sir, and Slytherin’s position in the rankings will be affected by the outcome of the match.”

“And because of that you feel that I am incapable of acting impartially?” Snape said threateningly. “Is that it, Potter?”

 _It_ _’s a trap!_ Harry thought. He tried to backtrack fast: “I…I…I don’t think it’s a secret that a lot of students feel that way, Professor.”

“Which obviously includes yourself, or you wouldn’t be here right now.” Harry quailed and stepped back. No matter that the boy’s assessment was true, Snape thought. He was enjoying this too much. Now to twist the knife: “As it happens, this is for _your_ benefit, Potter. The Headmaster felt that it would be good to have someone more familiar with the Dark Arts close at hand should your broom mysteriously ‘malfunction’ again—”

“But then wouldn’t Professor Quirrell be a better choice, sir?” Hermione burst out. Harry whirled around and glared at her.

 _What_ _’s this?_ Snape thought. _A difference of opinion? Perhaps_ she _is the instigator in all this. And if so, it would seem her brother_ _’s instincts are better than hers._ He was very tempted to reach out with Legilimency, but that wouldn’t go over too well with Albus. And anyway, he was cleverer than that. “The Headmaster trusts my judgement in this matter, Miss Granger. If you would prefer to have Professor Quirrell referee the match that is something you ought to take it up with him,” he said.

And there it was. A faint flicker of horror crossed Potter’s face when he suggested that Quirrell might take his place. _It seems I_ did _misjudge him. He_ _’s not_ quite _as single-minded about Quidditch as his father. I shall have to inform Albus that the boy is also on to Quirrell._

“I’ll…I’ll discuss that with the team, Professor,” Harry said nervously, though Snape suspected he had no intention of doing so. “Thank you for informing me of the situation.”

Snape nodded curtly and said, “If that is all…” Harry quickly pulled his sister out of the room. Just before they left, Snape muttered too quietly for them to hear, “A point to Gryffindor for vigilance.” It technically met the requirement of being spoken in their presence, but the foolish lions would be wondering all day why the books didn’t balance.

* * *

Hermione didn’t speak to Harry for the rest of the day, since he steadfastly refused to speak to Dumbledore or even the rest of the team about switching referees, even though he still doubted himself that Snape would be impartial. He wished he could find some hard evidence against Quirrell to convince her that he wasn’t a good guy. The gun lesson had soured her on him, but she still insisted he meant well. Of course, he knew Hermione felt the same way about Snape, and Sirius was obviously on her side whenever they spoke of it to him.

Even Mum and Dad had a problem with Snape, although that was mostly based on the quality of his teaching, something on which Harry could agree with them, and they _were_ appropriately furious about Quirrell’s gun lesson and had joined in the children’s complaint, as had the Finch-Fletchleys when they contacted them.

Unbeknownst to Harry, Hermione had used her time alone to perfect a really good wandless Leg-Locker Curse that she could use against Snape if he caused any trouble. If he _did_ try to hurt Harry, she thought, she’d be ready, and when she saw the teams line up on the pitch the next day, she was really worried she might have to use it. Snape looked even more evil than usual. She stood beside Ron and Neville in the stands, watching the Potions Master like a hawk as the match began.

“And they’re off, with Angelina Johnson taking the Quaffle for Gryffindor,” Lee Jordan commentated.

Hermione watched as Harry rose high in the air and began circling the pitch a safe distance from Snape.

“Ouch!

Draco Malfoy had elbowed Ron in the head as he and his minions filed into the row behind them.

“Oh, sorry, Weasley, I didn’t see you there.”

“Yeah, right,” Ron muttered as he watched the pitch.

“Say, Granger, your “brother’s’ supposed to be rich,” Malfoy needled. “Why didn’t he spring for a broom that actually works?”

Hermione took a deep breath and forced herself to ignore the jab, keeping her eyes on Harry.

“You think he’ll get lucky and not fall off again?”

She said nothing and instead focused on Lee Jordan’s commentary: “Bell passes to Spinnet—Oh! Intercepted by Truman! And George Weasley hits a Bludger at Truman—Hey! Since when is that a foul?”

Malfoy laughed as Snape gave Truman a penalty shot, to the glares of the Gryffindors, but out on the pitch, even Wood didn’t try to argue the call.

“That was a real stroke of genius for Professor Snape to referee,” he went on. “I bet if he’d known Dumbledore would fall for it that easy, he would’ve done it years ago. Quickest way to take Gryffindor out of the running—well, besides the Gryffindor team, anyway.”

“Sod off, Malfoy,” Ron told the blond boy. Then he cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled out, “Harry Potter is our king!”

A few Gryffindors called back: “Harry Potter is our king!”

“Potter can catch anything!” Ron yelled the next line, this time with Hermione and Neville joining in. And with that, the chant was going strong.

“Sounds like lots of Potter fans here today,” Lee Jordan said. “He put on quite a show at the first match. Let’s see if he can follow it up.”

Harry waved to the crowd as he circled the pitch, to loud cheering, which grew even louder as Katie Bell scored on Hufflepuff. But then, Snape called a penalty against her for no reason at all, and the Hufflepuff Chaser managed to score back on the penalty shot.

“She didn’t even do anything!” Lee Jordan yelled.

“You know, Theo,” Malfoy said loudly to Nott, “I think Gryffindor picks the people they feel sorry for to be on their team. I mean, you’ve got the Weasley’s, who’ve got no money, and then Potter, who’s just plain nuts. Say, Longbottom, why didn’t you try out? Squibs can still fly brooms, can’t they?”

“I’ll show you who’s a squib, Malfoy,” Neville said, drawing his wand, but the Slytherins just laughed at him.

“It’s too bad we couldn’t get hold of that shotgun thing of Quirrell’s,” Malfoy continued. “Maybe we could scare Potter off the pitch.”

That was too much. Hermione, to the shock of everyone standing nearby, whipped around and slapped Malfoy hard across the face, casting a weak wandless Stinging Jinx the moment her hand made contact for extra emphasis. “That’s not funny, Malfoy!” she screamed.

Malfoy staggered and yelped in pain, rubbing his cheek. “Why you mudb—Oof!” he made to throttle Hermione, but Neville, to even his own surprise, stepped in front of her and knocked Malfoy back with a karate chop—not a very good one—he hurt his arm about as much as he hurt Malfoy—but still. Then, the other Slytherins joined in…

But Harry was oblivious to all this, as he was keeping his eyes fixed on the game. He needed to catch the Snitch before Snape helped Hufflepuff get too far ahead. Suddenly, he saw it, hovering right behind Snape’s head, of all places. He couldn’t believe his luck. The Snitch was charmed to be especially difficult to find early in the game. Catches this fast were usually made by accident. He tipped into a dive.

“And Potter’s seen something,” Lee Jordan said. “He’s diving—he’s—he’s—he’s charging Snape?!”

A look of utter horror appeared on Severus Snape’s face as he looked up and saw the image of his arch-nemesis zooming out of the sky directly at him, but he didn’t have time to call anything before the boy shot past him, missing him by inches.

“Wait—he’s—HE’S GOT IT! POTTER’S CAUGHT THE SNITCH!” There was a deafening roar from the crowd. “Amazing! Under five minutes! That’s gotta be a record! I’ve never seen anything like it!”

Hermione looked up from where she and Ron were holding off Malfoy and Nott. In a moment, the fight stopped completely as Slytherins saw what had happened.

Harry landed to the adulation of his housemates and even a kind word from Professor Dumbledore. Snape looked pretty angry, but at least Harry hadn’t got his broom jinxed. Then, McGonagall confirmed that this was the fastest catch of the Snitch at Hogwarts since accurate records had been kept. His housemates were so excited by that that they bowled him over onto the damp grass that they were fast trampling to mud. He didn’t expect to get dirtier after the match than during it, but it was worth it.

Then his sister ran up to him, her hair even more messed up than normal, flanked by Ron with a bloody nose and Neville with a black eye.

“What happened to you?” he said.

“We’ll explain later,” Hermione said sheepishly.

“Okay…You go ahead. I gotta get cleaned up in the locker room.”

“Sure. Great job out there.” She hugged him and started back to the castle.

Meanwhile, Draco Malfoy trudged back to the castle behind the main group of students, his face still stinging. That hadn’t been his best move. Apparently, muggle-borns really were that sensitive about guns. Also, apparently, Granger had quite an arm on her. Still, the knowledge might yet prove useful. If he could paint Potter _and_ Granger as dangerous and unstable…Yes, that might be worth suggesting to Father.

Harry took his time wiping the mud off himself, basking in the glory of his record-breaking catch. He was the last to leave the locker room, strolling over to the broom shed to put away his Nimbus before heading back to the castle and making a dramatic and fashionably late entrance to the party.

But just as he reached the broom shed, he spotted something: a dark-robed figure came out of the castle. It was hunched and had its robes drawn tight around it, as if trying to be less conspicuous, but Harry recognised the over-large head at once: Quirrell’s turban. He was headed toward the Forbidden Forest.

Harry’s curiosity got the better of him. Why would Quirrell be going into the forest when everyone else was either at lunch or partying? He hopped back on his broomstick and followed Quirrell from high up.

He could just barely follow Quirrell through the trees. The Defence Professor walked a little way in until he came to a small clearing, and then appeared to be waiting. Harry landed as silently as he could in a tall beech tree to watch from above.

A few minutes later, another dark-robed figure entered the clearing. This one Harry recognised by his prowling gait: Snape. _Curiouser and curiouser_ , he thought.

Snape started to say something, but Harry couldn’t quite make it out. Taking a bit more of a risk, he to transformed cat form so he could see and hear better, holding his broomstick against the branch with one paw. As long as a sudden breeze didn’t hit it, it should stay put.

“Alright, Severus, we’re here,” Quirrell said impatiently. “Why ever you wanted to meet all the way out here—”

“Oh, I thought we’d keep this private.” Snape sounded more sarcastic than usual. “It wouldn’t do to go blathering about the Philosopher’s Stone where we might be overheard, would it?”

“And what about it?” Quirrell asked. He lowered his voice so that Harry could just barely hear it with his cat’s ears. “It’s safe behind our traps, and Dumbledore’s—”

“And have you figured out how to get past that beast of Hagrid’s yet?” Snape interrupted.

“What, Fluffy? Why don’t _you_ work that out for yourself,” Quirrel mocked him. “I seem to recall you were the one who needed it.”

“As if you weren’t behind that whole incident. I’d expect such treachery from an average Defence Professor, but you were supposedly a loyal colleague for years. Let me be clear: you don’t want me as your enemy, Quirrell.”

“But why should we be enemies?” Quirrell said smoothly. “We both want the same thing, don’t we?”

“You know perfectly well what I mean,” Snape snapped. An owl hooted loudly nearby, but Harry didn’t miss Snape’s voice: “Tell me what you want the Stone for. What, you think it wasn’t obvious when you used a mere troll for your little bit of hocus pocus? I’m waiting.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Severus. I want to protect the Stone, the same as you, and you know that Dumbledore approved all the protections, anyway.”

“You _insist_ on playing dumb with me, do you Quirrell? Very well, we’ll have another little chat soon, once you’ve figured out where your loyalties lie and actually have something to show for it.” Snape threw his cloak over his head and strode out of the clearing.

“Perhaps you are the one who needs to reevaluate your loyalties, Severus,” Quirrell called after him. Snape didn’t react.

Harry was very late to the party by the time he made it back to Gryffindor Tower, but he didn’t care. He had to tell Hermione and then Sirius and Remus what he’d heard.

Hermione was not happy. “Harry, where have you _been_?” she squeaked when he got back to the Common Room.

“Harry, that was awesome!” Ron interrupted. “You broke a school record, and I gave Malfoy a black eye. And Neville took on Crabbe and Goyle, didn’t you Nev?”

“Yeah,” Neville grunted from his seat, apparently nursing a headache.

“What happened out there?” Harry said.

“Malfoy happened,” Hermione said flatly. “What were you doing? I was getting worried Snape hexed you or something.”

“Well, Snape was there, but it wasn’t that,” Harry said cryptically. “I need to talk to you in private…” He appraised Ron and Neville. “You two can come, too.” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “It’s about the you-know-what on the third floor.”

Ron’s and Neville’s eyes widened. Harry had mentioned about the Philosopher’s Stone to them shortly after Christmas. They looked at each other, then got up to follow him.

After a brief round at the party, Harry retrieved his mirror and led the group to an empty classroom, making sure Peeves wasn’t around before shutting the door.

“Harry, is that a two-way mirror?” Neville said in awe. “They’re really rare.”

“Yeah. I got it for Christmas—though I’d appreciate it if you didn’t mention I had it.” The other boys nodded. “Sirius Black.”

Of course, the first thing Sirius and Remus wanted to know was how the Quidditch match went, and it took them quite a while for them to finish celebrating Harry’s record breaking catch. Then, Hermione had to tell her story of what the Slytherins had done, to both laughs and admonishments to be careful from the alleged adults in the conversation.

“You didn’t have to do that for me, Mione,” Harry said. “Although it is pretty funny.”

“Yeah, I know. So what’s your story? Why were you so late getting back?”

“Right. Listen. When I was coming back to the castle, I saw Quirrell heading out to the Forest, and I thought it was suspicious, so I followed him on my broom.”

“What!” the other children yelled.

“You flew into the Forbidden Forest in broad daylight and didn’t get caught? Excellent!” his godfather added.

“This is serious!”

“I think your friends already know who I am.”

“Argh! I saw Quirrell meeting with Snape in the Forest.” And Harry told them about the conversation he had overheard. “So that means Quirrell’s trying to steal the Philosopher’s Stone, and Snape’s trying to stop him.”

“I don’t know cub,” Sirius said suspiciously. “It’s kind of hard to tell from just what you said. It sounds to me like maybe Snape’s trying to get Quirrell to let him in on the scheme.”

“Or Quirrell’s innocent, and Snape only _thinks_ he’s after the Stone,” suggested Hermione.

“Nah,” said Remus, “I’d put better money on the Defence Professor being up to _something_.”

“W-we need to tell somebody, don’t we?” Neville said.

“What?” Harry said in surprise. “Who could we tell, though? We’re not supposed to know about any of this.”

“He’s right, Harry,” Remus replied. “If the Philosopher’s Stone is in danger, that’s too big to let it lie.”

“Well, maybe, but who? McGonagall will skin me if I tell her I flew into the Forest.”

“I bet she knows more than one way, too,” Sirius quipped.

Harry glared at him and made a small jerk of his head toward Neville.

“Sorry.”

“Harry,” Hermione said suddenly. “There’s one person who already knows we know—Hagrid. We could warn him, and then he could tell Dumbledore.”

“Yeah, that’s a good idea,” Harry agreed.

“Can it wait till after the party, though?” Ron said. “I wanna get some more food.”

The others rolled their eyes, but they agreed.

* * *

“We figured out what’s in the third floor corridor,” Harry told Hagrid after they went through yet another play-by-play of the Quidditch match. The huge man tensed up. “It’s the Philosopher’s Stone.”

“Yeah, well don’ go spreadin’ that around,” Hagrid grumbled. “That’s top secret, that is. An’ yeh certainly didn’ hear anythin’ about it from me.”

“Okay, but Hagrid, we think there’s a problem…” Harry started.

“We think one of the teachers is trying to steal it,” Ron blurted out.

“Poppycock!” Hagrid roared. “Who would try an’ do that?”

Harry and Hermione each shot each other a sharp look.

“Either Snape or Quirrell,” Hermione conceded. “Maybe both.”

“That’s ridiculous. Neither of them would do nothin’ like that.”

“Not even Quirrell?” Harry pressed. “You know, the Defence Professor?”

“He wouldn’t. I’ve known him for years. Where’d yeh get an idea like that, anyway, Harry?”

“I…I rather not say,” he said nervously. “But I’ve got good reasons. Could you please just…tell Dumbledore for me?”

“Well, I s’pose I could…but I still think yer barkin’ up the wrong tree.” Harry winced at the idiom.

But suddenly Neville spoke up: “Are there any other teachers guarding the Stone, Hagrid.”

“Well o’ course there are.” The half-giant counted on his fingers. “Professor Sprout, Professor Flitwick, Professor McGonagall, and Dumbledore himself did somethin.” Course, nothin’ll get past Fluffy, anyway,” he finished proudly.

“Well, that’s something,” Harry admitted.

“Hmm…wait!” Hermione remembered something: “Now that I think about it, I don’t think anyone ever put a stronger locking charm on that door. Did Dumbledore ever do anything about that?”

“Uh…no. Don’ think he did,” Hagrid said. “Said it weren’t needed. After all, nobody’s been hurt in there.”

“It still seems awfully dangerous. And if anyone can get in and out anytime, it might be easier for them to find a way past Fluffy.”

“Impossible! Not a soul knows but me an’ Dumbledore. I’ll let him know what yer thinkin’, but mind yeh, yer worrying over nothin’.”

Harry accepted this assessment for the moment, and the children went back up to the castle. But as he walked, something else was nagging at the back of Harry’s mind: Quirrell had said that Dumbledore approved all the protections. So why would he approve a “mere troll” if Snape thought it wasn’t good enough?

* * *

Meanwhile, as soon as Neville felt up to it again, he was back with Harry and Hermione in the disused seventh-floor corridor practising karate. Or rather Harry and Hermione were practising karate, and Neville was mimicking them. They had never really questioned him about what he was doing, and he had never really mentioned it, and moreover, they had never really coached him much at it, even to the extent they could.

That meant that Neville had improved a little, but only slowly. Only showing up about once a week and not having formal instructors wasn’t a way to get really good. Until now, Harry and Hermione had simply humoured anyone who wanted to join in and walked them through a kata, or a little more if they came regularly, thinking that any interest was good. But after Neville’s attempt to join in the fight at the Quidditch match, they had to wonder if they were giving him a false sense of security.

“Say, Neville—” Harry said cautiously. “Not that we mind or anything, but why you come up here to practice with us?”

Neville turned rather red and looked down. “W-well…you see…” He stammered. “My Gran wants me to do well here—get good grades and everything, especially in Defence—I think she really wants me to become an Auror someday, like my parents. But I’m not that good in classes, and I know I’m not that good at fighting either—I mean, I got creamed by Crabbe and Goyle. I’m not strong or in good shape, even. But you two, you’re really good. I couldn’t believe it when you broke those boards with your bare hands. So I just thought…if I copied you, some…”

“Oh, Neville…” Hermione said sympathetically.

“Look, mate,” Harry replied, “it’s nice that you want to learn, but we’re not really qualified to teach it—I mean, we could probably teach the lower ranks, but…”

“But how’d you learn it, though?”

“We had a good muggle teacher…and classes three days a week for five years.”

Neville’s eyes went wide, and he turned pale.

“A black belt is like a good O.W.L. score in Defence,” Hermione explained. “Except it’s more impressive to muggles because so few people learn it. But it’s about the same amount of work.”

“And that’s not really even the point of why we do this every day,” Harry added.

“Th-then why do you?” Neville asked in confusion.

“Well, _I_ still think it’s an important skill,” Hermione countered. “But honestly, this is mostly just for exercise at this point, and to keep our reflexes up,” Hermione said. “It’s not really proper training. We’d prefer to spend some time practising duelling, but there’s not really a space where we can do it.”

“You know, I wonder if we should change our routine to make it more serious exercise,” Harry mused. “The katas are good, but I don’t think they’re keeping us in as good a shape as they could.”

Hermione cocked her head and thought about this: “It’s worth a thought…I don’t want to get too out of practice, though. Karate’s still a good skill to have.”

“We can always catch up over the summer with Sensei John. I think he’d let drop in for just a month or two. And it’s not like we have a sensei here to keep us in really good form, anyway. Plus, the duelling’s gonna be more important once we really get started at it.”

“Well, there’s that. I suppose we _should_ focus more on skills that are important with magic. We can write Mum and Dad and ask for advice on a general exercise routine.”

“Great,” Harry replied. “And Neville, you can join in if you want to get in shape. It might be a little easier with a more standard exercise routine. But you’d need to come more often to get much good out of it—not every day, but maybe three days a week.”

“G-gee, thanks, Harry,” Neville said. “I…I’ll think about it.”

“And I don’t think you’re that bad in your classes, Neville,” Hermione encouraged him. “Like Charms.” And it was true, though he couldn’t be called much better than average. “And you’re actually serious competition for us in Herbology.”

“Well, for me,” Harry said. “Not for Hermione.”

Neville turned red again and mumbled a thanks.

Over the next week, Harry and Hermione refined their exercise routine, and Neville did, indeed, show up three times, though he was winded by the end of the routine every time. If he wasn’t skilled, he was certainly dedicated. After all, the Sorting Hat had debated whether to put him in Hufflepuff for a full four minutes for a reason.

* * *

_Dear Harry and Hermione,_

_Congratulations to Harry on winning the Quidditch game and breaking the school record! We don_ _’t know how you keep pulling off things like that, but we’re proud of you._

_However, we_ _’re also very disappointed in you, Harry, for flying off into the Forest like that. It was only by luck that you didn’t get caught, much less learnt something important._

_But be that as it may, the problem with Professors Snape and Quirrell is the most important thing to worry about. We strongly encourage you to go directly to Professor Dumbledore, Professor McGonagall, or someone else you trust about your concerns, and tell them the whole story, even if it means getting in trouble. From what Sirius says, this sounds more important._

_We also want the two of you not to fight about this. Your should be careful around both Professor Snape and Professor Quirrell if you think they might both be up to no good. Don_ _’t ignore any evidence about either of them._

_Now, the other thing we wanted to talk to you about was to trying to do something about Professor Snape regarding his teaching habits. We_ _’ve compared notes with the Tonkses, and we think he has several problems. One is that he only accepts O’s to N.E.W.T.-level, when most teachers accept E’s, which means only half as many people qualify. The second problem is that he doesn’t really try to teach, and third, he’s such an unfair teacher that he makes a lot of people hate the subject. The fact that he’s singlehandedly cutting the applicant pool for Aurors and healers in half means something needs to be done._

_We thought we would publish an anonymous open letter to the Board of Governors in the Daily Prophet explaining the problems we have with Professor Snape and also encourage other parents and former students like Dora to do the same. Then, maybe we could see some action. But we wanted to make sure you were okay with it first—especially with his tense relationship with Harry, not to mention Remus and Sirius, plus your recent concerns._

_We hope things continue to go well with you, and you don_ _’t have any more of these problems. And Harry, don’t go looking for trouble, either._

_Love,_

_Mum and Dad_

No one had mentioned Hermione’s fight with Malfoy to their parents, which was probably a good thing, considering how much else they had to worry about.

“The thing is, I’m not sure about Dumbledore right now,” Harry said as they discussed the letter with their godfather and honorary uncle.

“Why not?” Remus said in surprise.

“It’s just that he seems so…cavalier about this—like not putting a stronger lock on that door. I don’t understand what his game is.”

“Well, what about Professor McGonagall?” Hermione said. “You trust her, don’t you?”

“Yes, but…I don’t know. I’ve got a funny feeling about this whole thing.”

“Funny feeling how?” Sirius asked with concern.

“That’s the thing. I can’t sort it out, even in cat form. It’s just that something doesn’t feel right—It’s not about not getting in trouble, honest. It’s just that I’m not sure who to trust—and yes, Hermione, I know I’m being paranoid. I can’t help it. Maybe it comes with the feline territory.”

“Could be,” Remus said. “I can smell trouble on someone from the minute I meet them, and Padfoot’s usually pretty good, too.”

“Mum and Dad are right, though, Harry,” Hermione said. “We need to tell someone—We really should be able to tell Professor McGonagall. She’s a cat animagus, too.”

“I know. I know,” Harry said. “And I think I will. But…please let me try to sort this out first. Something doesn’t add up, and I don’t like it.”

His sister sighed: “Okay, I will. But I won’t wait forever.”

“Thanks…So what do you think about Operation Snape?”

Sirius grinned. “I’m game for any plan that sticks it to Snivellus,” the old dog said.

“Honestly, Padfoot,” Remus muttered. “I’ve looked into it a bit myself. The complaints against Snape pile up every year. The exam scores alone show that the quality of teaching has declined with him…”

“And even after hearing about it for four months, I still can’t picture that _man_ as a teacher,” Sirius finished. “Or not any kind of good one.”

“We may be biased, but it looks like anything you can do to improve Professor Snape—” Remus concluded.

“Or _remove_ him—” Sirius cut in.

“—would be a benefit to the school as a whole. And those kinds letters are probably the best chance to do it. Throwing money around would get you nowhere with Lucius Malfoy chairing the Board. The only trouble is, I don’t know if the _Prophet_ would actually print those kinds of letters.”

Sirius had an answer to that: “Well, if they don’t, I’ve still got a line on that guy from the _Quibbler_ —Lovegood—I’m sure he’d print them. The _Quibbler_ _’s_ not exactly mainstream—” Remus snorted. “—but it’s better than nothing.”

“Well, it sounds like a good idea to me,” Harry said. “Snape won’t like it, but it’ll be anonymous, won’t it. What’s the worst that could happen?” He saw Hermione’s “thinking” face. “Don’t answer that.”


	37. Dumbledore's Plot Revealed

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Harry Potter and JK Rowling at Tanagra.
> 
> I know what some of you are probably thinking. No, Dumbledore isn’t evil. He just has a lesson that he needs to learn.

Harry, however, didn’t go to McGonagall about Quirrell and Snape, despite Hermione’s continued nagging. He kept saying he was thinking about it, but that same uneasiness always stopped him. Before they knew it, a month had gone by, at which point Hermione started obsessing over exams, saying she should had started revising earlier, drawing up study schedules for both of them, and becoming so worked up and insufferable that Harry finally had to grab her hands away from her books to force her to sit still for a minute.

“Mione,” he told her sternly. “You. Need. To. Relax. You’re going to ace the exams. I’m going to do pretty well on the exams. And we’re both going to revise a reasonable amount so we don’t go mad before term’s over.”

Hermione slumped back in her seat with a heavy sigh. “But I just—”

“Hermione, as your little brother, it’s my duty to make sure you lighten up once in a while.”

“Well, as your big sister, it’s _my_ duty to make sure _you_ don’t skive off all the time.”

They glared at each other for a few moments, and then they both broke out laughing. It was actually pretty impractical from the start to act like a little brother and big sister when they were always in the same year at school.

“Okay, okay,” Hermione conceded. “I’ll trim back the study schedules.”

“Good. Now why don’t we revise outside for a while?” Harry looked longingly out the window. “It’s the first nice day in months.”

Hermione leaned forward. “Well, of course, you’d say that, furball,” she whispered. Harry had never fully left behind his initial stint as an outdoor cat.

But Harry stared her down and won out this time. “Alright, we can go. I just need to return this book to the library first.”

“Yes!” Harry said behind her back. The two of them walked down to the library to return Hermione’s book, where they found Neville helping Ron with a Herbology essay.

“Hi, Ron. Hi, Neville,” Harry said.

“Hey, Harry. Hey, Hermione,” Neville replied.

Ron waved to them. “What’s up.”

“Just turning in a book,” Hermione said. “Harry wanted to work outside.”

“That’d be nice,” Ron said wistfully. “I gotta finish all this, though.” He gestured to the library books that were strewn around his table.

“Well, when that’s done, you should—” Harry started, but he was interrupted by a very large man in a moleskin overcoat shuffling through the stacks. “Hagrid? What are you doing in the library?” he asked.

“Jus’ lookin’…” Hagrid said shiftily. He appeared to be hiding something behind his back. “Doin’ homework I see?” But before they could answer, he said, “See yeh “round,” and made a hasty exit.

“Well, that was strange,” Hermione observed. “Even for him. I wonder what he’s up to.”

“Maybe you should see what section he was in,” Neville suggested.

“Good idea,” Hermione said happily, and she dashed off into the stacks. About a minute later, though, she came back looking very pale. “Dragons,” she said. “He was in the section about dragons.”

“Uh-oh. Didn’t Hagrid tell us once that he wanted a dragon?” Ron said.

“Uh huh. I don’t like where this is going.”

“Me either,” Harry said. “You can’t keep dragons on the grounds, can you?”

“No way,” Ron answered. “Charlie says they can barely keep them in the Hebrides. Not to mention they’re illegal outside the reserves.”

“Y-you d-don’t think Hagrid would really keep a dragon here, do you?” Neville said nervously.

“He calls a giant three-headed dog Fluffy,” Hermione said flatly.

All four of them packed up and rushed down to Hagrid’s hut.

The gamekeeper’s hut was locked tight, the curtains drawn, when the foursome reached it, and a gruff voice called out, “Who is it?” when Harry knocked on the door.

“Hagrid, it’s us,” Harry said.

After some sounds of rummaging around, Hagrid opened the door. “Oh, you lot,” he said, sounding annoyed. “Well, come in.”

It was stiflingly hot inside the hut, with a blazing fire in the grate, despite the warm weather.

“So, “s there somethin’ yeh wanted to ask me?” he said cagily.

“We were just wondering about what you were looking up in the library,” Hermione said, trying to sound sweet.

“Oh, that? Well, I was just, uh…”

But Ron had already noticed what was going on. Having a brother who was a dragonologist had its advantages. He pointed to a huge black globe in the centre of the fire and said, “Hagrid…is that a dragon egg?”

“Ah, that’s, er…”

“Where did you get one? I’ve heard they cost a fortune on the black market.”

“I won it!” Hagrid said, sounding scandalised at the suggestion that he would frequent such markets. “Last night, havin’ drinks in the pub. Stranger said he’d play me at cards for it—though teh be honest, he seemed like he was eager to get rid o’ it.”

“Gee, I wonder why,” Hermione said.

Hagrid, however, looked very pleased with himself: “It all works out, though. I got me some books here. I got everythin’ I need—brandy, chicken blood—”

“You can’t keep a dragon here, Hagrid,” she said sensibly. “Not only is it illegal, but you live in a _wooden house_.”

“I can handle it,” Hagrid said confidently. “The bloke last night was worried about that, too, but I told him, after Fluffy, a dragon would be easy.”

Harry watched the egg sceptically. “I’m not sure you can really make that comparison—”

“Can’t be that hard,” the huge man insisted. “Any beast is a piece o’ cake if yeh know how to calm ‘em down—well, take Fluffy, for example. Play ‘im a bit of music and he goes right to sleep.”

“Hagrid!” Harry shouted in horror.

The half-giant frowned. “I shouldn’ta told yeh that—Just forget I said anythin’.”

But Harry barely listened. His mind was reeling; in the blink of an eye, everything clicked into place. It was all he could do not to jump up and run straight to the castle, but he didn’t want Hagrid to think he was running off to tell about the dragon egg—though what he _would_ do about that he had no idea. But as soon as he felt it would be reasonably polite, he took his leave, pulling Hermione along with him.

“Catch you later, guys,” he told Ron and Neville before dragging her up to the castle.

“Harry, what’s going on?” Hermione demanded.

“I have to talk to Professor McGonagall.”

“Probably yes, but I was going to try to convince Hagrid first—”

He lowered his voice. “Not about the dragon. About the Philosopher’s Stone.”

“What? You’re bringing that up _now_?”

“I’ll explain when we get there.”

Harry raced up the stairs to Professor McGonagall’s office with Hermione in tow and knocked on the door.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Potter, Miss Granger,” McGonagall said. “How may I help you?”

Harry opened his mouth. Here went nothing: “Professor, a long time ago, you told me to tell you if Professor Dumbledore was messing with me.” McGonagall blinked a few times as the wheels of her mind began to turn. “Actually, I think your exact words were—” He let out a string of yowls that made both Hermione and McGonagall wince, McGonagall mostly at the butchering of the feline language by the human throat. It was only her decades of experience plus her memory of the incident that allowed her to translate it as, “You tell me if Old Wizard causes trouble.”

“I remember, Mr. Potter. Please come in.” Merlin’s beard, that _had_ been a long time ago—the very first time they’d met. But it was still a promise from one cat to another, and she would keep it. “And _is_ the Headmaster causing trouble for you?”

“I’m not sure, ma’am. I don’t know anything for sure, but…well, I feel like I’m being set up.”

“Huh?” Hermione said.

“Set up?” McGonagall said slowly. “You feel that the Headmaster is setting you up…to do something?”

The children sat down across her desk. “Something like that,” Harry replied. “Or to find something, or learn something, maybe. The point is, I’ve been having this nagging feeling that he’s trying to manipulate me into…I don’t quite know what.”

“And what brought this feeling about,” she asked, sounding concerned. She wasn’t sure whether to believe this sudden outburst, but she was inclined to give the boy’s feline sixth sense a hearing out, since it was very serious issue if true.

“It’s complicated, ma’am,” Harry replied. “Things that don’t add up—well, for one, how long has Professor Dumbledore known Hagrid?”

McGonagall blinked again at the non-sequitur. _Of course_ , she thought, _the other possibility is that Harry Potter has gone 'round the twist_. “Excuse me?”

“I was just wondering how well Dumbledore knows Hagrid.”

“I see…Professor Dumbledore persuaded Headmaster Dippet to hire Hagrid as an apprentice groundskeeper immediately after he was expelled, Mr. Potter. That was forty-nine years ago.”

“So they go way back?”

“Yes, Mr. Potter.”

“And Dumbledore trusts Hagrid to help guard the Philosopher’s Stone?”

McGonagall nearly fell out of her seat. “How do you two know about that?” She let out a feline hiss.

“It’s a long story, ma’am, but please, this is part of what I’m worried about. Professor Dumbledore trusts Hagrid with such an important and secret assignment?”

“Yes he does, Mr. Potter,” she said coldly. “Whatever should be the matter with that?”

“Look, Professor, I know he’s a good guy and all, but we’ve only known him a few months, and we can already tell Hagrid can’t keep a secret to save his life!”

Hermione gasped loudly as the pieces began to fall into place for her, too.

McGonagall didn’t gasp, but she looked grimly thoughtful about that assessment. She was silent for a long while, but she finally said, “I suppose Hagrid’s discretion always has left something to be desired. He told you about the Stone, then?”

“No, not directly, but he let slip enough to figure it out.”

“Not to mention the fact that the whole school knows about Fluffy,” Hermione jumped in.

“Fluffy?” McGonagall said in confusion.

“The cerberus.”

“Oh,” the professor groused. “I _told_ the Headmaster he should put stronger protections on that door.”

“That’s what we told Hagrid, ma’am, but Professor Dumbledore hasn’t done anything.”

“No, he hasn’t. Is that what you’re concerned about, Mr. Potter?”

Harry shook his head. “It’s not just that. Hagrid accidentally told us how to get past Fluffy.”

“What!”

“ _And_ , it sounded like he let it slip to a stranger in the pub last night.”

“WHAT! Oh, Hagrid, you buffoon,” McGonagall hissed.

“I don’t think it’s his fault, ma’am,” Harry interrupted. “I mean, it is, but Professor Dumbledore approved it, didn’t he?”

“Well, yes…yes, he did.”

“And I also know that he approved a security troll for Professor Quirrell’s protection.”

McGonagall stared at him like a cat stares at a particularly evasive canary. “And how, pray tell, did you learn that, Mr. Potter,” she said in a voice that almost seemed to channel Snape.

“I overheard Professor Quirrell and Professor Snape talking. I think—” He glanced at Hermione. “I think one or both of them might be trying to steal the Stone.”

In the end, McGonagall wheedled the full story of the meeting in the forest out of Harry, something which didn’t earn him any points—literal or figurative—with his head of house. “We will discuss your punishment for this later, Mr. Potter. First, you should be aware that these are very serious charges you are bringing against your professors, but I’m afraid it is reason enough to take a closer look at Professor Quirrell, at least. However, I still don’t fully understand what your issue is with the Headmaster.”

“But he approved a troll, Professor,” Hermione said, putting the rest of the pieces together. “And Fluffy. Those don’t seem like very strong protections. We understand if you can’t tell us what it is, but how strong would you say your protection on the Stone is?”

McGonagall thought back. She hadn’t thought the chessboard idea she had come up with was her best one, but Albus had seized on it and encouraged her to implement it. “The Headmaster said it was good enough,” she replied. “He’s keeping an eye on the protections personally. It’s mostly just to slow a thief…down…” She thought about the rest of the protections, which she had, with difficulty, convinced Albus to confide with her in case of emergency. “Pomona…Filius…Severus…” she whispered, counting them off on her fingers. She didn’t know what Albus’s was, but still… “By Morgana, it’s not a safe at all, it’s a bloody trap! He means to _catch_ the thief, not stop him.” _And he never mentioned it to the rest of us_ , she thought. _Could he actually suspect a staff member? Could he suspect me?_ But back to the matter at hand: “But in that case, Mr. Potter, I suspect your involvement in this matter was merely a coincidence.”

“I don’t know, Professor,” Harry replied. “I mean, Dumbledore approved a set of protections on the Philosopher’s Stone that aren’t all that strong, and he also gave critical information about them to someone who he should have known was likely to leak it, especially to me. He must know how much Hagrid likes me. Maybe it’s crazy, but I just have this weird feeling he’s trying to nudge me into some kind of magical scavenger hunt.”

McGonagall opened her mouth to respond. She wanted to tell him that he was right—that it _was_ crazy—but something stopped her: her own feline sixth sense that was telling her that it was just crazy enough for Albus to do something like that. “Well, Mr. Potter,” she eventually said, “that seems like quite a stretch in my opinion, but based on what you’ve told me, this is information that needs to be taken to the Headmaster immediately, so you can ask him for yourself.”

* * *

An hour later, they were in Albus Dumbledore’s office, where the portraits of the past headmasters and headmistresses were listening intently as Harry, Hermione, and Minerva explained their concerns, several of them expressing disdain at their impertinence. Fawkes the Phoenix was softly crooning on his perch, seemingly oblivious to the whole thing.

Albus himself was looking in shock on as his carefully-crafted plan turned into a train wreck. How had a young boy deduced so much of what he intended before he could implement it? He hadn’t figured out the true reason he had been allowed to hear these secrets, but in a way, this was even worse. He couldn’t very well answer that the Stone wasn’t safe, and there would be no reason for Harry to investigate the trap in that case.

And Minerva wasn’t about to let him off the hook; the safety of the Stone was, in fact, her very first question.

“It is safe,” Albus said truthfully. “It would be quite impossible for any thief to bypass the protection that I have placed on it.”

“And all the rest of us are just window dressing, then?” she pressed.

“I would not put it so crudely—”

“How you would put it is irrelevant, Albus. I’m surprised you would build a trap like that without informing me. One layer of protection hardly seems adequate, even if it’s yours. Would it be possible to use a decoy Stone, instead?”

“Unfortunately, the Stone’s magical signature is impossible to fake,” he said, “but I assure you my protection is quite secure.”

“Fine. And Mr. Potter’s part in this? Were you intending for him to learn about all of this?”

“Well…” he said, “there is certainly no need for Harry to know about the details of the plan.”

But Harry wasn’t buying it: “Professor, if there’s something you want me to do, please just tell me. You don’t have to have Hagrid go hinting about it.”

Albus was taken aback. It was almost an out, but what could actually he do? Even if he could convincingly challenge the boy and his friends to get through the obstacles, there was no guarantee they would do it at the same time Quirrell did. No, it was no good. He’d have to settle for capturing the thief, and then, hopefully, he could convince Harry to help afterwards—perhaps his blood alone would be enough.

“No, Harry,” he said. “There is nothing that you need to do, now. I assure you that I have everything well in hand. And I do hope you will keep this information confidential.”

Harry sighed with relief. “Thank you, Professor. I was getting worried, things seemed so strange…There’s one thing I still don’t understand, though. Were you actually _planning_ for Hagrid to leak that information as part of this “trap’?”

“Well…I admit that I had anticipated—”

“What? But you’re _using_ him!” Hermione burst out. “He’s supposed to be your friend of fifty years, and you’re playing on his weaknesses! He was really worried about the things he let slip out.”

Albus drew back. Harry and Minerva looked no less unhappy. “I can’t believe you would do that to Hagrid, Albus,” his deputy said. “This is the biggest lapse in judgement I’ve seen from you since you placed Harry with his aunt and uncle, and I suggest you apologise to the man immediately.”

The Headmaster hung his head. Perhaps he _had_ overstepped his bounds on this plan. It was manipulative—he freely admitted that—but it seemed necessary. It would take a very clever trap to catch Voldemort’s servant alive, one that had plenty of plausible deniability—though it seemed he may have miscalculated on that point. “Yes, I’m afraid I have overstepped my bounds, Minerva,” he said. “I will speak with Hagrid this evening.”

“Good…Mr. Potter,” she said sternly. “Twenty points from Gryffindor and a detention for being out of bounds, and be thankful it isn’t more. You and your sister may go.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Harry said sheepishly. He and Hermione ducked out of the office.

* * *

The next day was the last Saturday of March, which meant a Wizengamot meeting, which meant Dumbledore would be out of the castle. By a happy accident, he would be gone longer than usual due to his need to hand off the illegal dragon egg he’d found in Hagrid’s possession last night. Quirinus Quirrell was surprised, but pleased with the development. He didn’t think, Dumbledore would find the oaf’s new pet until after it hatched, but this, combined with Dumbledore’s own manipulation of the half-giant, had left Hagrid in a foul mood that would, if he was lucky, distance him from the old meddler.

Now having all the information he needed, Quirrell implemented his plan to get into the third floor corridor. He would need something more subtle than a troll, this time. After considering a few possibilities, he decided on planting an idea in the head of one of his third year students, Lee Jordan, to enlist Peeves’s help in vandalising the dungeons. In retrospect, he should have tried that the first time instead of the troll. While Snape was cleaning up the mess outside his classroom, Quirrell sneaked up to the third floor.

He disabled the elaborate detection wards as best he could. Hopefully, it would at least slow Dumbledore down in finding out. Fluffy was quickly dispatched with an enchanted harp, the devil’s snare with fire, and the keys—with difficulty—with his flying skills. It was far too easy—definitely a trap, but so far, nothing was blocking his escape route.

McGonagall’s chess board—clever one, that. The difficulty level wasn’t the problem. It was the time. For that, Quirrell took off his turban to let his Master, who had a far quicker analytic mind than he, see the board. His troll he dispatched with a conk on the head, and finally, he solved Snape’s laughably easy riddle to come face to face with…the Mirror.

The Mirror of Erised. Trust Dumbledore to come up with something like this. He could see the Stone in the Mirror—the magical signature confirmed it—but he couldn’t get it out. How was it bound inside? He drew his wand and started casting diagnostic spells, some of them suggested by his Master. There were powerful enchantments laid over top of the Mirror’s original magic. Nothing he did could break them. He worked for as long as he felt was safe before Dumbledore’s return, trying to figure out how they worked, but he only had time to get an inkling. It looked like some kind of intent-sensitive magic, but what it was he couldn’t be sure. It was not a good day. His Master was very angry at his failure, but he _would_ have more chances. Dumbledore’s political work was heating up, and the school year wasn’t over yet. His body was growing frightfully weak, though. Something had to give soon.

* * *

In the middle of that Saturday’s Quidditch practice, Harry Potter suddenly stopped in midair, flew down to the stands, and sat down, rubbing his forehead.

“Hey, Potter, you alright?” Wood called from above.

“Yeah…” he said. “Just a…headache. Gimme a minute.”

The pain lasted about a minute before it went away. Harry hopped back on his broom and rejoined the team. By dinnertime, he had forgotten all about it.

* * *

_Arthur Weasley, Head of the House of Weasley, Head of the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Office, to Lord Harry James Potter, Head of the Noble House of Potter, and Hermione Jean Granger_

_Dear Lord Potter and Miss Granger,_

_I wanted to keep you abreast of what my office has been doing behind the scenes at the Wizengamot, since you_ _’re family friends and major backers of our Muggle Protection Act. I also wanted to thank you for your continued support. I’ve personally been lobbying for increased protection for muggles for years, and it’s great to finally see that bearing fruit._

_We had some very promising developments at the Wizengamot meeting last weekend. Your Godfather, Lord Black, helped to solve one of the biggest obstacles to passing the bill. A number of members thought the restrictions on enchanting muggle artifacts were too strict—or rather on their use, the way I wrote it the first time. Lord Black publicly said he shared these concerns—I think a flying motorcycle may have had something to do with it—and he and your friend, Mr. Lupin, worked with me on an amendment to loosen these restrictions and focus enforcement more on sales and other transfers. Of course, muggle-baiting and giving dark artifacts to muggles will still be banned._

_Anyway, that amendment was really a stroke of genius on Lord Black_ _’s part. Once I got the wording just right, it swung four votes to our side who had been holding out. We’re not there yet, but we’re in the lead now. If all goes well, I think we’ll be able to get it passed at the May meeting. You should be very proud of your godfather. Good luck with the rest of the term._

_Sincerely,_

_Arthur Weasley_

“Wow, Ron, it sounds like your dad really does do good work,” Harry said after he read the letter aloud.

“Yes, I guess,” Ron replied as he tried to corral his own hyperactive owl.

“He _does_ know what he’s good at,” Percy said standoffishly from nearby—not that he was against the bill, but he had implied before that he was not impressed by his father’s career choices.

“Really,” Hermione told Ron. “We’re glad to have him as an ally.”

“Yeah, well, I _am_ glad to have you guys as friends,” he said.

“That too,” Harry quipped.

* * *

April was passing quickly. Despite Harry’s best efforts, Hermione was becoming increasingly frantic about exams. Fortunately for her, no other major disruptions came from any quarter. The one thing that did happen was that their parents published an anonymous letter in _The Quibbler_ decrying Professor Snape’s atrocious teaching methods. Being in _The Quibbler_ , it had taken a while to filter through the population of magical Britain, but the responses were beginning to roll in, and when it finally got reprinted in the _Daily Prophet_ , it turned a lot of heads, as Harry and Hermione soon learnt from Hedwig’s latest delivery:

 

_Wotcher Harry and Hermione,_

_Can you believe that letter in the Prophet against Snape? That was amazing! Really gutsy of those_ _“anonymous concerned parents,” too. Of course, half the country already knows Snape’s an awful teacher, but now people are starting to talk like they can actually do something about it. I don’t have much of a leg to stand on, since I passed my Potions NEWT, but I’m gonna write my classmates and try to get some of them to write letters, too. If you happen to find out who wrote that thing, be sure to thank them for me._

_And it was a reprint from the Quibbler, of all places! The Prophet_ _’s really got egg on its face for that. People say it’s the best-selling issue the Quibbler’s ever had. Can you believe the Prophet passed something like that up the first time—you know, since they’re_ _ so _ _fair and unbiased? Here_ _’s to less Snape in your lives._

_Dora_

 

“Yeah, but it would be nicer if it didn’t put Snape in such a foul mood around me,” Harry groaned. Professor Snape had singled him out and taken ten points from him for breathing too loud in class on Friday, and his very presence was enough to intimidate Neville into accidentally exploding his cauldron—again.

“And you said he wasn’t out to get you,” Hermione whispered. She glanced up at the High Table, where Snape was glaring in their general direction.

Severus Snape had no proof, but he knew. Oh, yes, he knew. An organised campaign to get him sacked was brewing, and that had Potter written all over it. He’d tried to be respectful of the boy for Lily’s sake, but ever since his infernal godfather had been released it was growing more difficult. Now, his greatest challenge could very well become keeping his job—not that it wasn’t a thankless job to start with.

Albus Dumbledore was keeping tabs on Severus out of the corner of his eye. He, too, had his suspicions about where the open letter had come from. He couldn’t deny that Severus was a poor teacher—several prominent figures were already reiterating their dissatisfaction with the Potions education at the school—but for his safety and, to be honest, his continued usefulness, it was imperative that he remain at Hogwarts. If this issue continued to grow, they would need to reach some kind of compromise.

“Oh, Cousin Andi sent one, too,” Harry said as an eagle owl landed on the Gryffindor Table. He read the note—the first of two:

 

_Dear Harry and Hermione,_

_This came addressed to Harry, and I thought I_ _’d pass it along. I think you’ll find it amusing._

_Cousin Andi_

Harry unfolded the next note, which was written in a dazzling colour-shifting ink, and, with some difficulty, read it over:

 

_Dear Harry Potter and Hermione Granger,_

_Sales of The Quibbler are at an all-time high—even higher than the issues with Mummy_ _’s articles on runes and Daddy’s features on crumple-horned snorkacks. Daddy’s delighted. He says with the extra money, we can expand our dirigible plum garden and grow enough to sell some of them._

_It sounds as if Professor Snape has a very bad infestation of wrackspurts. I hope he can get them cleared up before the fall term, since it would be very difficult to learn from a teacher who is so badly infested. Daddy says he may be able to build Wrackspurt Siphons strong enough to help him by September if the nargles don_ _’t interfere. Do you think you could convince Professor Snape to wear them on his hat?_

_I do not know who wrote the open letter, but a blibbering humdinger told me that you would appreciate knowing how much it_ _’s helped Daddy and me, and they haven’t lied to me yet._

_Sincerely,_

_Luna Lovegood_

 

Ron didn’t know what a Wrackspurt Siphon was (did anyone?), but he laughed uproariously at the suggestion that Snape should wear some on his hat. Harry, who suspected that Luna Lovegood _did_ know who wrote the letter, simply smiled at her note. It was almost like it was written in code, although, granted, she probably actually _believed_ those things.

“What’s a snorkack?” Hermione said. “Or a dirigible plum? Or a…I’m gonna need to check this against the library.”

Harry shook his head: “I don’t think it’ll help.”

Still, he was glad they could be of some help to a girl who, by the sounds of things, _did_ need some help. Maybe it was just because she was so strange, but he had a feeling he ought to keep an eye on her when she came to Hogwarts next year to make sure she got off to a good start.

* * *

The Friday after Easter, the fool Dumbledore left early for the next day’s Wizengamot meeting. Apparently, there was a lot of work to be done for his ludicrous Muggle Protection Act. That suited Quirinus Quirrell just fine. He would probably need all night to discover the secret of the Mirror.

But Snape was as vigilant as ever, and it was getting hard for Quirrell to hide his increasing illness. The chest pains were growing more frequent, as was the haze of confusion. The conduit of rage from his Master was growing stronger. He felt fatigued all the time and was having difficulty keeping up with his classes. His tongue was tripping over more words than Potter’s name, and worst of all, he was certain that both Potter and Snape noticed. He wasn’t sure how much longer he could keep this up.

In any case, it wouldn’t do to use the same trick twice. The timing alone would be suspicious enough. He would need a different sort of distraction. Fortunately, he was not ignorant of the major goings on in magical Britain, and he was well aware of the things his Master had learnt from Wormtail.

Quirrell himself was not that powerful a wizard, but with his Master’s arcane lore, there was much he could do—like cast illusions subtle and convincing enough to fool Severus Snape. It was a quite simple plan. He simply snuck up around the corner from where Snape was keeping watch over the forbidden corridor and conjured the shadow of a large black dog, which he set to canter around the third floor.

Snape look notice as soon as the shadow came out from around the corner. “Black!” he hissed. “What do you think you’re—come back here!” He followed the shadow away into the next corridor.

Quirrell seized his chance. Working quickly, he disabled the detection wards. He knew he only had a minute. Soon, Snape would catch up with the shadow, use a _Lumos_ Charm, and it would vanish. Sure enough, about a minute later, the Potions Master came back to his post, thinking it was merely his eyes playing tricks on him, but Quirrell was already through, undetected. His work wouldn’t be enough to fool Dumbledore, but it would probably fool Snape.

Within an hour, he reached the Mirror again and looked longingly at the vision inside. He was presenting the Philosopher’s Stone to his Master. He was being honoured with wealth and power and immortality…but he couldn’t get distracted. At the sound of a hiss from the back of his turban, Quirrell got to work, probing carefully to tease out the complexed threads of the charm Dumbledore had laid on the Mirror.

He worked all night. It was difficult, delicate work. One wrong move, and he could tip off Dumbledore, or damage the enchantment and lose the Stone. At first, he thought only certain select people could get the Stone out of the Mirror. That would have been the most logical thing, but that soon proved not to be the case. Then, he looked for signs of a lock and key or a magical password that was needed to extract the Stone. That would also be a good idea. But no, he could detect no sign of it. It all came back, it seemed, to intent.

Quirrell was growing very nervous as dawn approached. He couldn’t risk staying past the end of curfew in the morning, not after one too many suspicious happenings in the castle. But he had to discover the secret for his Master. Time grew short, but nearly at the last minute, and with his Master’s help, he found it! He learnt the secret!

It was obvious in hindsight. Dumbledore was such a romantic. Anyone who was so noble in mind that they wanted to remove the Stone from the Mirror, but not to use it, could do so. Unfortunately, it was too late to act on this knowledge, but he would have one more good chance. Dumbledore was sure to be especially busy at next month’s meeting, and he had that long to formulate a good plan. Quirrell smiled as he walked back to his office in the pre-dawn light. For once, his Master was pleased with him. They were nearly there!

* * *

He couldn’t understand what he was seeing. There was a great pane of cloudy glass before him, like a frosted window at night. Something was moving behind it—something dark and evil.

_No! Go away!_

But it didn’t go away. The shadow grew closer and more distinct.

_No! Stop!_

_Harry?_

It filled the window, now. It was coming for him.

_Stop! Make it go away!_

_Harry! Harry!_

He could almost see it clearly now. It was upon him. It rushed forward to break the glass.

_Stop! Stop!_

_Harry, wake up!_ “Harry, wake up!”

“NOOO!”

“AHHH!”

There was a loud crash, and several grunts of pain and confusion. He blinked and looked around to see what had happened and finally came to his senses. Harry Potter realised that he had sprung bolt upright in bed and thrown a wandless _Flipendo_ from each hand, knocking both Ron and Neville back into the wall.

“Ha-Ha-Harry? What happened?” Neville said nervously.

“Blimey, what was that?” Ron added, rubbing the back of his head.

“Um, wandless magic. Sorry,” Harry said uncomfortably.

“That was wandless magic?” Neville said in awe.

“Yeah,” Harry admitted. He was glad that Dean and Seamus were still blinking awake dumbly. “I, uh, had a nightmare.”

“We could tell, mate,” Ron said. “You were practically yelling in your sleep. What happened?”

“I…I don’t really remember.”

“What’s wrong with your head?” Neville asked with concern.

It was only then that Harry consciously realised that he was rubbing his forehead, and his scar was stinging as if it were a fresh cut. “Just…a…headache,” he replied.

He had a bad feeling about this.

* * *

Rita Skeeter was a woman on a mission. She knew that records for former muggle-born students of Hogwarts were incredibly hard to find. There simply weren’t enough of them to be had in the magical world, and in the muggle world, she soon found herself drowning in a sea of them. It had taken months of looking up Lily Potter’s school friends for her to track down her childhood hometown. It didn’t help that many of them didn’t particularly want to talk to her, but that’s what being a fly—or beetle—on the wall was for.

It took several tries and some slightly illicit charms to find Lily Evans’s primary school and gain access to her records. She located the files for Lily Evans and Petunia Evans and copied them, taking particular note of the address printed on them. In skimming the names, she found another, much more surprising one: Severus Snape. She copied that file, too, for future reference.

The next step was the go to the Evans house. The Evans family was long gone, of course—the parents dead and the daughters moved away, but she asked the neighbours where they had gone, and the little snippets of information she gleaned from each one painted a picture well enough. Unsurprisingly, no one was quite sure what had happened to Lily Evans after she’d graduated from her exclusive Scottish boarding school, but Petunia Evans, who had not qualified for that school, married a man named Dursley and moved to Surrey. By chance, one of the neighbours who happened to be in Petunia’s year knew the town: a place called Little Whinging.

Searching easy places like the muggle phone directory failed to turn up any Dursleys in the area of Little Whinging, so she repeated her investigation into primary schools. Finally, she found them—in Year 1 only, but there they were: a Harry Potter and a Dudley Dursley, both registered as living at Number Four Privet Drive.

Unfortunately, the current residents of Number Four Privet Drive knew the name Dursley only from the woman who had sold them the house, but Rita was determined. Under various ruses—newspaper feature, census taker, academic study—she interviewed the Dursleys’ neighbours, and what she found was _very_ interesting.

“Dursleys?” The nosier and more gossipy women would say with a conspiratorial grin. “Nasty pair, those two. Hauled off to prison a few years ago.”

Rita couldn’t believe it, but multiple neighbours confirmed it. “Prison?” she said, genuinely aghast. “Why, whatever did they do?”

“Child abuse, I heard it was,” the women would whisper.

“Child abuse? My goodness!”

She went to the courthouse to try to find records of the case, but they were sealed under the Children and Young Person’s Act to protect Harry Potter’s privacy. Given how tight the watch on Potter was, she didn’t want to break that law if she could help it, but there was more than one way to skin a kneazle. She went back the current residents of Number Four and asked about the woman who had sold them the house. After some prodding, they gave her both a name and an address for a Marjorie Dursley.

This was going to be good.


	38. Rita Skeeter's Scoop

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Harry Potter is owned by JK Rowling. The Daily Prophet is de facto owned by the Ministry and Lucius Malfoy, who are owned by JK Rowling.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Potter, but I still can’t find anything physically wrong with you,” Madame Pomfrey said. “And I can’t give you any more Headache-Relieving Potion unless something changes. It’s not meant to be taken for extended periods.”

“Right, well, thanks anyway.”

Harry sighed and left the Hospital Wing, his concerned sister at his side. His headache had come back intermittently for the past several weeks, to the concern of his friends and family. It happened particularly around Professor Quirrell, who incidentally seemed to be slowly losing his mind. He had been stuttering badly for the past few days and sometimes ranting incoherently for minutes at a time. At other times, he sat leaning over his desk and clutching at his chest like he was having a heart attack. Most people thought this was due to the curse, and many students took to inventing increasingly horrible diseases that might kill him off before final exams. The headaches were making Harry all the more suspicious of him, and he was having more nightmares, too. Hermione kept saying it was his imagination running away with him, but she didn’t sound very convinced herself anymore.

“Maybe you should tell Dumbledore about the headaches,” Hermione told him as they walked back to the Common Room to wait until breakfast.

“Yeah, maybe,” Harry said. “You know, sis, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with my head at all,” he said, even as he massaged his scar with his fingers. “I think it means danger is coming—something to do with Voldemort.”

Hermione seemed to have giving up arguing: “Well, in that case, you should _definitely_ tell Dumbledore.”

“Yeah—yeah! I think you’re right,” Harry said after a pause. He turned around and started toward Dumbledore’s office.

Hermione froze in surprise that her brother didn’t argue with her before running after him to catch up. The two children rushed through the corridors to reach the gargoyle outside the Headmaster’s office, only to run into a very large and worried-looking man.

“Hagrid? What are you doing here?” Harry said.

“Oh, hello yeh two,” Hagrid said wearily. “Bad business, I’m afraid—really bad. I found a unicorn dead in the Forest last night.”

“A unicorn?” Hermione exclaimed in horror.

“Yeah. Don’ know what coulda killed it, but this is the second one in a week, and Dumbledore told me teh tell him straightaway if anythin’ funny happened in the Forest.”

“That’s horrible! Aren’t unicorns supposed to be sacred animals?”

“They are. They’re the only animal that it curses yeh teh kill ‘em, but somethin’s doin’ it, anyway—signs o’ dark magic, looks like.”

Harry cast a concerned look at his friend. “Hagrid…” he said hesitantly, “do you think Voldemort could be involved somehow?”

Hagrid drew back in horror. “Don’ say that name,” he growled. “I dunno. I s’pose he could be, but I hope not.”

Luckily, Hagrid was rescued by the gargoyle stepping aside and Albus Dumbledore stepping into the corridor. “Good morning, Hagrid,” the Headmaster said sympathetically. “More trouble, then?”

“Yeah. Happened again last night,” came the reply. Hagrid, to his credit, had remained reasonably friendly around Dumbledore for the past few weeks, even after the mess with the Philosopher’s Stone and the dragon egg.

“I see. I should like to hear the full story at once. We must discuss how to respond to these developments.”

“Yes, sir—”

“We have something to tell you, too, Professor,” Harry jumped in. “I think it might be related.”

“Related, Harry? Well, then I think you should come in, as well.”

But just as they were about to step onto the moving staircase, they heard a shout: “Albus! Albus!”

Minerva McGonagall was running— _running_ —towards them, frantically waving a newspaper in her hand. Harry and Hermione had never seen their head of house looking so flustered.

“Minerva, whatever is wrong?” Dumbledore said with concern.

“What’s wrong! Haven’t you read the paper, Albus?”

“I’m afraid I haven’t had the time.”

“You need to see this. You too, Mr. Potter,” she added, noticing the children’s presence. She thrust the paper in front of them. The headline declared in large block letters:

 

_HARRY POTTER ABUSED BY MUGGLE RELATIVES!_

_EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH POTTER_ _’S AUNT, MARJORIE DURSLEY_

_By Rita Skeeter_

Harry summed up everyone’s sentiments succinctly: “Oh crap!”

* * *

Rita Skeeter certainly had a knack for digging up sensational stories. So far, her stories about Harry had been more accurate than her usual fare just because Harry’s life was so crazy—sensational, but still accurate, and this story was no exception:

 

_The early life of the Boy-Who-Lived has been kept tightly under wraps by Albus Dumbledore and the Ministry of Magic. Why the secrecy? Why do we know so little about how the Savior of the Wizarding World was raised? Why was he placed with muggle relatives, only to be removed and placed with another muggle family with a muggle-born daughter four years later? Searches for the boy_ _’s current guardians and his Ministry records have both proved fruitless, but this reporter undertook an extended investigation of Harry Potter’s muggle relatives, and I can now report the answer to these questions._

_Harry Potter_ _’s muggle aunt and uncle are currently in muggle prisons on charges of child abuse and neglect._

_Yes, my fellow witches and wizards, the Savior of the Wizarding World and Head of the Noble House of Potter was viciously abused in the muggle world—in fact, abused so badly that he ran away from home at the tender age of five. While the records of his relatives_ _’ trials remain sealed, this reporter was able to contact one Marjorie Dursley, the sister of Potter’s uncle, Vernon Dursley and current guardian of his cousin, Dudley Dursley. After some prompting, Miss Dursley consented to discuss the details of the case, and of Harry Potter’s tragic upbringing._

_The Boy-Who-Lived_ _’s trials and tribulations first began when, newly orphaned, he was unceremoniously dumped on his relatives’ doorstep in the dead of night on the chilly evening of 1 November 1981. This placement was clearly a mistake from the start. Lily Potter had had a serious falling out with her sister, Petunia Dursley, shortly before the Potters were married. This animus was made worse by the fact that Harry, who, as we all know, was only a baby, was not delivered to his relatives in person, but left out all night on their doorstep with nothing but a letter delivering the news of his parents’ tragic deaths. And who carried out this thoroughly ill-conceived placement? Why, none other than the Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot and Headmaster of Hogwarts, Albus Dumbledore!_

_However, my dear readers, Albus Dumbledore_ _’s callous disregard for the well-being of the Boy-Who-Lived is no excuse for the atrocious treatment he suffered at the hands of his relatives. Majorie Dursley’s eyes were swimming with disapproval for her criminal brother as she recounted the story. What must first be understood is that Vernon and Petunia Dursley were well off. They lavished attention on their own son, spoiling him to the point where he was extremely fat and possessed with an overbearing sense of entitlement by the time Miss Dursley gained custody of him. (Dudley now attends a prestigious muggle school and is considered a model student, according to Miss Dursley.) In light of this, it is all the more inexcusable that Harry Potter was neither given his own bedroom nor made to share a bedroom with his cousin, but instead was made to sleep in a dark, dusty, and spider-filled cupboard under the stairs from the day he entered the house—a house with not one, but two spare bedrooms. The eventual criminal investigation that led to the Dursley’s trials also revealed that the five-year-old Harry’s health had been neglected, and he was underfed, distrustful of others, and clearly unloved._

_The reason for this horrid treatment? Since Miss Dursley is not aware of magic, I could not be certain, but from her description of James and Lily Potter as_ _“freaks’ and “no-good drunks,” it can be surmised that Vernon and Petunia harboured a deep-seated hatred of all things magical that led them to abuse their nephew so severely._

_The final straw for the young Harry Potter came shortly after his fifth birthday, when, according to Miss Dursley, his uncle savagely beat him on two separate occasions, leaving him bruised, bloody, and likely locked in his cupboard without a healer_ _’s care. The reasons for this sudden escalation are hazy, but given the timing, we can perhaps envision the unfortunate boy’s first manifestations of accidental magic, normally such a joyous time in wizarding families, but here, his wizard-hating uncle sought to stamp it out of him as soon as possible._

_Luckily for Harry, he managed an incredible feat and ran away from home before his relatives could do permanent damage to his magical ability. Young Harry subsequently evaded the muggle authorities for two months before being found. The whereabouts of the Boy-Who-Lived cannot be confirmed during this time, either in the muggle or the magical world. Miss Dursley believed the boy was living on the streets during those two months, and it is entirely possible that she is correct. In any case, the next and last thing that she heard of Harry Potter until a brief encounter two years ago was that he had been found and adopted by his current guardians, the parents of muggle-born witch Hermione Granger, Potter_ _’s self-described sister and classmate. But sadly, all is still not well for Harry Potter. Several of his classmates have described the boy’s behaviour as unusual and erratic and have claimed that he is known to lash out unexpectedly at certain triggers, which behaviour may range from hissing at classmates with whom he does not get along to, on one occasion, a loud and public rant that frightened many of his fellow students at the midday meal. It seems that only Harry Potter’s current guardians know the full extent of the mental damage done to the Boy-Who-Lived by his relatives—and they aren’t talking._

_And through all of this, we ask, where was Albus Dumbledore? Why did he place Harry Potter with such unsuitable guardians? Why didn_ _’t he check on the boy sooner? What did he know and when did he know it about boy’s disappearance and subsequent adoption. How and why was he able to be placed with a muggle-born family on what we may presume was very short notice? We at the_ Daily Prophet _demand a full account of Dumbledore_ _’s actions that have so egregiously harmed the Boy-Who-Lived._

_And to Harry Potter, we say this: You have the sympathy of the wizarding world for the horrors you faced. You deserved better than to be tormented and beaten at the hands of muggles. We hope you can forgive us for neglecting you when you needed us most. Please know that we are not all like Albus Dumbledore. We cherish our children most dearly, and cannot bear to see them harmed. We are all with you, Harry Potter._

_FOR A FULL TRANSCRIPT OF THE INTERVIEW WITH MARJORIE DURSLEY, SEE PAGE 2._

_LUCIUS MALFOY RENEWS CALL TO OPPOSE MUGGLE PROTECTION ACT, PAGE 3._

_FOR A FULL ACCOUNT OF THE INVESTIGATION TO FIND THE DURSLEY FAMILY, SEE PAGE 5._

 

The group that was assembled in the Headmaster’s office glanced at page 5 and saw a glowing account of Rita’s tireless efforts to follow the muggle paper trail to uncover Harry’s past.

Harry was shaking, half on the verge of tears and half feeling like he was about to throw up. Hagrid looked livid. Dumbledore slumped down in his large, plush chair, looking defeated. McGonagall was clearly nursing a headache and looked very worried for her charge.

Hermione was fuming as well. She wasn’t too young and inexperienced to see the anti-muggle undertones from a mile away, especially in downplaying the fact that the Dursleys had already been brought to justice. Lucius Malfoy was already moving against the Muggle Protection Act, and only three days before the Wizengamot meeting, too—the meeting where they had been hoping to pass it. But at the moment, she had to worry about her brother. Realising that the only person in the room who wouldn’t understand it was Hagrid, who was probably too angry at Rita Skeeter to notice, she pulled Harry close so that he leaned against her and began scratching him soothingly behind his ears. He started to relax.

With a sigh, Harry said, “Could this day get any worse?”

“I can’ believe tha’…tha’… _woman_ would do tha’ to yeh!” Hagrid growled.

“I can,” Harry groaned. “She’s been screwing with me all year.”

“Harry,” Hermione chided, but her heart wasn’t in it.

“I’m afraid we have all been outplayed, Harry,” Dumbledore said at last. “Miss Skeeter is one of the most frustrating people I know, but she is extremely intelligent. I am very sorry that your secrets have been exposed in this way.”

“We should’ve just let it all out at the start,” Harry grumbled.

“Perhaps,” Dumbledore replied, “but I think not. With the sensationalism that was already surrounding your return, it would have only made it worse.”

“This is ridiculous,” Hermione said, skimming the paper again. “The article’s still riddled with sensational speculation, but the crazy part is it turned out to be mostly right.”

“There are many intelligent people who believe that Rita Skeeter’s articles are just pure fabrications, Hermione,” the Headmaster mused. “However, I have found this not to be the case. Instead, Miss Skeeter prints whatever will garner the strongest reaction, whether true or not. In this case, she was handed a, forgive me, near-perfect story in reward for her hard work, and she would not dare change it.”

There was silence in the office aside from the clicking of Dumbledore’s machines and a slight mewling sound from Harry.

“What are you going to do Albus?” Professor McGonagall asked. “You know how the public will react to this. The timing could hardly be worse. Anti-muggle sentiment will rise drastically overnight.”

“But why should it?” Harry yelled, springing upright in anger. “Our mum and dad are muggles, too.”

“Not everyone thinks as clearly as we do, Harry,” Dumbledore replied sadly. “Unfortunately, we have very little time to respond. I myself have been pressing for a final vote on the Muggle Protection Act this weekend, and with emotions running so high, it would undoubtedly fail.”

“But…but…couldn’t I speak at the meeting?” Harry asked. “Tell everyone I still support it?”

Dumbledore smiled. “An excellent idea. You are thinking quite well. However, I fear it would not be enough at this point. I think the best thing to do would be to delay the vote until June, thus letting cooler heads prevail and giving all of us more time to craft a response. You could perhaps release a brief statement of your position, whilst saying that you are very busy revising for your exams next week, and that you will respond more fully at a later date.”

Harry thought about this for a minute and looked to Hermione. She nodded, as he expected. Of course, she would approve the part about the exams. “Yeah…I guess I could do that, sir.”

“Very good. I will begin making preparations after breakfast. Now, I believe you and Hagrid each had something else to tell me?”

They told him.

“So, just to be clear,” McGonagall said as she rubbed her temples over a strong cup of tea with extra milk, “We have a unicorn killed in the Forest—again, our Defence Professor going insane, Harry Potter having suspicious headaches, and the news of Harry Potter’s past causing a political uproar, making for four disasters before breakfast…I don’t believe we’ve had that many since before the war ended.”

“Quite,” Dumbledore said. “It seems that when it rains, it pours. However, with our current precautions, I believe we have the situation here at the school in hand.”

“But Albus, the Stone—” McGonagall whispered. Harry pricked up his ears.

“Yes, you will need to be especially vigilant while I am away on Friday night, Minerva, but I’m afraid this cannot wait.” Harry thought he saw Dumbledore shoot him a glance as he said this, but maybe it was his imagination. “I will, of course, be reviewing these situations at the earliest opportunity.”

“And Mr. Potter’s scar? His headaches? I’ve looked up a bit about curse injuries, but I’ve never heard of anything like this. Do you think he really could be predicting something?”

“Alas, as to that, I cannot speculate. The situation is unprecedented. Why the Killing Curse should leave a mark at all I’m afraid I cannot answer.” _Of course, there is the prophecy_ , Dumbledore thought, _but that still doesn_ _’t explain a mechanism_. “Now, I think we have said all that we need to say here. I know this is difficult for you, Harry, but if you are feeling up to it, I think it would be good if you present a strong face to your classmates,” Dumbledore told them. “You should have just enough time to get to breakfast.”

Hermione looked to her brother with concern.

“Yeah, I think I can do it,” he sighed. “Let’s go.”

* * *

When Harry and Hermione entered the Great Hall for breakfast, all eyes turned to them. Harry decided that his best course was to ignore the stares, so he walked to his place at the Gryffindor table without a word and sat down. He sat up straight, emulating Hermione’s sometimes-aloof manner, and helped himself to some bangers and mash (with extra bangers, of course) as if nothing were out of the ordinary. A picture of him with his Order of Merlin medal from the December Wizengamot meeting smiled out from several newspapers held by the students around them, but Harry ignored these, too, and did so so resolutely that no one dared speak to him, though the Hall was filled with whispers and pointing in his direction.

Eventually, Neville broke the silence: “Ha-Ha-Harry…?”

“I’ve seen it, Neville,” Harry said in his best tone of feline indifference, refusing to look away from his plate. He was still aware of everyone with a clear line of sight staring at him.

“And…is it…is it true?” Neville asked nervously.

And here, Harry turned and looked his friend in the eye. The round-faced boy drew back under his gaze. “Mostly, yeah, except for the me being crazy part. ’ he said. Gasps rippled across the Hall. “But it was six years ago. It’s all been dealt with.”

“But a cupboard!” Lavender Brown burst out. Harry just nodded.

“Bloody hell, how could they do that?” Seamus Finnigan demanded.

“Because they’re evil gits,” Harry replied dismissively. “That’s why I ran away.”

At that, the floodgates opened: “Where did you go?” “How did you hide for two months.” “Did you curse them when you left?” “How did you escape?” “How could Dumbledore do that to you?” “My dad’ll get them for you if you want.”

“Guys! Guys! That’s enough!” Harry yelled. Everyone stopped to listen. “It was six years ago,” he said firmly. “My aunt and uncle were arrested by the muggle authorities. They’re still in prison, and they will be for a while. I don’t need anyone going out for revenge or something. And I don’t have a problem with Dumbledore, either. We’ve worked it all out with him, too.”

“How touching, Potter,” a smarmy voice sounded behind him.

Harry spun around and stood up as he saw the usual contingent of Slytherins approaching. “Malfoy, don’t start,” he said.

“I can see why you’ve been keeping your past so secret,” Malfoy said smugly, waving a copy of the _Prophet_ in Harry’s face. “Even I can’t believe what those muggles did. How could you stand to stay in that world at all?”

“Because I don’t apply what they did to all muggles,” Harry replied evenly. “And because most of the other muggles I met actually cared about me.”

“Hmpf, still clinging to those noble family values, Potter? Honestly, _most_ of us can see how unsavoury the muggles really are.”

“Not all muggles, Malfoy. Just a few bigots. You know, _you_ _’re_ one to talk. If my relatives were wizards, they’d fit in perfectly with your lot. They were as proud of being pureblood muggles as you are of being pureblood wizards. Heck, my cousin probably would’ve grown up to replace Goyle.”

Goyle growled and cracked his knuckles. Harry had to resist the urge to hiss back.

“You’re right, Draco, he is really messed up,” Theo Nott spoke up. “He must’ve got whacked in the head one to many times.”

Neville jumped to his feet, and said “Shut up, Nott.” Ron also jumped to his feet, as did Hermione, her fingers poised to draw her wand.

“You all lay off him,” Ron snapped. “Harry’s done more than all of you put together.”

“We weren’t talking to you, Weasel,” Malfoy said. He didn’t even look at Neville or Ron, but he eyed Hermione warily. “Such a _shame_ what happened to the Boy-Who-Lived,” he said sarcastically. The other Slytherins sniggered. “A lovely, tragic story, really. Perhaps my father can… _convince_ the Brocklehursts to turn it into a play.”

“And what’s that supposed to mean, Malfoy?” Mandy Brocklehurst leapt to her feet behind him.

But Malfoy didn’t get a chance to clarify how much of a threat that was because an acid voice sounded over the group: “That will be _quite_ enough from all of you.” Professor Snape had descended from the High Table to break up the argument. “We wouldn’t want to have anyone getting in trouble as a result of something someone printed in the newspaper, would we?” He cast a very penetrating eye at Harry and Hermione as he said this. “That would be _most_ unpleasant for all involved.”

Malfoy seemed to get the message that was obvious to Harry and Hermione. The letters against Professor Snape in the paper had continued intermittently. “Yes, Professor,” he said, and he turned and led the other Slytherins away, his nose in the air. Snape left without another word.

“Definitely out to get you,” Hermione whispered at Harry. Harry just rolled his eyes.

Harry left breakfast as soon as he could, with Hermione in tow. They would have a little time to hang out in their dorms alone before they had to go to Transfiguration that way, but Ron ran after them, saying, “Hey, Harry, wait up.” They turned around. Aside from the one outburst against Malfoy, Ron had been uncharacteristically silent all through breakfast. “You coulda told me—” he started. “I mean, I understand you didn’t wanna talk about it, but—Look, I’m sorry you’re stuck in the middle of this, mate. I know I complain about being poor and stuff sometimes, but I…you…I mean, what happened to you—that was insane. Nobody should have that happen to them. Anyway, I told the rest of them to lay off you again. You don’t deserve all that.” He jerked his thumb behind him.

“Uh, thanks, Ron. That’s really good of you,” Harry replied curtly. “See you in class.”

The one thing Harry hadn’t thought to expect in all this, though, was that his two-way mirror had been sitting hot on his dresser all morning. Not even bothering to go down to the Common Room and call for Hermione, he picked it up and said, “Sirius Black.”

A minute later a worried Sirius and Remus appeared in the mirror.

“Cub! Are you okay? We saw the article—” Sirius started.

“I’m fine, Sirius,” Harry grumbled. “It’s just the worst time to deal with all this—answering all the questions, worrying how the public will react…”

“And what about your poor godfather?” he chastised him.

“Sorry, I—”

“I had to stop Padfoot from running out and doing something stupid,” Remus interrupted. “You never told us about the cupboard.”

“Oh…Sorry. I guess it was so long ago that it’s not that important to me anymore. They were horrible to me, I got away, they went to prison. That’s it.”

“So it’s all true, then?” Remus said.

“Yeah, pretty much. I’m sorry I didn’t really think to tell you.”

“It’s alright, Cub,” Sirius admitted. “I just wish I didn’t have to learn about it from _this_.” He waved the paper in frustration. “Rita Skeeter,” he growled. “And this Majorie Dursley—like _she_ _’s_ so pure and noble.”

“Ha!” Harry exclaimed. “Aunt Marge was just as bad as Uncle Vernon before he went to prison. At Dudley’s fifth birthday party, she whacked me in the shins with her walking stick to keep me from beating him at musical statues.”

“That’s awful!” Remus said.

“Welcome to Dursleyland. Anyway, from what we heard, she turned herself around once she saw how much trouble it got her brother in—but all the while claimed she’d always been a model citizen.”

“Sounds like she’d make a perfect Death Eater,” Sirius grumbled. “So what happens now? You read Lucius Malfoy’s crap?”

“No, but I can guess,” Harry said. “Dumbledore’s gonna push the vote back to next month. I’ll have Cousin Andi release a short statement now, and I’ll make a speech then.”

“That sounds wise,” Remus said. “Padfoot, you should probably make a speech this weekend—a calm and collected one.”

“Hmm. I’ll try.”

“Sounds good,” Harry said. “I’ll talk to you guys later. I have to get to class.”

Sirius nodded: “See you later, Cub. Love you. Mirror off.”

* * *

After Transfiguration, Harry and Hermione were met by Terry Boot, whose home life in the muggle world wasn’t that far off from Ron’s in the magical one. He also gave Harry his sympathy and informed him that he’d told the Ravenclaws to back off from him. A horrified Justin had done the same in Hufflepuff, so things didn’t look too bad for Harry at the moment. Only the Slytherins were left to cause him grief.

Meanwhile, they had to go to Double Defence next, where Harry did not fail to miss the fact that Professor Quirrell seemed more bright-eyed and bushy-tailed today. His stuttering had mostly subsided, and he seemed uncommonly happy.

Harry concluded that this was probably a bad sign.

Unbeknownst to the children, Quirrell’s Master was also in an unusually good mood, especially after these past two months of setbacks. The article today had Lucius Malfoy’s fingerprints all over it. Perhaps the coward wasn’t so useless after all. He’d dealt a heavy blow to Dumbledore’s pet cause, and the old wizard would have to be out of the castle even longer this weekend to try to salvage it.

So much the better.


	39. The Philosopher's Stone

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: JK Rowling is the soul of Harry Potter.
> 
> Well, here’s the showdown. I hope it’s suitably epic. Thank you all for reading.

The time had come. Quirinus Quirrell stalked the corridors of Hogwarts Castle late Friday night, ready to put his plan into action. Snape wouldn’t be so easily fooled tonight. He had noticed what had happened in the past week, and he would be watching like a hawk for anything out of the ordinary. This time, Quirrell needed a stronger distraction, one the Potions Master couldn’t ignore. He had already put step one of his plan into action: rearrange the prefects’ schedules so that a member of the correct house and gender was on patrol.

He found the two Gryffindor prefects on the fifth floor: Percy Weasley and Audrey MacDougal. With Weasley’s slavish devotion to his duties, he wasn’t much for conversation. Unfortunately for his partner, that meant he wasn’t paying as much attention to other things he should have, either.

Just as the prefects passed where he was hiding, Quirrell emerged from the shadows, pointed his wand at the MacDougal’s girl’s back and whispered, “ _Imperio_.”

The girl stopped cold. The boy turned around to ask what was going on when Quirrell came closer to them and cleared his throat.

“Good evening, Professor,” Weasley said formally. “Can we help you?”

Step two: get a hold of the student who was most likely to be able to retrieve the Philosopher’s Stone from the Mirror of Erised—one noble enough not to be swayed by riches, intelligent enough to know the limitations of the Elixir of Life, but easily enticed by more abstract temptations, like the allure of knowledge.

“Yes,” Quirrell replied. “There are some sudden issues th-that n-need attending,” he said. He casually leaned against the wall to support himself in his weakness. His stutter was already back with a vengeance. “Miss MacDougal, g-go back to Gryffindor Tower at once, p-please. Find Hermione G-Granger, tell her that Professor McGonagall wants to speak with her immediately, and bring her here.”

“Yes, Professor,” the MacDougal girl said flatly. She turned and walked away toward the Tower.

As expected, Percy Weasley accepted this without question. His implicit trust of all authority figures worked to Quirrell’s advantage. However, he was somewhat curious: “Professor, may I ask what is going on?”

“You may _ask_ ,” Quirrell said with a wry smile. Then, he levelled his wand at the boy—the boy who had unknowingly harboured the arch-coward Pettigrew for most of the past decade. He barely had time for a look of surprise to cross his face before Quirrell said, “ _Stupefy_.”

Step three: force Snape away from his guard duty by invoking one of his more important duties as Potions Master.

Quirrell stepped closer to the unconscious prefect and carefully tipped the contents of a small vial into his mouth. The tall boy began shaking and twitching on the floor as if in pain.

A few minutes later, the female prefect returned to him, with the Granger girl in tow. Naturally, expecting to see McGonagall, she sensed that something was wrong.

“Professor Quirrell?” Granger said in confusion.

“ _Stupefy_.”

Granger started to move, but she wasn’t fast enough, and she slumped to the floor. MacDougal didn’t even notice. She stood still before Quirrell until he addressed her again: “Find Professor Snape by the third floor corridor and inform him that Percy Weasley has been poisoned. Do not tell him that you’ve seen me or Miss Granger.”

“Yes, Professor.”

The older girl walked away, leaving Quirrell alone with two unconscious students. At that point, it was quite easy to toss the younger girl over his shoulder (for as long as he could take the weight) and wait in the shadows for Snape to come and rush the boy to the Hospital Wing. He would know something was up at once, but the third floor corridor would be unguarded for a precious few minutes.

Step four: a spark of Quirrell’s Muggle Studies days came back as he whispered, “Once more unto the breach.”

* * *

Harry Potter stared drowsily by wandlight at a tiny dot wandering back and forth on an old piece of parchment. _You will need to be especially vigilant while I am away on Friday night_ , Dumbledore had said. Hermione was unconvinced, but he was sure it was a message meant partially for him. After all, watching for thieves on the Marauder’s Map may not have been officially sanctioned, but it certainly couldn’t hurt matters, could it? So far, though, the dot labelled _Severus Snape_ had just been moving back and forth in front of the third floor corridor for the past hour. Most of the castle was quiet.

Suddenly, he saw something else moving. A dot labelled _Audrey MacDougal_ came close to Snape’s. They both stayed still for a few seconds, and then they both moved away from the forbidden corridor at running speed.

Harry was wide awake instantly. What could draw Snape away from his post so fast? And what was going to happen now that the corridor was unguarded? He scanned around the area. Surely, someone would try to break in, now. Sure enough, he spotted two dots, practically on top of each other, both moving toward the forbidden corridor, and the names made his blood run cold: _Quirinus Quirrell_ and _Hermione Granger_.

He was about to drop everything and run down there at once, but a modicum of common sense broke through his horror, and he paused for a minute to kick two of his roommates in their beds.

“Ron! Neville!” he hissed.

“Huh? Wha?” his friends groaned stupidly.

“Shhh!” he told them. “Listen up. This is important. Quirrell’s got Hermione, and he’s taking her to the third floor corridor.”

“What!”

“Shhh! I think he’s gonna use her to steal the Philosopher’s Stone, somehow. I’m going after him.”

“You are?” Neville said fearfully.

“I’ll come with you,” Ron replied.

“No. We need the teachers to help. It all fits—my scar hurting and everything. I think Quirrell’s working for Voldemort.”

Ron and Neville gasped. Seamus snorted and rolled over in his sleep.

“I need you to go out and find a teacher— _any_ teacher—and tell them what’s going on.” He checked the Map again, not caring who saw it, now. “McGonagall’s patrolling the sixth floor. Try her first.”

“But we’ll get in trouble,” Neville whimpered.

“I’ll take the blame if you do, but I have to help Hermione first. Here, we’ll use this to get out of the Tower.” With that, Harry grabbed his invisibility cloak threw it around all three of them.

“Wicked!” Ron whispered. “When’d you get this?”

“Christmas. Don’t tell anyone. Now, please—hurry.”

Neville still seemed reluctant, but he came along. They rushed down the stairs, past the O.W.L. and N.E.W.T. students who were up late studying in the Common Room, and slipped out the portrait hole without incident.

“Thanks, guys,” Harry said. Then, he quickly pulled the cloak off his two friends and wrapped it around himself alone. Before they could protest, they heard him call out, “Find McGonagall!” And they heard his footsteps sprinting invisibly down the corridor.

Harry reached the third floor corridor, not knowing what he would find. Quirrell and Hermione had vanished from the Map entirely, and there was still no one else around. He ran up to the door without even bothering to draw his wand, and cast a wandless _Alohomora_. With a mere wave of his hand, the locked clicked open. For once, he was thankful that Dumbledore _hadn_ _’t_ used something stronger. He dashed into the room—

And promptly froze stiff.

In his haste, he had conveniently forgotten that there was a colossal three-headed dog in this corridor. “Fluffy” (he was gonna get Hagrid for that) was even bigger than he’d feared—the size of a small elephant. He couldn’t see Harry, but he could certainly smell him. The monster started growling, and Harry jumped back into a defensive position, shaking badly. This must be how a real cat felt when faced with a Rottweiler. _Can I just fight Voldemort instead?_ He thought.

Fluffy growled louder and started pawing angrily with his feet. Harry fought through the haze of fear to remember what Hagrid had said about the dog: _Play_ _‘im a bit of music and he goes right to sleep. Play ‘im a bit of music and he goes right to sleep._

Hagrid had given Harry a hand-whittled flute shortly before Christmas, but he hadn’t thought to grab it. He was on his own for this, so he took a deep breath and did the one thing he could think of in that situation: he started humming the _Doctor Who_ theme song. It was off-key and not exactly lullaby material, but from the first note, Fluffy’s six mad eyes began to droop, and he staggered back and laid down on the stone floor, fast asleep.

Harry didn’t waste any more time. He threw open the trap door and, without even bothering to look, jumped in.

He fell a long way. After the first half-second, he instinctively transformed into Ratsbane and twisted himself to land on his feet and hopefully not die horribly. He needn’t have worried about that, though, as he landed on some sort of soft, leafy material, completely unhurt. He changed back to human at once, but that was all he had time to do.

The plant was moving. Snakelike tendrils wrapped around his arms and legs like something out of an old Tarzan movie and began to constrict painfully. He tried to shake them off, but they just gripped tighter, and more creepers made for his chest and neck. He didn’t know for sure what kind of plant this was, but he could guess: Devil’s Snare. Its weakness, he knew, was fire. He tried to snap his fingers to draw his wand from his holster, but he realised in horror that a thick vine had wrapped around his right palm, making it impossible. He couldn’t reach over with his left hand, either, and he couldn’t risk transforming, lest his small feline body be crushed in a second.

As a vine began to curl around his neck, Harry focused with all his might on his wandless magic. After all these months, he still hadn’t managed to cast this spell wandlessly, no matter how easy it was for Hermione, but it was his only chance, now. “ _Lacarnum Inflamari_!” He grunted. “ _Lacarnum Inflamari! Lacarnum Inflamari_!”

He felt a flare of magic. Tongues of blue flame shot out from his hands and began hissing and smoking on contact with the deadly plant. The Devil’s Snare cringed back from the light and warmth, loosening its grip. Harry shook himself out of its grasp and ran for it, pulling his invisibility cloak back around him as he raced down the passageway.

* * *

The first thing Hermione was aware of after the red light hit her was being thrown down and set on her feet on a square of black marble. _Mental note_ , she thought ruefully, _work more on dodging skills_. She looked around. After a moment’s confusion, she realised that she was on the black’s queen’s side castle square of a giant chessboard, with life-sized chessmen with blank faces. Turning around, she came face to face with Professor Quirrell.

 _Great. Harry was right_.

“P-Professor?”

“G-good evening, Miss G-Granger,” Quirrell stammered. He was sweating and looked unsteady on his feet, but still very dangerous with his wand trained on her. “I was hoping I wouldn’t have t-to wake you up just yet, b-but, it seems you’ll have to play through with me.”

“Wh-what’s going on, sir,” Hermione said, stuttering as badly as he was. She angled her right hand behind her leg and quietly snapped her fingers.

Nothing happened.

“Looking for this?” Quirrell drew her wand from his robes. “Very c-clever, wearing a duelling holster, but not clever enough. Now, you will d-do as I say, Miss G-Granger.”

Hermione thought fast. She still had her wandless magic, but she knew from duelling practice that wanded magic was superior, even if she had been anywhere near Quirrell’s level. And even if she got him with the element of surprise, she still didn’t know where she was or how to get out. “What are you going to do?” she asked.

“ _We_ are going to play chess.”

Quirrell stepped back, keeping his wand trained on Hermione while taking the place of the queen’s side knight. “Master, are you ready?” he said nervously.

A terrible, hissing voice replied, “I am.”

Quirrell turned around, so that the back of his turban faced the board. “Now, it is time for my Master to do his work,” he said. And, still keeping his wand pointed at Hermione with his right hand, he shakily unwrapped his turban with his left.

Hermione screamed.

“ _Silencio_!”

Hermione felt herself keep screaming, but no sound came out. She could only gaze in horror at the second face on the back of her Defence Professor’s head: chalk white with glowing red eyes and slits for nostrils. She knew the description in _Modern Magical History_ by heart. It was no exaggeration.

 _I_ _’m so sorry, Harry_ , she thought.

“You will d-do as we say, Miss G-Granger,” Quirrell said, even as he seemed to shake more. “Lord Voldemort commands it!”

As he spoke, a life-sized white pawn glided forward two squares. Voldemort’s face immediately hissed out, “Pawn to e5,” and the game began.

* * *

Harry landed the rickety school broom, having finally caught the correct flying key. He jammed it in the lock and carefully creaked the door open.

The people in the next chamber didn’t seem to have noticed the sound. Harry’s heart leapt when he saw Hermione alive and well, standing on the back row of a huge chessboard. Then, he surveyed the rest of the board, and it was his stomach that lurched next. Quirrell was stand on the right edge of the board, but he wasn’t surveying the position. The face on the back of his head was.

“Queen to a4,” the face hissed. There was a grinding sound as the black queen moved.

It was all Harry could do to keep from crying out in horror. A sharp pain shot through his scar, and his senses clouded for a moment, replaced by a vision of a flash of green light and a high, sibilant laugh.

_Voldemort!_

He had to get Hermione out of here, and fast, but how? Quirrell literally had eyes in the back of his head. Even if he ran up and threw the cloak around her, could her pull her out of the room before Voldemort noticed? What happened if he interrupted the game? And what about the Philosopher’s Stone? If Voldemort got his hands on that, it was all over. He decided he would have to wait and hope that Dumbledore’s final trap was as good as he had said and would be enough of a distraction for them to escape.

But there was one thing he could do. He walked over to the nearest edge of the board, where his sister stood frozen in terror and made a small scuffing sound with his foot. She snapped her head in his direction. Then, Harry carefully drew back his cloak at an angle where Hermione could only see his face, and Quirrell couldn’t see anything at all.

Hermione appeared to gasp, but no sound came out. Harry placed a finger to his lips and covered himself back up. She gave him a tiny nod and relaxed slightly. Quirrell hadn’t even noticed.

The game went on.

* * *

Despite the accusations of some, Albus Dumbledore was a humble enough man. He thought nothing of staying overnight in a rented room at the Leaky Cauldron when the situation demanded it, as it did tonight. It had been a long day of political manoeuvring, lobbying, and horse-trading to try to put together a big enough coalition to postpone the vote on the Muggle Protection Act until next month. Dropping Harry Potter’s name here and there was some help, but it was still slow going.

It didn’t help that this was the last meeting of the school term, which meant that it was the last best chance for Voldemort to make an attempt on the Philosopher’s Stone. Worse yet, the increasingly erratic behaviour and declining health of the Defence Professor had confirmed to Albus that Voldemort actually _had_ slipped back into the castle—in Quirinus Quirrell’s body. For this reason, Albus was travelling light, concerned that he might need to rush back to his trap at a moment’s notice.

But despite his careful preparations, things still failed to go as planned. Just as he was getting ready for bed, there was an urgent knock at the door. He opened it curiously, and one of the pub’s younger employees handed him a note.

“Chief Warlock,” he said, “Professor McGonagall just brought this for you, sir. She said it was an emergency.”

“Thank you, young man.” Albus unfolded the note and glanced over it. He froze. Quirrell had kidnapped Hermione Granger? Harry Potter had followed? This was not good. “Oh my word, I have to get back,” he breathed. He pushed past the messenger, ran down to the main floor, and rushed to the fireplace to connect to his office, all in such a flash that no one had a chance to ask him what was happening. As the landlord gave him a quizzical look, Albus just had time to say, “Put it on my tab, Tom,” before he vanished into the green flames.

Upon arriving in his office, the Headmaster did not immediately race down to the third floor. Instead, he turned to a swan-sized red and gold bird that sat blinking awake on his perch.

“I’m afraid we are out of time, my friend,” he told the bird. “We must take action now.” He waved his wand once, and a broom sailed down from the upper levels of his quarters. Then, he snatched up a certain cursed locket from a glass display case and mounted the broom. He reached out to the beautiful bird. “We must leave at once, Fawkes,” he repeated. “The location is three hundred miles due west of the castle. This ends tonight, I hope. Come!”

The phoenix flew off of his perch and circled Albus’s head once. The old wizard reached out a hand and grabbed his long tail feathers, and the two of them flamed out in an instant.

When Albus Dumbledore reemerged into existence, he was hovering on a broom high above a featureless stretch of the Atlantic Ocean. Fawkes had not been to the location he needed to go to before, so he could only get an approximate transport, but it was less than half an hour’s broom flight away, if all had gone well.

If anyone had thought Albus liked this plan, they would have been sorely mistaken. He hated abandoning the castle at a time like this. He hated prioritising this mission over the safety of his students. He had reconsidered it more than once already, but it was too good a chance to pass up. Destroy the horcrux before Voldemort lost whatever semblance of a body he had in Quirrell, and he would be truly dead once Quirrell inevitably was. Oh, but he should have destroyed the damn thing earlier. Now, there was a hostage to worry about, and not just any hostage, but Harry Potter’s own sister. He could only pray that he could finish this and get back to the castle in time.

A quick _Point Me_ spell, and he was headed in the right direction. Albus pushed the mid-range broom for all it was worth, his long hair and beard flapping almost comically behind him, had there been any light to see by. Finally, after about twenty minutes, though it seemed like an eternity, he reached his destination. Far out in the Atlantic Ocean, the bare peak of an undersea mountain, the only point of a whole undersea mountain range that poked above the waves, formed a rock about the size of an apartment building that stood isolated from any land for hundreds of miles around. Many might have said that the rock wasn’t worthy of a name, but the muggles had given it one anyway: Rockall.

Fawkes flew to a farther distance as Albus approached the rock. The phoenix didn’t want to see what came next. There was a small ledge near the top of the rock, on which he placed Voldemort’s horcrux. Then, he parted his lips and spoke a haunting, hissing word before flying to a safe distance himself. Parseltongue was not an easy language to learn the old-fashioned way, but it had paid off. The locket popped open.

The horcrux was not about to go quietly, though. A suffocating cloud grew out of it, which seemed to shine with an inner, malevolent light. Albus heard it whispering terrible things to him and saw the light begin to shape itself into the figures of Gellert, Aberforth, and Ariana. But he tore his eyes away from the vision and braced himself. Even here, over the open ocean, this was the most dangerous thing he had done in years.

Albus waved his wand in a complex pattern, summoned up the dark anger evoked by the ghosts of his past, and shouted out a terrible incantation: “ _Incendium Infernalis_!”

An enormous burst of flame blasted from the tip of his wand and formed into the shape of a chimaera. It ran toward the rock at an enormous speed on its fiery legs and splashed against it like a breaking wave, shattering into a hundred smaller fire-monsters than kept forming and reforming as they encircled Rockall. A large colony of periwinkles and several dozen seabirds sadly perished, and the thin coating of moss on the rock was entirely burnt up, but the cursed locket was finally melted into slag.

With difficultly, even by his standards, Albus dispersed the Fiendfyre. The final blast exploded outward in a ring that would dissipate harmlessly over the miles of open ocean when robbed of fuel.

“ _Accio_ locket,” he called. A twisted, half-molten lump of metal flew towards him, and he placed it in a conjured ceramic jar for safekeeping. Voldemort’s horcrux was no more. Satisfied, he called Fawkes to him and flashed back to Hogwarts.

In the coming days, the muggle authorities would chalk up the scorching of Rockall to a weapons test gone awry. The Royal Navy blamed the Royal Air Force, the Royal Air Force blamed the Royal Navy, and in the end, most muggles assumed, with no real evidence, that it was actually MI6.

* * *

“Bishop to c5.”

The bishop made its move, and the white queen immediately captured it, but now Voldemort was ready. “To h3,” he ordered.

Quirrell turned and stepped over to the h3 square.

“Checkmate,” Voldemort said.

The white king threw down its crown before Quirrell’s feet, and the chessmen parted to let them pass.

“C-come along,” Quirrell ordered Hermione.

Harry considered making his move, but Quirrell was already coming back for her. There was just no good way to escape a man with four eyes. Hermione reluctantly followed the Defence Professor across the room, looking down to avoid Voldemort’s awful gaze. Harry followed as close as he dared. He prayed that the chessmen would let him pass, since he hadn’t been in the game, but they made no move against him, and he went on into the next chamber.

This room was Quirrell’s, and it contained nothing but an enormous, ugly, and smelly mountain troll. Harry didn’t have to worry about crying out, since he could barely breathe for the smell alone. But Quirrell simply levitated a huge chunk of loose stone over the troll’s head and dropped it, and the beast collapsed with a sickening thud. He obviously hadn’t added any spells to make this task more difficult. Harry again looked for an opportunity to get his sister out, but Voldemort seemed to be anticipating her making a break for it and kept his snake-like eyes on her the whole time.

Harry walked as quietly as he could behind the pair into the next chamber. Here, the exits sealed themselves with enchanted flames as soon as they entered, one purple and one black. On a table in the room were seven potion bottles and a scroll, but Quirrell didn’t even look at the scroll. He just picked up the smallest bottle and took a swig from it. He shivered and swayed on his feet. Harry started to make his move, but the spasm passed too quickly. With shaking hands, Quirrell handed the bottle to Hermione and ordered, “D-d-drink, Miss G-Granger…It will allow you to p-pass through the b-black flames.”

Hermione took the bottle, but hesitated. Quirrell trained his wand on her. “Drink!” he ordered.

Aware that Harry was following, she only drained about half of what little was left in the bottle. She shivered. Fortunately, this seemed to be enough to satisfy Quirrell, and he motioned her forward through the enchanted flames.

Harry watched her go nervously, hoping she would be alright. As soon as Quirrell was out of sight, he rushed forward and drank all that was left in the tiny bottle. He shivered himself as an icy sensation flooded his body and then rushed through the black fire. The next chamber—the final chamber—held the biggest surprise of all.

There, on a stone dais, stood the Mirror of Erised.

“Y-you see, Miss G-Granger,” Quirrell stammered. He swayed on his feet again. “The rest was, indeed, so m-much window d-dressing, b-but here, you see how D-D-Dumbledore truly p-protected the Philosopher’s Stone. You know all about the Philosopher’s St-Stone, d-don’t, you?”

He flicked his wand, and Harry finally heard Hermione speak. “It was you all along, then?” she said in mingled shame and horror.

“B-but of course,” he replied. “Who else did you think it could be?”

“But I thought Snape—”

“Oh, yes, S-Snape _does_ seem the sort, doesn’t he— _former_ Death Eater, and all that. How c-convenient for me.”

“You—you—I _defended_ you!” Hermione shouted.

Quirrell laughed. It was a weak laugh, but then Voldemort himself joined in, which made it utterly terrifying. “You d-did, did you? Even after I singled out you and your ‘b-brother’ for those…unusual c-class demonstrations? Rather c-clever, don’t you think, Miss G-Granger? Testing your abilities like that? P-Potter suspected the whole time, I’m sure, b-but it seems his silly little m-mudblood pet was st-still fooled.”

It took an enormous effort for Harry not to shout out in his sister’s defence at that, and even more effort to keep his magic in check, but he managed it for her sake.

 _Keep him talking,_ Hermione thought desperately. _I have to keep him talking. Slow him down._ “B-b-but you were teaching against pureblood misconceptions—You gave the Slytherins lower grades!”

“Forcing them to w-work harder so they’d be more p-prepared than the rest of you,” Quirrell said offhandedly.

Harry’s eyebrows shot up. That was such a brilliant Slytherin manoeuvre that he hadn’t even thought of it. It even made him wonder a little about Snape—but no, Snape didn’t actually _teach_.

“B-but enough idle ch-chatter,” Quirrell cut them off shakily. “I m-must continue my work.”

“Dumbledore’s going to stop you!” Hermione yelled defiantly.

“What a n-noble sentiment,” Quirrell said with a leer. He stumbled slightly. “Unfortunately, the fool D-Dumbledore is stuck in London t-tonight on your _dear_ “b-brother’s’ behalf. There is n-no one here to help you. We will—”

But at that moment, Quirrell gave them the opportunity they needed: he staggered and clutched at his chest, nearly dropping his wand and collapsing. Seeing him now, it seemed obvious that his possession must be killing him. Before Hermione could even think about running away, he grabbed her by the arm to keep her close, but, thinking fast, she stomped on his foot and at the same time brought the side of her free hand down hard on his wrist with a wandless Stinging Jinx added for good measure. Harry jumped at the chance: punch to the stomach, kick to the knee, wandless _Expelliarumus_ to get Quirrell’s wand away from him. Quirrell went down hard. Then, he threw the cloak over Hermione and pulled her away, back towards the black flames.

“Harry, wait, my—” Hermione whispered.

“ _Impedimenta_!”

Harry and Hermione barely had time to feel the spell coming before they felt like they’d tripped and fallen into a vat of treacle. Impelled by a force coming from behind them, they were turned around to see Quirrell, shaking in his shoes, but successfully holding them immobile with Hermione’s wand. He hadn’t been able to see them under the cloak, but he knew the only place they could run was out that door. With a flick of his wand, the invisibility cloak flew away.

“P-P-Potter!” he yelled.

“Potter!” Voldemort hissed hatefully.

“ _Incarcerous_!” Quirrell said. He snapped the fingers of his free hand, and tight ropes bound the children’s arms and ankles.

 _So he can do wandless magic, too,_ they thought. _Of_ course _he can._

 “ _Expelliarmus!_ _”_ Quirrell may have looked weak, but the spell was powerful enough to rip his own wand from Harry’s grasp and Harry’s from its holster. “Now, we will…” he started.

“Let me face the boy,” Voldemort said.

A look of fear crossed Quirrell’s face, but he quietly said, “Yes, Master,” and slowly turned around, and a pain pierced Harry’s scar as the red eyes lock on him.

“Harry Potter…we meet again,” Voldemort whispered. Harry was too terrified to speak. “You see what I have become because of you? Less than the meanest ghost—no power or form of my own unless I share the body of another. My faithful Quirrell has endured the curse of unicorn blood to sustain me these last few weeks, but all that changes tonight. With the Elixir of Life, I will be able to create a new body for myself. And then I will finish what I came to do ten years ago and finally kill you.”

“What?” Harry said.

“No!” Hermione screamed.

But Harry was thinking, _Me? Not my parents?_

“And your dear _mudblood_ ‘sister’ is going to get the Philosopher’s Stone for me,” Voldemort concluded.

“NEVER!” she shouted.

“DON’T CALL HERMIONE THAT!” Harry yelled, as if that were the important thing at the moment, but Quirrell and Voldemort both ignored him.

“Oh, b-b-but you w-will,” the possessed man stammered to Hermione. He half-turned and waved her forward. She glided, her feet dragging on the floor. With a snap of his fingers, the bindings loosened. “It’s v-very simple, you see. Only one who wishes to t-take the Stone, but not use it, can retrieve it from the M-Mirror. That is why I n-needed a student who was not tempted by its p-power.”

Harry’s eyes grew wide. _Quirrell wanted Hermione for herself?_ Not _to get at me?_

“Look in the M-Mirror, Miss G-Granger. Tell me what you see.”

“I…I see…I see myself escaping from you,” she answered truthfully.

“You will escape if you retrieve the Stone,” Quirrell said.

Hermione kept looking, but she didn’t see any Stone, as if she would tell him, anyway. “The Mirror only shows you what you want to see,” she said with a quaver. “I don’t want you to get the Stone.”

“You will if you want your ‘b-brother’ to live.” He levelled Harry’s own wand at the boy’s head.

“Hermione, don’t do it!” Harry yelled.

“Silence!”

But Harry knew she would probably see the Stone now because she wanted to save him. Was that how the enchantment worked? _The Mirror shows my heart_ _’s desire,_ he thought _, and right now, my heart_ _’s desire is to get the Stone away from Voldemort and save Hermione, so maybe it’ll show me where it is._ He looked in the Mirror, and, to his surprise, his terrified reflection suddenly smiled and moved of its own accord. Shrugging off his ropes, Mirror-Harry pulled a blood-red stone from his pocket. Then, he winked and placed it back in, and at that moment, the real Harry felt something heavy drop into his real pocket with a tingle of magic emanating from it.

Hermione stifled a small gasp. She had seen the Stone in her hands for a moment, but then it vanished.

Harry, meanwhile, knew that he had to get out. He tried a wandless Cutting Charm, but he couldn’t cut the ropes deep enough from that angle. He focused with all his might on burning through the ropes that bound him. The Bluebell Flame Charm had got him out of one set of bindings already without burning him, and hopefully it would again. It was even harder without being able to speak the words, but mortal terror was a great motivator. In a few moments, he knew he had succeeded. He felt the warm flames licking his fingers as they ate through the conjured ropes. He would back away and try to draw Quirrell away from Hermione…

He’d barely made it two small steps when the sibilant voice sounded again: “The boy! The boy has it!”

“HERMIONE, RUN!” Harry burst out of the smoldering ropes and took off in the other direction, behind the Mirror, as fast as he could. _If I can just distract him long enough, she can escape_ , he thought desperately.

“SEIZE HIM!” Voldemort screamed, and Quirrell took off after Harry.

But Hermione hesitated, torn between running for help and trying to get her brother out herself.

“RUN! RUN!” Harry yelled, but then Quirrell grabbed his arms.

“ARRRGGHH!” Both Harry and Quirrell screamed in pain. A white hot agony shot across Harry’s scar, so intense that he felt like it was being carved deep into his skull. Quirrell’s hands were blistering against his skin. In desperation, he lashed out with a wandless _Flipendo_ that threw Quirrell flat on his back. He staggered to his feet and ran for the exit. “Come on, let’s go!” he yelled at Hermione, grabbing her by the wrist.

But Quirrell wasn’t out yet. Voldemort yelled again, “Seize him! SEIZE HIM!” And their teacher leapt up with seemingly magically-enhanced strength and ran at the two children. Now, both children threw any wandless jinxes they could think of, but he simply parried the spells, jumped on top of Harry and wrapped his hands around his throat.

They screamed in pain again, and Hermione screamed in fear. She desperately tried to pulled Quirrell off her brother, but as her eyes met Voldemort’s, a horrible pain exploded in her own head—not like a scar, but like she’d been whacked with a cricket bat. It took her a moment to realise the cause was a blast of hateful, but unfocused magic that she couldn’t identify swirling around all three of them. She could only watch as Harry’s scar ripped open like a fresh wound with torn stitches, and Quirrell’s hands blackened and withered like burning leaves. What was happening?

“Master, my hands!” Quirrell whimpered, his briefly increase strength seeming to wane. “I can’t hold him—Help me, Master!”

“Kill him!” Voldemort hissed.

Quirrell raised his wand and uttered the deplorable words: “ _Avada Kedavra_!”

“NO!” Hermione summoned the last of her strength and pulled back Quirrell’s wand arm. The curse missed Harry’s head by inches and blasted a crater in the stone floor.

Time seemed to stop. The children had felt the magic of ordinary spells and jinxes before. The Killing Curse was nothing like them. Just being in its presence felt like being plunged into something slimy and unclean. It chilled their hearts and churned their stomachs and made their skin crawl from the sheer hate bound up within it.

Then time started again. Harry reached up and grabbed Quirrell’s head. More screaming. Hermione managed to pull Quirrell off Harry, but now, Harry wouldn’t let go, even as Quirrell’s face began blackening and peeling under his grip.

“KILL HIM! KILL HIM!”

But Quirrell dropped all three wands. It seemed all he could do was reach blindly for Harry’s pockets, still trying to get the Stone. Harry tried to fight him off, but he was swaying heavily on his feet.

“Harry, stop! STOP!” Hermione cried, but he wouldn’t let go.

Both of them were weakening fast. Quirrell collapsed on top of Harry. Hermione tried to pull him off again, but he had passed out, and the dead weight was too much for her to lift. Harry shook, his breathing became laboured, and then he, too, slumped down and lay still.

“Harry! Come on, Harry please!” Hermione begged, trying to drag the blackened and burnt Quirrell off of him. Dizziness overtook her.

But then, aged, but strong hands lifted Quirrell up and practically tossed him aside. She looked up and saw the help she had been so longing for. Still in his plum-coloured Wizengamot robes and sporting a beautiful red and gold bird on his shoulder stood Albus Dumbledore.

“Professor! Thank Merlin!” Hermione gasped. “Harry’s hurt he’s—” She felt a horrible lurch in her stomach as she saw her brother lying motionless on the floor. She frantically grasped his wrist and found a pulse. “He’s alive,” she sighed with relief. “But Quirrell did something to him—sir, Quirrell’s possessed by Voldemort!”

Dumbledore just nodded knowingly. He walked around them and flipped the professor over with his toe. Quirrell was a horrible sight, now, with half his face burnt up. With a cautious wave of his wand, he seemed to make an assessment. “He _was_ possessed,” he corrected. “Voldemort’s spirit has gone. You are both very lucky, Hermione.”

“Professor, is he…” Hermione started.

Quirrell gave a weak, rasping breath.

“Alive,” Dumbledore said grimly. “Though I’m afraid not for long. The possession has been slowly killing him for some time. But we must get Harry to Madam Pomfrey. Quickly—” He wrapped am arm around the dying teacher and extended his other towards the children. Fawkes hopped down to his hand and trilled soothingly. “—grab on to Fawkes’ tail feathers.”

Hermione wasn’t sure she could hang on to Harry in her present state, but she obliged. Suddenly, she felt a warmth of living fire—like the lapping of the Bluebell Flames, but running all through her body. _Phoenix fire!_ she thought in wonder. She felt as light as a feather—like she could spread her wings and—

They were flying! All four of them were carried by the phoenix in an aura of golden light that was felt and not seen. It really wasn’t so much flying, though, as it was like the _idea_ of flying. As if everything that was good and wonderful about flying were distilled into a single experience, and everything bad were purged away. It was beautiful—exhilarating—joyful. It seemed there was an exception to the rule that all fast forms of magical travel were uncomfortable.

Hermione had a vague sensation or racing through tunnels and up shafts and through corridors at an impossible speed, all seen as if through a flame and dazzling with colours that seemed to come directly from the magic and the essence of the castle rather than the faint torchlight. It was as if the sights they passed were also distilled down to the idea of them, and when they finally landed in the Hospital Wing, she couldn’t have said whether they had really flown the distance or simply vanished from under the school and materialised there in the same instant.

“Do not fear, Hermione,” Dumbledore said. With one fluid motion, he levitated Harry onto the nearest bed and levitated Quirrell onto another bed with a screen around him. “It is over.”


	40. Recovery

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Harry Potter is a beautiful and terrible thing, and should therefore be treated with credit given to JK Rowling.
> 
> I am indebted to Josie Kearns of the Harry Potter Companion blog for her analysis of Dumbledore’s plan for the Philosopher’s Stone in canon.

“What the hell were you thinking, Albus?”

After getting an earful from Harry’s family, as well as from Minerva, Albus Dumbledore was growing weary of being told how badly he had botched things—not that it wasn’t true—but it was Severus Snape who knew the most of his plans, and he wasn’t taking it well. “I was thinking,” he replied, “that we had a chance to end the threat of Voldemort permanently, at minimal risk to the boy’s safety.”

“His physical safety, you mean,” Severus shot back.

Albus raised a bushy eyebrow. “Have you, then, begun to care for the boy, Severus?” he asked.

But Severus ignored the question: “You tasked me with keeping him safe, and yet it was your own risk assessment that appears to have failed badly. Or do you think that being put in a coma by the Dark Lord himself was a minimal risk.”

“I made mistakes, Severus. I admit that. It was a mistake to overreach with my plan, and it was a mistake not to isolate Quirrell from the students. But the boy will recover in the next day or so, and I stand by my assessment. It was an invaluable opportunity to end Voldemort once and for all, which is why I asked you here.”

Severus’s eyebrows shot up. “You think…you think you succeeded, Albus?” he growled. “Allow me to enlighten you.” He rolled back his sleeve to reveal the dull, red outline of a serpent emerging from the mouth of a skull.

Albus gasped—actually gasped—as he realised the implications. “No,” he breathed.

“Yes, Albus, it is still there. It seems your plan was not as successful as you thought. And you forgot to mention that it was a mistake to involve me in this mad endeavour in the first place. You’re lucky the boy wasn’t harmed worse, not to mention the girl. The next time you want to endanger him with such a mad scheme, kindly do it yourself, and leave me out of it so that I can actually protect him like I’m supposed to.”

The old man’s faced hardened. “Severus, you have no right—” he began.

“I have every right.”

“You swore to me eleven years ago that you would perform all duties necessary—”

“I swore to protect _her_ son!” the younger man shouted. “I spied for you in exchange for _her_ protection. I have worked for you these past ten years, as much as it galls me teaching these dunderheads to stew horned slugs, because you deemed it essential for _his_ protection, and I should hope that has not all been in error. I told you long ago where my loyalties lay, Albus, and your actions this year have not instilled me with confidence in _yours_.”

The old man sighed: “For all my mistakes, my loyalty is and ever has been to the side of the light. You know this full well, Severus, and you may rest assured that I will protect Harry and his family in every way that I can.”

“You had better.”

* * *

The first thing Harry was aware of was the sound of muffled voices around him. There were several voices—kindly ones, not like Quirrell and Voldemort—but he couldn’t resolve them into words. The second thing Harry was aware of as his eyes cracked open was a bushy mass blocking his field of view, back-lit by sunlight. He blinked once, slowly, and the mass resolved itself into a familiar head of brown hair surrounding a smiling face.

“H-Her-Hermione?” he said slowly.

“Oh, Harry!” His sister lunged forward and flung her arms around his neck.

Harry patted her gently on her back: “You saved me, Mione.”

Hermione pulled back, looking very pink. Despite her present smile, her eyes were red and puffy. She sniffed once and said, “You saved me first, Harry. If I hadn’t been so trusting of Quirrell—”

Harry started to shake his head when the rest of his memory came back to him. He tried to sit up and exclaimed, “Quirrell! The Stone—!”

“Has been taken care of.”

He turned his head and saw the kindly face of Albus Dumbledore looking down at him.

“Good afternoon, Harry,” the old wizard said.

Harry looked around and saw more familiar faces sitting around what he now knew to be the Hospital Wing, each smiling and teary-eyed. “Mum…Dad…Sirius…Remus…” he said, his smile growing wider as he spotted each one. “You’re here…”

“Of course we are, dear,” his Mum said. “We were so worried about you.”

Harry said nothing. He could imagine his parents’ reaction to being awakened by the alarm on the Floo in the middle of the night and being rushed to Hogwarts to see him at once. “But Quirrell—the Stone—what happened?”

“Professor Dumbledore ran in right after you passed out,” Hermione said. “Fawkes—his Phoenix—carried us up here. But Quirrell…he didn’t make it.” She turned away, fighting back tears. “It wasn’t your fault, Harry. You saw him—he was already dying.”

Harry closed his eyes and slumped back on his pillow. Somehow, he felt like he’d already known it. He heard his parents come up on either side of his bed. They placed their hands on him comfortingly.

“And…Voldemort?” he asked.

There was a single gasp from nearby.

Harry leaned up and saw someone tall and redheaded lying in the next bed. “Percy?” he said in confusion.

“Quirrell poisoned him,” Hermione explained. “A distraction for Professor Snape.”

“Oh, sorry,” Harry said.

Percy winced. “It was my own fault, Mr. Potter,” he replied formally. “I failed to be sufficiently attentive.”

“It was an easy mistake to make, Mr. Weasley,” Dumbledore assured him, then turned back to Harry: “It seems Quirrell’s plan was well thought out. He took Hermione to try to retrieve the Stone for him, as you know. He placed Miss Audrey MacDougal under the Imperius Curse to do so and poisoned Mr. Weasley to remove Professor Snape from the equation.”

“He stunned me,” Hermione told him. “I woke up standing on the chessboard.”

“The one thing he did not count on was you, and those charming family heirlooms of yours,” Dumbledore concluded. “When it became clear that you would prevail, Voldemort fled Quirrell’s body, and I am sorry to confirm that he left him too badly damaged to survive. But I assure you that no blame falls on you. Clearly, it was a hard-fought battle. I confess that I feared the worst for a moment when I first found you.”

Harry just nodded, his head swimming with the revelations.

“You gave us a real scare, there, Cub,” Sirius said wearily. “Most of us were in here all day yesterday.”

Harry’s eyes snapped wide open. “Yesterday?” he said. “Isn’t today Saturday?”

“No, Harry,” his Mum said gently. “It’s Sunday. You’ve been asleep for a day and a half.”

“Aye, and you’re lucky you’re in such good shape, or it would have been a lot worse.” Harry recognised the voice of Madam Pomfrey as she hustled over to his bedside. “Whatever exercises you’re doing, keep doing them once you’re better…The boy needs his rest, now. I want visitors down to two at a time until after dinner. You can discuss what happened tonight, _if_ he’s up to it.”

Hermione got up. “I’ll let you catch up with Mum and Dad,” she said.

“Until tonight, Harry,” Dumbledore said.

“Later, Cub,” Sirius added.

“I’m glad to see you’re alright, Harry,” said Remus.

As the visitors filed out, Harry heard a matronly voice shouting, “No, I will _not_ let you give him a toilet seat!”

After that, he heard some male laughter, the sound of high fives, and Sirius saying, “Good one!”

Harry wouldn’t admit it out loud, but it was easier only dealing with two visitors at time right now. “Harry, we’re so proud of you for running out to save your sister like that,” Dad told him. “Might’ve been a better idea to go straight to Professor McGonagall yourself, but we’re proud of you just the same…So we’ve decided you’re not grounded for almost getting yourself killed.”

Harry laughed. Nervously.

* * *

“Just five minutes,” Madam Pomfrey insisted. “Family’s one thing, but I can’t be letting in all of your admirers.”

With that, Ron and Neville ran into the room.

“Harry! Are you okay, mate?” Ron said. “The whole school’s talking—”

“Hermione told us what happened.” Neville said. “I can’t believe you did all that.”

“The three-headed dog and everything!” Ron added.

“I had to do it,” Harry said. “What happened with you?”

“Not much,” Ron said. He sounded a little disappointed. “We found McGonagall. She started to take a bunch of points, but we told her what happened, and she freaked out and ran off to send a message to Dumbledore.”

“She told us to go back to bed, but we said we wanted to stay up until we knew you and Hermione were okay,” Neville added.

Harry smiled: “Thanks, guys—for everything.”

“No problem,” Ron said. “Just wait till I tell Ginny I helped save Harry Potter. So, are you still playing the Quidditch final on Saturday?”

Harry’s eyes widened. He’d forgotten all about that. “I don’t know. I hope so.”

“You’d better. We’ll get flattened without you.”

Neville looked on awkwardly. “I’m just glad you and Hermione are okay, Harry,” he said.

“Yeah, me too,” Harry agreed.

* * *

Throughout the course of the afternoon, Harry was brought up to date on recent events. Dumbledore had succeeded in postponing the vote on the Muggle Protection Act until next month, though with difficulty. He had offered to stay with Harry yesterday so that he would be there when he woke up, but Hermione had vetoed that at once, saying, “Harry would want you to go down there and get that work done.” Harry was expected to be released from the Hospital Wing tomorrow, but he would be excused from his exams and allowed to make them up on Friday, and, if he behaved himself, there should be no trouble with playing in the Quidditch final on Saturday.

Percy was released later that afternoon, on Dumbledore’s recommendation. This was against Madam Pomfrey’s better judgement, but he was so agitated about his O.W.L. Exams already that he was better off just getting on with it. However, Harry suspected it was really so that they could speak without being overheard.

By the time dinner came around, Harry was feeling much better, which was good, because he had a lot of questions for Dumbledore about this whole thing. He lay back on his pillow, his eyes closed, as his family filed in.

“Harry, are you awake?” Emma asked. He opened his eyes halfway and turned toward her.

“How are you feeling, Harry?” Hermione asked.

“I don’t want to go on the cart,” he groaned.

Hermione slapped him lightly on the arm. “He’s fine,” she admonished.

“Alright, Harry,” Dan said. “We know Hermione’s side of the story, but we’d like to hear what happened to you, if you’re up to it.”

Harry nodded and began to tell them how he was worried about the Stone and was watching the Marauder’s Map for any funny business. (Sirius and Remus had been a little uncomfortable about revealing the Map’s existence to Dumbledore, but they decided that since he already knew about the cloak and had given it to Harry personally, it didn’t make much difference.) Harry then explained how he had taken off running when he saw Quirrell take Hermione and sent Ron and Neville for help, how he had followed invisibly through all the traps, and finally, the fight at the Mirror. Even though they’d heard most of it already, his family still looked horrified as he described it, although Hermione squealed with excitement and hugged him again when he told her he’d finally cast the Bluebell Flames wandlessly.

Then, when no one seemed to have anything to add that hadn’t already been said, he concluded with, “But, Professor, I had some questions,” to Dumbledore.

“That is quite understandable,” the old wizard replied. “And I will do my best to answer them. There may be some that I cannot, but I shall not, of course, lie.”

Harry quirked an eyebrow at that briefly and said, “What’s going to happen to the Philosopher’s Stone?”

Dumbledore smiled a little more. “Nicolas and Perenelle have taken it back to their unplottable manor. I have left it for them to decide what to do with it. However, after nearly seven hundred years, I believe it has been weighing more heavily on them of late, and they have been considering setting their affairs in order for some time.” A look of shock crossed Harry’s and Hermione’s (and Sirius’s) faces. “But do not worry for them, children, for after all, to the well-organised mind, death is but the next great adventure.”

“Okay,” Harry said sceptically and moved on. “Um, sir…down in that chamber…Voldemort said he came to kill _me_ when I was a baby—not my parents. Why was he after me instead of them?” Dan and Emma raised their eyebrows.

“Alas, Harry, this I cannot tell you,” Dumbledore said. “You will know one day, but not today, not now.”

“Excuse me,” Dan interrupted. “Why can’t you just tell him?”

“He is too young for such a burden, Mr. Granger.”

“I thought we agreed that he should be as prepared as possible.”

“Mr. Granger, there are times when the risks of such information outweigh the benefits.”

“No, he’s right, Albus,” Sirius countered. “If you won’t tell him, I will. I should have told him months ago.”

“Tell me what?” Harry said.

Dumbledore sighed. He had been hoping it wouldn’t come to this. Even with his agreement to be open with his information, this was too much—too dangerous. He would certainly not be able to tell the boy the whole thing. On the other hand, the boy _was_ discreet. And the half that Voldemort already knew couldn’t cause any more harm if it were kept to the family…he hoped.

“Very well. The truth, Harry, is that before you were born…there was a prophecy made concerning you.”

“A prophecy?”

“Yes. It was our own Sybill Trelawny who made it.” Dumbledore held up a hand. “I know her reputation is known even to the first-years, but this was a genuine prophecy, quite possibly the only one she has ever made. She fell into a trance and spoke in a voice not her own, remembering nothing afterwards, the hallmark of a true prophecy. She prophesied that _you_ , Harry, would have the power to vanquish Voldemort.”

“What!” Dan, Emma, and Hermione shouted.

“You mean he’s actually going to _have_ to face Voldemort someday?” Emma demanded.

“And you didn’t mention that before?” Dan added.

“It made no difference,” Dumbledore defended himself. “I warned you that Voldemort would pursue Harry if he ever returned. The reason for his actions is immaterial.”

“Yes, but it would have been nice to know we had to prepare him for…for _that_ , not just self-defence,” Dan argued. “You’re basically saying that Harry’s been…been drafted or something.”

“The prophecy is beyond all of our control, Mr. Granger. However, I can understand your concerns. Unfortunately, prophecies are an uncertain thing. It may not be fulfilled for many years, or even never, but it the important thing is that it _could_ be. Harry could one day possess the power to vanquish Voldemort. And, more to the point, Voldemort believes this and so regards Harry as the gravest of threats.”

Harry let out a feline-sounding whine.

“So now we know why…” Dan grumbled as he held Emma’s trembling hands, “Well, have you got any other tidbits we should know about?”

Dumbledore hesitated. “Nothing that I can confirm at the moment,” he said cagily. “I will, of course, keep you informed, as I have done.”

“Sir, what does the prophecy actually say?” Harry asked timidly.

“I am sorry, Harry. That I truly cannot tell you—no, I swear to you that I _cannot_ tell you more. The details of the prophecy are far too dangerous. I never even told your birth parents the exact words. Someday, I will tell you, but you must learn to guard your mind first. There are those who can pull secrets directly from your mind unless you are trained to block them, and Voldemort is most accomplished at the art.”

“You want Harry to learn Occlumency?” Sirius asked

Dumbledore hesitated again, but he said, “Yes. I had not thought he would need to start so early, but I think that would be for the best.”

“Occlumency?” Harry asked.

“The art of guarding one’s mind against Legilimency,” Remus said. “What you might call “mind-reading,” although that’s a crude way of putting it. Sirius and I are decent at it. We could teach you the basics, but we’ve never had a Legilimens to teach us properly.”

“Will you be teaching him, Albus?” Sirius asked.

“No, Sirius, there is too much risk, given my own secrets. However, I believe I could persuade Severus to do it.”

“No! No way!” Sirius barked. “I’m not letting Snape in my godson’s head.”

Dumbledore jerked back slightly. “Harry—?” he appealed to the boy.

“I…I’d rather not do that, either, Professor,” he said. He didn’t dislike Snape as much as Sirius did, but he still didn’t want him reading his mind.

“I’m Harry’s magical guardian, and I won’t allow Snape to teach him Occlumency unless it becomes an emergency,” Sirius said. “I’ll make some enquiries at the DMLE for an instructor. I can probably find one by this fall.”

“Can I learn it, too?” Hermione asked.

Sirius stopped. “You…? Are you sure, Kitten?”

She nodded. “If it’s that secret, I don’t want to be left out.”

“Alright. If it’s fine with Dan and Emma, I’ll put you down for it, too.”

After that, Harry sat silently for a while instead of asking the next question he had planned. He was prophesied to defeat Voldemort. In fact, he’d already done it twice, after a fashion—once seemingly by accident, and this time by…

“Professor, why couldn’t Quirrell touch me?” he asked.

Dumbledore gave him another small smile. “Your birth mother died for you, Harry. Not just dying whilst trying to save you. I believe, though I cannot confirm it, that because Voldemort came for you and not for her, she made a deliberate choice, in advance, to die in your place. That is old magic—magic that Voldemort dismissed, to his ruin. To his eyes, it would have been a positively irrational choice, because the one thing he cannot understand is love, but in truth, it was agony for him to touch a person marked by something so good.”

Harry began to cry openly. He put his legs under him and pitched forward on all fours, stretching out his back and quivering as he was overcome with emotion. Suddenly, he looked up at Dumbledore. “Professor,” he said, “is Madam Pomfrey coming back anytime soon? I think I need a few minutes…” He gave a very cat-like shake of his head.

Dumbledore nodded in understanding and waved his wand in a pattern that Harry didn’t recognise: “I think I can give you some privacy for the time being.”

“Thank you, sir.” Harry at once transformed into Ratsbane and flopped down wearily on the bed. Emma reached over and stroked his fur.

In cat form, he could calm down somewhat and think more clearly. He didn’t have the words to describe his feelings about his mother’s sacrifice. He was loved—more than he ever knew—and protected more than he could have imagined. And as he lay there under the gentle caress of his adoptive mother’s fingers, he reflected that he had perhaps never fully appreciated—or at least not since he was very little—how lucky he was to have two families who loved him so dearly. He could smell her love for him—whiskers and all—and the deep affection from each of his other family members, and even Dumbledore, that pervaded the air.

Harry lay there basking in the feeling for quite a bit longer than a few minutes. He began purring before long, to Sirius’s and Remus’s infinite amusement. Finally, he allowed himself to think back on everything that had happened since—ages ago, it seemed—he first spotted Hermione with Quirrell on the Marauder’s Map. Quirrell and bloody Voldemort.

He shifted back to human form instantly, accidentally clawing the sheets in the process. “Professor, how the hell did you manage to hire _Voldemort_ to teach Defence?” he demanded.

There were sniggers from Remus and Sirius, and Hermione muttered, “Language, Harry.”

“That’s what I said,” Dan told him.

“And what I said, though I think I said it more colourfully,” Sirius added. “And I still can’t see how you didn’t know, Albus. Why else did you shift Quirrell onto Defence if not to get rid of him?”

“As I told you yesterday,” Dumbledore replied stiffly, “I suspected that Quirrell was working for Voldemort from the moment he returned to Britain, but I had no reason to believe he was possessed until after the term started.”

 _To get rid of him_ , Harry thought. _But what was the whole business with the Stone, then?_ “But sir,” he said. “You said the protections around the Philosopher’s Stone were supposed to be a trap. Were you actually trying to trap Voldemort inside Hogwarts?”

Dumbledore suddenly began to look very nervous, likely because everyone else in the room was glaring at him. “That was one possibility, I admit,” he said. “However, at the time, I thought it a slim one. I did not think that Voldemort would dare to enter Hogwarts himself in his weakened state while I was present. I was initially hoping that Quirrell would lead me to him.”

“But that changed,” Harry observed.

“I concluded that the trap would work just as well on Voldemort himself if he was, indeed, possessing Quirrell,” the Headmaster defended himself. “He was weakened, and he would not risk his chance to get the Stone by harming anyone else. And, of course, he could not possibly have got the Stone from the Mirror.”

“Except he nearly did.”

“Yes,” Dumbledore sighed. He looked at Hermione. “There was a loophole in my plan. Quirrell chose a student who cares more for knowledge than wealth or long life, one whose greatest earthly desire is to earn a Doctor of Wizardry.”

The children tensed up. “How did you know about that, Professor?” Hermione gasped.

“A Supersensory Charm, of course,” the Headmaster smiled.

“Um, sorry, what’s going on?” Emma said.

Reluctantly, the children told Dan and Emma of their nighttime excursion in which they first found the Mirror. They weren’t pleased, but they hugged the children again when they heard what they saw in the Mirror.

“But what about the other traps, then?” Harry asked as a growing realisation came upon him.

“What do you mean, Harry?”

“It’s all just too neat. Hagrid let slip how to get past Fluffy. You let me figure out how the Mirror worked. Neville’s good at Herbology. I could fly to catch the key. Ron’s good at chess. The troll was Quirrell’s idea and not really that hard to beat. And if the potions were a logic puzzle, like it sounds, that would have been Hermione’s strength.”

“Harry, what are you saying?” Emma asked worriedly.

“Well, think about it, Mum, he let Hagrid tell me about the Stone. He gave me the cloak. He tailored the traps to my friends’ and my skills…” He rounded on Dumbledore: “You really _were_ planning for me to go after the Stone, weren’t you?”

“You didn’t!” Dan said sharply. But Dumbledore’s uneasy silence was all the proof they needed. “You did!”

Everyone started shouting at once, and no one could make out exactly what was being said, but it was all filled with expressions of disbelief and anger that the old man would do something so stupid. The oil lamp on the bedside table flared, and the candy and gifts and small items on the table rattled in response to the children’s uncontrolled magic.

“How could you possibly think that was a good idea?” Sirius was the loudest of the group, and he was on his feet, looking as if he had half a mind to tear Dumbledore’s throat out as Padfoot.

“If I may…” Dumbledore looked downcast. “My second plan, which I later abandoned,” he emphasised, “was to lead Harry to the Stone with the clues and tools I gave him, in the hopes that he could end the threat of Voldemort permanently. But I certainly did not undertake this plan without careful consideration, and I had every confidence that both he and his friends would not be seriously harmed.”

“But how could you possibly know that, Albus?” Remus demanded. By now, he was on his feet, too, holding Sirius back.

“The tiny potion bottle!” Hermione burst out. All eyes turned to her. “You set things up so that Harry would have to face Quirrell alone, because…because he’s the only one who has his mother’s protection!”

Harry’s mouth dropped open. There were times (rare ones) when he could forget just how brilliant his sister was. “So that was your big plan, then?” he deliberately flared his magic into the room intimidatingly. The loose items around him rattled again. Sirius and Remus stepped back in surprise that he could make a controlled display like that, and Dan and Emma, to their astonishment, could feel an electric twinge of energy bounce off their charmed necklaces. “Force a confrontation between me and Voldemort while he was weakened and hope it would finish him off for good?” Harry said. “Why would you—?” It dawned on him a split second after it hit Hermione. “Because of the prophecy!” they said in unison.

Silence reigned. Sirius and Remus didn’t seem to know how to respond to that. Even they had to admit it was a brilliant plan, even though they vehemently disagreed with it.

“So let me get this straight,” Dan said once he thought he understood. “You were basically trying to trick our son into facing down the most evil and dangerous terrorist this side of the former Iron Curtain. You believed he was capable of defeating him because of this prophecy, and you believed Harry would be alright because of his mother’s protection. You believed those things strongly enough to gamble his life on it?”

Dumbledore took a deep breath and resolutely answered, “I did.”

Sirius and Remus both growled at him softly. Harry hissed.

“Well, there was a problem with your plan,” Dan grumbled.

A little to the family’s surprise, Dumbledore nodded in agreement: “Several problems, in fact.”

“Yeah, like the fact that I’m bloody eleven,” Harry burst out. The glass of water on the bedside table shattered. “Sorry,” he murmured. He reached out his hand.

“No, I’ve got it, Harry,” Hermione said soothingly. She waved her hand and levitated the pieces of the glass back onto the table and reassembled them.

“Honestly, Dumbledore, how could you think of sending a child into that kind of situation?” Emma scolded.

The old man hung his head. “As I said, it was a mistake. When you came so close to the truth two months ago, Harry, I realised that the plan was ill-advised and abandoned it. I then hoped to merely capture Quirrell and then beg your assistance in dealing with him afterwards.”

“Uh huh,” said Harry, sounding unconvinced. “Well, we see how _that_ went. Did it at least _work_?”

Dumbledore sighed and responded, “No. Professor Snape’s Dark Mark remains. It would vanish if Voldemort had truly died. It would seem that he has more means of preserving his life than I had hoped.”

At that, Sirius and Remus suddenly quailed and sat down with expressions of abject horror.

“What is it?” Harry said.

Remus just shook his head. “Occlumency,” he muttered. “Some things are better left unsaid.”

Harry grew more subdued, but he still hissed again softly as he turned back to Dumbledore: “So it didn’t even work. And either way, it’s the same problem. If I have to face Voldemort someday—if I have to…” His voice faltered. “If I have to _kill_ him…” He quailed at the thought. “Or catch him, or—what did you say? ‘Vanquish’ him—? I want to be a hell of a lot more ready than I am now before I do it.”

“And so do we,” Dan said.

“I understand,” Dumbledore replied. “I do. However, I must warn you that you may not have that luxury. Voldemort will continue to try to come back, and he will continue to try to come after you. And he will learn. Your mother’s protection will not save you from less direct methods of attack. I am aware that you are young—painfully aware of that fact. A prophecy such as this is a terrible burden to bear at any age, must less as a first-year student. But given the circumstances, I was forced to conclude that this was one of the best possible opportunities to finish it, and I thought that since you have shown yourself to be quite capable…well…”

“What?” Harry said. “You thought I had the right to face Voldemort if I could? Are you mental? In case you’ve forgotten, your little plan nearly killed me!” The glass shattered again, this time into dust. (The Mending Charm never left things _quite_ as good as new.) The bedside table, the chairs (especially Dumbledore’s), and even the bed itself began to shift and creak, and the air in the room swirled violently. Sirius and Remus shrank back in awe of the uncontrolled magic.

“Please calm yourself Harry, or you will exhaust yourself, and Madam Pomfrey will not take kindly to that,” Dumbledore chastised him. The hum of magic slowly subsided. Harry suddenly felt lightheaded and slumped back onto the bed. “You misunderstand,” he continued. “My ultimate plan failed not because I underestimated Voldemort, but because I underestimated _you_.”

Harry blinked a few times, and so did the rest of his family. “Huh?”

“I knew what you had seen in the Mirror of Erised. You saw your families—both of them—together and whole—the one thing that is truly missing from your life. I was confident that you would see the same thing in the Mirror again, and the Stone would be safe. Instead, you saw the key to removing the Philosopher’s Stone: not desiring to use it, but only taking it to save your sister and stop Voldemort. I don’t think you realise how few wizards could have seen what you saw in that Mirror.” He paused to let this sink in. “While Lily’s protection would have saved you from Quirrell’s attack, you fought back, and it was the effort involved in keeping the Stone from him that nearly killed you.”

Harry was silent. He supposed he should be flattered, but he wasn’t feeling it.

“I can’t believe you would do this to us after all these years,” Emma bit at Dumbledore in a tone that Harry thought, had it been directed at him, would be nearly as terrifying as Quirrell-mort. “You used your friend, you used our children, and it sounds like you tried to use a couple of other children and teachers, too. And if that was your idea of a smart plan, I have to wonder if maybe at a hundred and ten, you’re getting too old for this.” That one looked like it really hurt. “It was sheer dumb luck that no one was killed.”

Dumbledore met her eyes with difficulty and said, “You are right, of course, Mrs. Granger. In my zeal to end the threat of Voldemort, I allowed myself to become too single-minded and failed to give adequate attention to the safety of others. If I could go back and do it again, I would keep the entire plan far more separate from the student body and your family in particular.”

“I should certainly hope so,” Emma said.

But Dan wasn’t finished, yet. “Say, Sirius, Remus,” he said, “we haven’t really planned our summer holiday, yet. The French school—Beauxbatons, right? Is there a magical village there we could visit?”

Harry and Hermione were surprised, and Sirius looked scandalised, but Remus didn’t miss Dumbledore starting to sweat and caught on: “There is, Dan. It’s called Baton Vert—my parents considered sending me to Beauxbatons for my schooling. You can connect to it from the magical district of Paris. I can help you make some bookings.”

“If you are thinking of—” Dumbledore started.

“We’re just keeping our options open,” Dan said with a sly grin. “I think we have more than enough reason to reevaluate the education our children are getting.”

“I understand, but—”

Before the Headmaster could finish, Emma laid down the law: “Dumbledore, when we adopted Harry, you agreed to be open with us, and you haven’t been. You said you had learnt from your mistakes, and right now, it doesn’t look like you have. So you’d better straighten up from now on, regardless of where we go, and if you want to even consider such an insane plan as this again, you’d better consult us first.”

Dumbledore decided that moment that if you put Emma Granger’s hair in a bun, you would have a twenty-years-younger Minerva. “Mrs. Granger, I deeply apologise,” he replied. “I apologise to all of you. I have made many mistakes in this past year, but I see now that given Harry’s destiny, it is important to keep you fully involved and informed rather than trying to protect your children from the truth. I promise you that you will have my full confidence from now on, barring that which must be protected with Occlumency.”

Dan and Emma nodded sternly. Dumbledore had no doubt they would hold him to that. “Now, it has been a difficult day,” he concluded. “I think Harry will need his rest, and the rest of us, as well. If there is nothing else, I shall leave you to it for the evening. I believe there will be no harm in leaving the privacy charms up for another hour.” He looked pointedly at Harry.

The Grangers decided they’d all had enough for one day and waved him off. Harry changed back to Ratsbane and meowed with relief.

“A cat,” Sirius said as Hermione scratched Harry behind his ears. “Of all the things…”

“Sirius,” Emma asked, ever the practical one, “can muggles learn Occlumency?”

Sirius blinked in surprise. “Can muggles learn…” he wondered aloud. “No idea. I don’t know enough about mind magic…can’t hurt to try, though.”

“Then could you see if you can find an instructor for all four of us?”

“I can try, Emma. It won’t be easy, but galleons talk louder than words.”

“Good.”

“Dad…you don’t really want us to leave Hogwarts, do you?” Hermione asked her father nervously. Harry meowed in her apparent support.

“Probably not—” Dan replied. “Not if Dumbledore learns his lesson, certainly. But he doesn’t need to know that.”


	41. The Muggle Protection Act

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: If you strike Harry Potter down, JK Rowling shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.

_Dear Father and Mother,_

_I_ _’m sure you have been informed by now of Professor Quirrell’s death. I don’t know how much Dumbledore told the board, but according the rumours here, Quirrell kidnapped Potter’s sister and took her into some hidden chamber under the school. Then, Potter followed them, and there was some kind of confrontation that left Quirrell dead and Potter in the Hospital Wing for two days. They’re keeping very tight-lipped about how it happened, and they’re trying to make it sound like Quirrell got mauled by the three-headed dog, but I’m not convinced of that story. I don’t think either Potter or Granger has it in them to kill, but something doesn’t smell right._

_However, the most important thing is that Potter and Granger seem to have had a major falling-out with Dumbledore after the incident, but they_ _’re not talking about that, either; Potter will only say that it’s a private matter. Most people think it’s sour grapes just because Dumbledore let him get hurt, but I’m not convinced of that, either. I’ve heard rumours that Dumbledore tried to trick Potter into that fight somehow or maybe even put him in that situation in the first place. Whatever it was, it was bad enough that I’ve personally seen Potter glaring at Dumbledore during dinner. I think Dumbledore’s looked a little less “energetic” this week, too._

_Potter_ _’s attitude toward the other teachers doesn’t seem to have changed, even for McGonagall. And it’s hard to tell, but I don’t think McGonagall looks happy with Dumbledore right now, either. I think you may be right that Dumbledore has lost influence among his own followers. If I may, I would suggest that putting increased pressure on Dumbledore to disillusion his supporters would be the best course of action for the next month._

_Your loving son,_

_Draco_

* * *

_Our beloved son,_

_This is excellent news, and most welcome. The Muggle Protection Act hangs by a thread, and its keystone is now under fire. The whispers have, indeed, reached beyond the walls of Hogwarts, and with this information, your father can feel confident in acting upon them. The unfortunate downside of this will be that it will weaken the old meddler_ _’s defence of Professor Snape. However, we are investigating a compromise with the Board of Governors that should see him returning next year with minimal difficulty. We consider this a small price to pay for our larger goal. Next month, we_ _ will _ _prevail._

_However, we must give you a stern warning. Your father has heard the most alarming rumours regarding the circumstances of Quirrell_ _’s death. The less you know about them, the better, at least until the end of term. Tread very carefully around the subject of Quirrell’s death, both within and without Slytherin house, but if you do learn anything concrete, inform us at once._

_Continue to watch Potter and Dumbledore for any changes._

_Father and Mother_

* * *

“Okay, men—and women—this is it. _Silencio_!” Oliver Wood silenced Fred and George before they could step on his speech.

Harry’s exams had gone well, he thought, despite his revising being disrupted. Indeed, Hermione had been a good deal more stressed about them than he was, as usual.

“The big one. The one we’ve all been waiting for. This is for all the Gobstones.”

It was an open secret by now that Dumbledore had done something to make Harry pretty mad, though only Hermione, Ron, and Neville knew the true extent of it. There wasn’t much he could do about that, though. He’d have to just take whatever happened as it came. On the bright side, Malfoy hadn’t given him any trouble about it. A few people were convinced that Harry was a dark wizard and had killed Quirrell for daring to touch his sister, but given how badly he was hurt himself, most people chose to believe that Quirrell was eaten by Fluffy, and whatever else had happened down there was either Quirrell’s fault or Dumbledore’s (or both).

“Win the game by fifty points, and we win the Quidditch Cup,” Wood continued. “Win by a hundred and thirty, and we win the House Cup. Potter, I’m counting on you. Don’t go for the Snitch if we’re down by more than twenty, got it?”

“Yeah, I got it,” Harry said. He rolled his eyes behind Wood’s back. Wood had been telling him that incessantly for days. Gryffindor was down by forty points against Slytherin the House Cup standings. The winning team in each Quidditch match received one third of the spread in house points, so while the Quidditch Cup would be a fairly easy win, they needed a sizable win to take the House Cup as well.

“This is the best team Gryffindor’s had in years, and I know we’ve got this in the bag. It’s time. Good luck, all of you.”

The two teams lined up on the pitch, and Harry smiled and waved, to the roar of the crowd. This time, at least, he didn’t have to worry about getting hexed off his broom. It was time for a _real_ Quidditch match. At the sound of the whistle, he kicked into the air, and at once, he felt more free than he had in months.

Winning by a hundred and thirty points wasn’t particularly difficult, but it did mean that the Chaser Squad had to be on their game. Angelina, Alicia, and Katie were good, but Ravenclaw’s Chaser squad was the best in the school. Harry weaved back and forth across the pitch as the points racked up, one team taking the lead, and then the other. Despite being annoyed with Wood, he knew full well how delicate this was. He not only had to catch the Snitch before the Ravenclaw Seeker, he would have to keep both himself and the Ravenclaw Seeker away from it if even Gryffindor was down by more than twenty points.

At one point, Gryffindor was, indeed, down by thirty, then forty, then fifty. It looked like the Chasers had slipped up. Slytherin was in line to win the House Cup for seventh straight year, and now, Harry had to start worrying about that one hundred point deficit that would lose them the Quidditch Cup, too. But just as he started to lose hope, Angelina took the lead and ploughed through Ravenclaw’s defence with the determination Wood had drilled into all of them, and she scored three goals in quick succession. The crowd roared in triumph, including Hufflepuff and even a few of the Ravenclaws, they were so eager to see Slytherin dethroned.

Now, with the score standing at one hundred thirty to one hundred ten, Harry saw it: a flutter of gold barely visible against the yellow Hufflepuff section of the stands. With the points now in line, he gave chase at once, and the Ravenclaw Seeker was hot on his tail. But Harry had a better broom and was a good enough flier to use it, and when his hand closed around the Snitch, it wasn’t even close. The stands erupted into deafening cheers from Gryffindor and Hufflepuff, and the Gryffindor section took up the refrain of “Harry Potter is our king!” once more as the team zoomed towards the staff box.

The most dangerous part of that match for Harry turned out to be when Oliver Wood, sobbing with joy, hugged him in midair and nearly made both of them topple off their brooms. When they reached the staff box, Wood took the Quidditch Cup from Dumbledore, tears still streaming down his face and had him and Harry hold it up together, to another roar from the crowd. After so many years of Slytherin wins, even the Ravenclaws were taking it pretty well, and Professor McGonagall was actually crying harder than Wood. Harry was so happy that he couldn’t give Dumbledore anything less than a broad smile as the old man patted his shoulder and said, “Good flying, Harry.” He only caught a glimpse of Snape, sitting in the back corner of the box, looking most displeased, but even he gave Harry a small, grudging nod, as if acknowledging that he had at least won fair and square.

* * *

The rest of the term passed in a happy blur. The House Cup was awarded to Gryffindor, and the exam results came out, with Hermione being first in the class, like everyone expected, and Harry third, behind Anthony Goldstein. Ron and Neville only got by with average, but they were both happy with what they got. Soon, the trunks were packed, Neville found his toad again, and they sailed back across the Lake to Hogsmeade Station, feeling the wards of castle wash across them one more time.

“D’you think you three can visit our house sometime this summer?” Ron said to Harry, Hermione, and Neville as they rode the train back.

“Probably,” Neville said. “Gran says you can stop by sometime, too.”

“We’ll try,” Hermione told them. “We’re gonna be pretty busy, though. We’re going to France in August, and we still have the Wizengamot meeting next weekend to worry about.”

“Oh, right,” Ron said. “We’ll all be there, too, for Dad. You think they’ll finally pass it this time?”

“I hope so,” Harry said. “I’m gonna do whatever I can to make it happen.”

When they reached London, Hermione and Harry said goodbye to Ron’s family (Ginny squeaked, turned bright red, and hid behind her mother’s robes when she saw Harry) and briefly met with Neville’s grandmother before their parents took them home for what was sure to be an eventful summer.

* * *

The first order of business was, indeed, the Wizengamot meeting. The one dark cloud over the end of the term had been the continuing articles speaking out against the Muggle Protection Act and its champion, Albus Dumbledore. The fallout from the revelation of Harry’s abuse was continuing, and the _Daily Prophet_ (though it still printed letters in support) was trying to paint Dumbledore as a senile old man who saw muggles through rose-coloured glasses and wasn’t able to keep them appropriately in line as guardians for the Boy-Who-Lived. Harry’s more recent “grudge” against Dumbledore was tied into that, even though he had said it had nothing to do with it.

The Grangers and Tonkses worked together on a speech for Harry to give on the anticipated second day of the meeting, even as Andromeda and Sirius frantically tried to round up votes. They were behind now, and a lot of their sure votes weren’t so sure anymore. It was definitely going to be a close one.

Before they knew it, the big day came. The Grangers arrived in the Wizengamot Chamber wearing their best clothes and sat in the visitors’ area near the liberal members. The Chamber was nearly as crowded as it had been for Sirius’s trial, and Harry spotted many more school-aged children in the audience with their parents, including several muggle-born students. To his surprise, he also saw Professor Snape.

Dumbledore called the meeting to order and got the usual housekeeping business out of the way first before bringing up the Muggle Protection Act. This took several hours, and was thoroughly uninteresting, but Andromeda assured them that even here, the horse-trading was still going on.

However, there was one event that threw the Chamber for a loop. It happened when Amelia Bones rose and said, “Ladies and Gentleman, I would again like to raise the issue that has been playing out in the press for the past few weeks: the quality of Potions instruction at Hogwarts.” Many eyes turned to Professor Snape, who glowered but resolutely refused to move a muscle. “I’m well aware that Hogwarts is and always has remained independent from the Ministry, Chief Warlock, but it seems clear that the public opinion is that something needs to be done, and I apologise if I’m out of order, but I, for one, would like to know what is being done to improve the situation.” A large swath of the audience broke into applause at that.

Dumbledore faced Bones and said as calmly as he could, “The situation is being investigated, Madam Bones. I am confident that we can reach a satisfactory resolution before the fall term.”

“Actually, Chief Warlock, I have an announcement to make on that point.” Dumbledore slowly turned and recognised Lucius Malfoy. “The Hogwarts Board of Governors has met with Professor Snape, the Potions Master of Hogwarts, and other interested parties, and in response to these discussions, the Board has now approved a new policy for this fall, based on best practises studies: henceforth, all classes at Hogwarts will accept students who receive and Exceeds Expectations on their O.W.L. exam to N.E.W.T. level.”

A large block of people in Malfoy’s corner of the room applauded mechanically, while some applause and some demands for more action were spouted from other parts of the room. One girl who had obvious just sat her O.W.L.s was jumping up and down screaming, “Yes! Yes! Yes!” Harry and Hermione, and even more so Remus and Sirius, were gobsmacked. They couldn’t have imagined Snape loosening his grip on the Potions classes like that. Indeed, while Snape stood and nodded his apparent approval of the measure, clearly trying to make it look like he was the reasonable one in this situation, his expression looked like he accepted the deal only grudgingly.

Dumbledore looked disappointed. It was obvious that Malfoy had timed this move just to score points today, but he couldn’t very well say anything about it. After all, he still needed to keep Snape around. He had no recourse but to move on to the Muggle Protection Act, and this time, the debate was not going well. Many of the conservatives cast aspersions on Dumbledore, on the bill’s supporters, on Harry’s mental stability, and so on. Some of them became quite vehement about the supposed moral failings of muggles—that they were violent, stupid, licentious, and jealous of magic, for starters. But it was Charles Nott, as he spoke near the end of the day, who most grated on Harry’s nerves.

“The wizarding world is under a continually growing threat from the sheer weight of numbers of the muggles,” the angry wizard bellowed. “Their uncontrolled population growth forces witches wizards further and further into the dark corners of the world and threatens to destabilise all of civilisation. They cannot control themselves and cannot even treat their own children properly. Their filthy industrial complex dirties the air and water for muggles and magicals alike. They scratch out a living by burning titanic amounts of coal to fuel their feeble powers of eckeltricity without the simplest of Smoke-Clearing Charms. When I say the muggles are a plague on the face of the Earth, witches and wizards, it is not an insult. It is the truth that the muggles’ own scholars have been repeating for years, to no avail.

“Are we so worried about the occasional hexing of muggles by wizards when they are already so adept at maiming and killing each other with reckless abandon? When we have lived for forty years under the threat of a muggle nuclear war that would utterly destroy the wizarding world as well as their own? Are we so worried about protecting them from us when it is half by sheer dumb luck that we can protect ourselves from them? I ask you, _where_ are our priorities in this day and age?

“Witches and wizards, I, along with Lord Malfoy, Lord Jugson, and others, have long called for a firmer separation from the muggle world—to separate ourselves to make it easier to deflect attacks, witting or not, from muggle quarters. Instead, the mad desire of many in our nation seems to be integration! A few words of support, and these _creatures_ are freely permitted to enter the hallowed halls of the Wizengamot itself. Lords and Ladies of the Wizengamot, I call on all of you to put aside this madness and focus your energy where it truly belongs: on protecting our own world and making it strong enough to withstand the barbarians that are even now slipping past the gates. I yield the floor.”

It was a brilliant bit of spin, focusing on the real dangers of the muggle world and surprisingly well-versed in muggle environmentalism and geopolitics. Slytherins weren’t stupid, after all. But Charles Nott had made one mistake—possibly no more than a slip of the tongue—and Harry Potter just couldn’t take it anymore. He sprang to his feet and called out, “Chief Warlock, I would like to speak.”

“Of course, Lord Potter,” Dumbledore said.

Andromeda and Sirius both looked very nervous as they met Harry’s eyes. He was supposed to give his speech tomorrow, right before the vote, when it would have the greatest impact. But then again, after Nott’s tirade, maybe now was the best time.

“I don’t appreciate my parents being referred to as something less than human!” Harry spat. “And yes, they are my parents. They love me as if I were their own flesh and blood, and have from practically the day we met. And I love them, too! You think muggles don’t know how to treat their kids? Just look! My parents have given me everything—a home, a sister, a chance at a normal life that I never thought I could have—”

Harry stopped and collected himself from that rant, then launched into his speech proper: “Over the past month, you have heard stories about my horrible treatment at the hands of muggles. I would like to say right now that those stories…are true.” There were scattered gasps from around the room. Harry drew on his feline indifference to stay calm as he repeated his story: “My muggle aunt and uncle kept me in a cupboard. It was my bedroom from the age of fifteen months to the age of five years. For four years, I was chronically underfed, made to wear my fat muggle cousin’s cast-offs, called ‘boy’ or ‘freak’ more often than my own name, sometimes locked in my cupboard for extended periods, punished for things I didn’t do, or for no reason at all, overworked with chores when I was old enough, routinely pounded on by my cousin, with my aunt and uncle’s encouragement, and twice was much more severely beaten by my uncle himself. Muggles did all of this.”

Most of the crowd looked appalled. Many, especially the mothers and young girls, were in tears. He saw Ginny Weasley crying into her mother’s robes as he turned to survey the hall. Several of the conservatives looked ready to spring up and respond with more anti-muggle ranting, but Harry wasn’t done yet.

“What those stories haven’t told you,” he continued, “is everything else that muggles have done for me. Six years ago, two muggles, who are here with me today, took one look at me and immediately brought me into their home, wrapped me in a blanket, and gave me my first proper meal in weeks. They had never heard of magic, much less the name “Harry Potter.” They didn’t see a wizard that day, and these past six years are proof that it wouldn’t have mattered if they had. All they saw was a scared, hungry, dirty, lonely, abused, and, frankly, terrified little boy, and they did what any decent human being would have done in that situation: they brought me into their home and made feel safe and cared for the first time in my life.

“It was muggles who, within half an hour of meeting me, reported my relatives to the authorities. It was those muggle authorities who, within an hour of finding out, arrested my aunt and uncle and made sure I would never have to see them again. It was muggles who, in that first afternoon, whilst still reeling from the shock of learning about magic for the first time _and_ finding out that they had a witch for a daughter, fed me, cleaned me up, and dressed me in properly fitting clothes for the first time in four years. It was muggles who, after knowing me for all of one day, decided that they wanted to adopt me as their son, at no small risk to themselves.” And here, Harry teared up and struggled to choke the words out. “To a boy who had suffered like I had, who had never known anything but neglect or worse, that was the greatest gift anyone could possibly have given me—to know that I was wanted and loved, no matter how messed-up or freakish I was.”

He took his glasses off and wiped his eyes on his sleeve. He was pleased to see that there were more even people crying now than before.

“It was muggles who, within a matter of weeks, tried and convicted my aunt and uncle for child abuse and neglect and shipped them off to prisons where they remain to this day. It was muggles who helped me to catch up on the school I had missed. It was muggles who gave me Christmas presents and birthday presents for the first time I can remember. It was muggle children who befriended me when I was just some scrawny, shy, and kind of weird new kid, not knowing I was either famous or magical—muggle children with happy and loving families. It was muggles who helped me to overcome my past—who calmed my fears, held me through the nightmares, healed the trauma that had been inflicted—which was not slight, but with their help, I _have_ overcome it—and showed me how much good there is in the world—family, friends, teachers, and mentors, all as good of people as any I have met in the magical world.

“It was also,” Harry said, gazing intensely at the moderate wing of the Wizengamot, the ones like Adrian Greengrass Sr, who cared most for tradition, “my muggle parents who reached out to my remaining cousins in the magical world so that I could grow up knowing the rest of my family, who took me to see my birth parents’ graves for the first time, and who set out to learn as much as they could about the magical world so that I—and my sister—could enter it better prepared than any other muggle-born child even has a chance to. It was my muggle parents who have supported me in everything these past six years, who have never treated me as anything but their own son and have loved me just as much as the parents I lost.

“What I mean to say is that yes, there are some bad muggles out there, but there are also bad wizards, like Voldemort.” Harry waited for the horrified screams to subside. That hadn’t been in the script, but he just couldn’t help himself. “To be sure, I was raised for four years by muggles who were incredibly cruel, but I was also raised for six years by muggles who are incredibly kind. I have found the vast majority of muggles I have known to be good people, my family first among them. They are good people just as deserving of equal rights and protections as any witch or wizard in this Chamber. If you are concerned with other issues like the traditions or safety of the magical world, fair enough, but a few long-overdue protections against muggles being cursed or mistreated do nothing against that. It is simply showing common decency towards a good and capable group of people who are, inevitably, some small part of the magical world as well. It’s the right thing to do, and I promise you that my support for the Muggle Protection Act has never wavered…I yield the floor.”

Harry slumped into his seat and sighed with relief as the hall broke out in thunderous applause. Many witches and wizards stood on their feet, teary-eyed, and a few called out, “Bravo! Bravo!” Sirius and Andromeda were two of those who were cheering the loudest. They had coached him through the speech all week, but it was entirely heartfelt, and Harry’s delivery was spot-on. Even those who opposed the Act couldn’t help but be touched by his story.

But there were still many who were not applauding. Malfoy, Nott, and many of the more conservative families in the room sat with their hands in their laps, glaring at Harry. This still wasn’t going to be easy.

But Dumbledore had things under control. “Thank you, Lord Potter,” he said, “and with that, perhaps it would be best to adjourn until the morning. Do I have a motion?” This was something of a breach of protocol for him to suggest it, but not technically against the rules.

“I move to adjourn,” Andromeda said quickly.

“I second,” Sirius jumped in.

Dumbledore called the vote, and it did, indeed, pass, though that was probably because of the late hour as much as rightness of the time. The Grangers relaxed as the crowd filed out of the hall.

“Good job, son,” Dan told Harry, and he, Emma, and Hermione all hugged him tightly.

* * *

That evening was a mixture of sitting and waiting and being dragged off by Andromeda or Sirius to glad-hand Wizengamot members and their families who wanted to meet Harry Potter for the first time. Harry and his parents had to shake a lot of hands and answer a lot of questions from politicians and from members of the public, which they did their best to answer succinctly. But through it all, Andromeda was mentally counting votes, and as the hour grew later, she pulled the Grangers aside to fill them in.

“Okay, the good news is that the public’s on your side,” she said. “Of course, they’ve been leaning that way since Christmas, but that’ll be really important for dealing with the aftermath. As for the Wizengamot, we’ve gained back the losses we sustained with that speech, thank Merlin. It all comes down to the Greengrasses, now. With their little club, they can swing the vote one way of the other. I think the speech really got to them, but Adrian Greengrass is a politician first, and he might need some pushing to commit.”

“What you mean by “pushing’?” Dan asked.

“Well, if you were watching this morning, you can see there’s an awful lot of _quid pro quo_ going on around here. Usually, it’s just that they want support for some pet project of theirs, but in this case, we have a certain one-of-a-kind item that would be particular interest to the Greengrass family—that is, if you and your family are willing to part with it, Harry.”

“What item is that?” Harry asked in confusion.

“Your portrait of Belladonna Greengrass Black.”

“Ohhh…” Harry said in recognition, remembering the eighteenth-century portrait they had moved from his bank vault.

“Isn’t that bribery?” said Hermione.

“Yes. Yes it is, but on parchment, we’ll call it a non-monetary gift, and it’ll be fine. Honestly, Lord Malfoy is much worse.”

“But is that really necessary?” Dan said in surprise.

“Well, not necessarily, but it’ll certainly help. I’ll understand if you don’t want to give up the portrait.”

“It’s not really the portrait so much. It’s just that—I’m sorry, Andi, but it’s just disgusting that the simplest human rights legislation can’t get through the Wizengamot without resorting to these underhanded tactics.”

“I know, really. Blame Malfoy and Nott for not going to Azkaban like they should have. Without them, support for their views would be a lot weaker. But the painting should be a viable option, if you’re okay with it.”

“What do you think, Harry?” Emma said.

“Well, I guess we can,” Harry said. “I mean, I don’t really know much about her.”

“Alright, well if you’re sure, then we can do it.”

“Will Melania Potter be okay with that?” Hermione asked. “I know she was sharing Belladonna’s frame.”

“I asked her, and she said it was fine,” Andi confirmed. “The Potters have always been pro-muggle, even in her time. Plus, I went and got her another frame. You can get still-lifes to replace old or damaged frames. So we’ll keep the painting as a bargaining chip. Oh—but let me do the talking on that bit. You don’t want to say the wrong word, for legal reasons. It can be a bit tricky. Come on, I’ll introduce you.”

She led the Grangers through the Wizengamot offices toward the Greengrass office, with Ted and Sirius following close behind, in part to fend off reporters. However, before they could get to their destination, they were blocked by another family that had given them more than their share of grief.

“Very impressive performance, Lord Potter,” the patriarch spoke most insincerely.

“Why thank you, Lord Nott,” Harry replied, equally insincerely. “I thought it made quite an impression.”

“Yes, well, sentimental, childish stories will do that,” Lord Nott said offhandedly. By his side, Theo sniggered at Harry.

“Hey, that was a lot more than a—!” Hermione started, but her mother held her back.

“Nobody asked you, mud—”

“That’s enough, Theodore,” Lord Nott waved his son back. Harry had started forward at that, but Emma and Hermione both stopped him. “This is about Madam _Tonks_ , not Lord Potter’s ‘family’.”

“What do you want, Lord Nott?” Andi said impatiently.

“I’m here to call you to account for what you’ve been doing here—taking advantage of an obviously emotionally-disturbed child—”

“Why you—!” Sirius lunged forward, but Ted stopped him.

“He’s baiting,” he whispered. “Don’t do it.”

“Emotionally disturbed?” Andi said with an oddly cold laugh. “Are you sure you were listening to the same speech I was?”

“You mean that obviously rehearsed speech.”

“I helped write it,” Harry protested.

“I’m sure you did, boy,” Lord Nott said patronisingly before turning back to Andi. “I weep for the next generation,” he said. “If only he had been raised by a proper wizarding family…”

But Lord Nott had said exactly the wrong thing to Harry. That insulting use of “boy” had dredged up and ancient and unpleasant memory, and he wasn’t going to stand for it. “Like you, Lord Nott?” he burst out. “You remind me of my uncle more than any other wizard I’ve met.”

“Harry!” Dan, Emma, and Hermione all whispered at once. Theo gasped. They were lucky there weren’t more witnesses. A duel with Harry involved would be the worst possible thing to have happen in this situation.

But Lord Nott didn’t bite, not yet. “So impertinent,” he said. “You’re lucky you’re underage, boy. But then that’s what I said about upbringing. You, on the other hand, Tonks. I can’t fathom where you went wrong. Perfect breeding, and yet you represent such nonsense and keep such company. And I thought you could sink no lower after you married this muggle-born like a common whore.”

“Why you—!” Ted shouted and lunged forward himself but this time, Andi held him back.

Andromeda Tonks stood up very stiff and straight, fighting to keep the fear off her face, not so much for what Charles Nott could do, but for the political risks involved. But she had to take control of the situation. She drew her wand and said with a deadly fire in her eyes, “Do you really think you can insult me so, Lord Nott? _I_ am a daughter of the House of Black. _I_ survived sixteen years under the same roof as Bellatrix Lestrange. I may be able to proudly bare my arms in public, as you do not, but if you think I can’t hold my own in a duel, you will be sorely disappointed. Now—” She levelled her wand at him. “—will you apologise?”

Sirius and Ted stopped struggling with each other and drew back in awe. Harry and Hermione could feel Andi’s magic flaring through her wand. The tip glowed a dangerous red. They knew immediately that she was not someone to cross. Lord Nott was plainly calculating very fast. Baiting someone into attacking him would work to his advantage. A formal duel would be a crapshoot.

“I apologise, Madam Tonks,” he said, in that overly formal and flowery tone that meant what he said was meant to be especially insulting. “I was out of line. Your extreme lack of loyalty to your pureblood heritage was no cause for me to cast aspersions on your virtue.”

“Thank you, Lord Nott. Now, we really must be getting to our next meeting.” And before the Notts could respond, she pulled the Grangers forward to the Greengrass office. When they were out of earshot, she said, “Phew, that was close.”

“That was amazing!” Hermione said.

“Now you see why I married her,” Ted said with a grin.

They went into the office, where they found three generations of Greengrasses: the white-haired Adrian Sr, the young and energetic Adrian Jr and Hyacinth, and two young girls: Daphne and a younger, brown-haired girl whom Harry and Hermione didn’t recognise. They shook hands with the adults, and then Andi went to work on Adrian Sr, while Harry and Hermione met the girls, whose parents were watching them closely.

“Good evening to you, Lord Potter, Miss Granger,” Daphne said. “May I present to you my sister, Astoria.”

“Pleased to meet you,” Hermione said, shaking the younger girl’s hand.

Harry started to shake her hand as well, but then, on a sudden impulse—perhaps it was the annoyingly formal setting—he leaned down and kissed her hand, saying, “I am honoured to meet you Miss Astoria.”

Little Astoria’s eyes went wide (as did Daphne’s), and she barely managed to remember her etiquette training: “Th-th-the honour is m-mine, Lord Potter,” she squeaked.

“Wow, just when I thought I’d seen everything from you, Lord Potter,” Daphne said. “Listen, I…I was really impressed by that speech. I’ve…I’ve never heard anything like it.”

“Thank you, Miss Daphne,” Harry replied cautiously. He wasn’t quite sure if that was a compliment.

“When I read about…you know…in the paper…I wasn’t sure I believed it…” She seemed to be having difficulty making the words come out.

“It sounded horrible,” Astoria said.

“Yes, it did. But I could see it in your eyes today…I can’t imagine what it was like to live through that and then find a loving family…I’m impressed, Lord Potter.”

Harry nodded and smiled. “Thank you.”

“You know, when you first talked to me about the Muggle Protection Act, I thought you were just being self-serving—and, be honest, you kind of still are, aren’t you? But after that speech…seeing how much your family…well, I guess what I’m trying to say is…I think I’d think less of you if you weren’t out here pushing it as hard as you could.”

Harry’s and Hermione’s eyebrows shot up. “That…that means a lot to us,” Harry said.

“May I ask how you feel about it?” Hermione said.

Daphne snapped back into her aloof pose, but it didn’t seem to fit her quite as well, now. “It’s politics, Miss Granger,” she said. “That’s all it’s ever been to me. You’re the first muggle-born I got to know at all. And if, hypothetically, I’m starting to think it shouldn’t be all about politics, well, I’m not the head of the family, am I.”

Hermione and Harry did their best to hide their surprise. “But I’m sure your grandfather listens to you,” she replied.

Astoria nodded a little too eagerly, but Daphne just said, “He does. He listens to a lot of other people, too. And he makes the final decision himself. But my sister and I will share our feelings with him.”

“That’s…all we can ask,” Harry said uncertainly. It wasn’t much, he thought, but it meant a lot coming from Daphne Greengrass. Maybe in a few more years, they could be something like friends.

By now, Lord Greengrass was also breaking off the conversation. “That’s certainly a very interesting proposal Madam Tonks,” he said pleasantly. “I must discuss it with the rest of my family, and we will certainly give it full weight. Good evening.”

“Good evening,” Andi said, and she led the Grangers out. “He’s not talking,” she told them. “Doesn’t want anyone to be able to turn him before the actual vote. I’m optimistic, but we won’t know until the time comes.”

“Well, we’ve done all we can,” Hermione said. “We think Daphne and Astoria are on our side.”

“You do? That’s a good sign. If that’s so, I think we just might have it.”

* * *

The meeting the next day was even more crowded, and all of the muggle-born families in Harry’s and Hermione’s year were in attendance, but the tone had noticeably changed. Harry’s speech really had made a lasting effect. Large parts of it had been reported in the _Daily Prophet_ , which, as biased as it was towards the purebloods, was even more hungry for Harry Potter gossip, and Andi reported that the owls that were coming in this morning were more in favour of the bill than they had ever been, and there would be serious consequences should it fail. That boded even better for Lord Greengrass’s decision, since he tended to follow the political winds.

The debate at this point shied away from the subjects Harry had addressed and more to the practical side of enforcement, penalties, and harshness. Additionally, with Harry no longer a viable target, Lucius Malfoy made a long speech railing against Dumbledore, noting in particular Harry’s recent falling-out with the old man and suggesting that the front for ratification was not so solid and unified as they let on, then trying to project this onto the merits of the bill itself.

This led Harry to stand and deliver his other, much shorter, rehearsed response: “The Chief Warlock and my family have had some serious disagreements, both in the past and more recently. This is a private matter on which we are still coming to an understanding, and I ask all of you to respect that. But on this issue, we stand united. The Chief Warlock can have no stronger ally than me in support of the Muggle Protection Act, and I am proud to call him my ally as well.”

That didn’t have the impact of his first speech, but it did cut off the worst of the criticism.

The debate went on tumultuously for a long while, but finally—it was past dinner time—there was a call for cloture, which passed easily, and, after closing statements by Lucius Malfoy and Augusta Longbottom, Dumbledore called the final vote.

“All those in favour, light your wands,” the old man said.

Wands lit up around the room. Many people in the audience lit their wands in solidarity, making it hard to count the votes, but Ted, Remus, and Arthur Weasley, all sitting around the Grangers, were counting them. The wands went up slowly, almost one by one, including a very nervous-looking Cornelius Fudge (after all, he had to take the public’s side). All three men were frowning as they counted until, to a flurry of whispers from around the hall, Lord Greengrass lit his wand, and three other Lords sitting around him did as well.

“I think we’ve got! I think we’ve got it!” The Grangers’ friends whispered to each other, and similar sounds were coming from around the hall.

“All those opposed, light your wands,” Dumbledore said.

Lords Malfoy, Nott, and Jugson immediately raised their wands, and many others followed suit. It looked very close, even closer than at Sirius’s trial, but Ted, Remus, and Arthur all agreed that they had won out.

Even so, no one dared speak until Dumbledore read the final tally: “By a vote of thirty-one to twenty-seven…the law is passed!”

“Yes!” Harry leapt up, pumping his fist in the air. Around the packed Chamber, hundreds of supporters were on their feet, shouting, cheering, and crying at their success—a solid majority of the spectators, even if it was just barely half of the actual Wizengamot. Harry was lucky that he didn’t get lifted up on the crowd’s shoulders.

Across the hall, he could see some of his Slytherin classmates. Draco Malfoy looked appalled, and Theo Nott looked outraged, but Daphne and Astoria Greengrass seemed to smile slightly when they met his eyes, and Daphne made a gesture that seemed to say, “You’re welcome.”

Arthur Weasley was weeping as he shook Harry’s hand: “I can’t thank you enough Lord Potter. That was a beautiful speech. And whatever you did to get Lord Greengrass…Thank you. I’ve been dreaming of this day for years.”

“I’m proud to have worked on this law with you, Lord Potter,” Augusta Longbottom told him.

“We were worried when we first heard about the prejudice in this world, Granger, but we feel a lot better about it now,” Sir William Finch-Fletchley told Dan.

Gilderoy Lockhart insisted on another photo op as he said, “Harry, Harry, Harry, you’re a natural at this. If you ever need some advice, though, I’m happy to give it. You know, I’ve always said my dearest wish is harmony between all magic and non-magical peoples…”

Somehow, the receiving line was even longer than it was at Sirius’s trial or the Order of Merlin presentation, but Harry didn’t care this time. At the first one, he’d just wanted to talk to his godfather, while the second was for an award he didn’t feel he deserved, but this—this felt like he was doing something really worthwhile. Quidditch was great, too, but this was the kind of thing that could change lives. And even though it had been so hard to pass through the Wizengamot, that made it that much better to see how much support he had gained from the people of magical Britain. After the disaster at the end of the school year, things were really looking up. Score one for the light side.


	42. Plans Are Laid

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Ultimate Answer to life, the universe, and Harry Potter is JK Rowling.

Exactly what happened between Harry and Hermione and the late Professor Quirrell was supposed to be a complete secret, so naturally, everyone knew. Okay, that was a bit of an exaggeration, but the rumours did slip past the castle walls, sneaking from one person to the next through whispers in dark alleys and shady pubs. People whispered that it wasn’t really a cerberus that had killed this year’s Defence Professor. The ones with the best connections to the underbelly of magical society started to put the pieces together: the Philosopher’s Stone, the break-in at Gringotts last summer, Potter’s involvement, his falling out with Dumbledore, and, most tellingly, the testimony of a seventh-year Slytherin who had snuck into the hospital wing and discovered that Quirrell’s body hadn’t been mauled, but had been burnt to a crisp. There was no concrete proof (Quirrell’s second face was no longer identifiable), but those who were willing to follow their noses smelled the involvement of the Dark Lord.

The overwhelming reaction to these rumours was denial—a denial borne out of fear. Those who had not served the Dark Lord naturally feared his return, and those who had served him knew that he would be displeased with everyone who had lied their way out of Azkaban. And even if he was back, it looked as if he was gone again, so it was far better to just let it lie.

But there were two people in magical Britain who did not think this way. To the eyes of the world, they were the wastrel brother and sister of a fairly prominent society figure, living together in a run-down house in the north, their fortunes having taken a mysterious turn for the worse after the fall of the Dark Lord. To those who knew the truth, though, they were two of the most sadistic and brutal Death Eaters alive, not on the level of the Lestranges, but still grade-A thugs. And they were not content to let things be.

“You really think he’s back, Amycus, after all these years?” the sister said to her brother.

“I’m telling you, Alecto, all the signs point to it,” snapped Amycus Carrow. “Who else could break into Gringotts? Who else would go to such lengths to try to steal the Philosopher’s Stone from under Dumbledope’s nose?”

“Well, excuse me for being thorough,” said Alecto. “You know what that means if he’s back, don’t you?”

“Of course I do! Anyone who disowned him after the war’s gonna be in it deep.”

Amycus and Alecto Carrow had definitely lost the genetic lottery: squat, lumpy, beady-eyed, and a bit pig-like, the both of them, not to mention none too bright, they were the complete opposite of their handsome and well-respected brother, Anteros. Throw in a pair of hotheaded and sadistic personalities, and they were the perfect candidates for joining the Death Eaters: ambitious, seeking shared glory, and thuggish, seeking more refined forms of cruelty.

“So what are we gonna do?” Amycus demanded.

“Keep your pants on—for both our sakes. I’ve got an idea.”

“What’s that?”

Alecto’s lopsided mouth twisted into an evil grin: “We’re going to help him.”

“What! Have you lost your head, woman?” He drew his wand on her.

But Alecto was faster, knocking him into a chair with a Stinging Jinx. “Use your brain for once. The Dark Lord’s coming back one way or another. He’s too powerful to be stopped forever. He calls us, we all go crawling back, and what does he do to us?”

“Tortures us for traitors, obviously.”

“Yes! We’re all second class in his book… _unless_ we have something to offer him.”

“Wha’d’you mean?”

“I mean, my idiot brother, we go and find the Dark Lord, help him return to power…and rat out everybody else who deserted him. Get it? We come back to serve him while everybody else is sitting at home, sipping Firewhiskey. Then, we’ll be above all of them—above _Malfoy_.”

Now, it was Amycus’s turn to flash a lopsided smile: “I like the way you think, sister.”

“Naturally. _I_ _’m_ the brains of this operation.”

“So what’s the plan?”

“The plan?” The alleged brains of the operation had to stop and think what the plan was. “Alright, the Dark Lord’s not gonna stay in Britain. He had contacts all over the Continent, and Dumbledope’s gonna be looking for him. We give it a week and tell the neighbours we’re going on a long holiday to France, but we don’t go to France. We go underground in Scandinavia—pack a tent and raid the muggles for food. We’ll be roughing it, but it’ll pay off in the end.”

“Not roughing it much more than this dump,” Amycus said. “Let’s get to work.”

Both the neighbours and their fellow Death Eaters tended to make rude insinuations about the Carrows’ relationship, but the truth was that they were living together because that was all they could afford. Given the choice, they would have lived apart, since without any mudbloods to torture, they were at each other’s throats on a weekly basis. Of course, the canard about taking a long holiday in France together would only cause the neighbours to whisper about them more, but this time, they thought, _Let them. Revenge will be sweet._

* * *

There was another man in magical Britain who was taking drastic action in response to recent events. That man waited until late at night after the Wizengamot meeting, after his wife and son had gone to bed, and opened the vault under his drawing room floor—so many dark artifacts that he’d have to sell off before Weasley got something actionable on him—and removed a black, leather-bound diary that had first been purchased from a muggle shop in 1938.

By the light of a single candle, he laid the diary open on the desk to one of its many blank pages and wrote, _Hello, Master._

Lucius was always very careful not to write too much about himself in this diary. He was a faithful servant, but he didn’t have a martyrdom complex, and his Master knew he was more valuable alive. Not that he knew the full extent of what the diary could do. Tom Riddle wasn’t stupid, after all.

The words vanished and then were replaced by more in a different handwriting: _Hello, Lucius. I trust the meeting was successful?_

As the words vanished again, Lucius sighed, perhaps a little too loudly, and braced himself for what came next: _I am sorry to report that it was not. Potter gave a heartfelt speech in support of his adoptive parents, which turned the public and therefore the Minister to his side. Even so, I thought we had it, but Potter managed to turn Greengrass at the last minute. I don_ _’t know what he gave him to do it, but it must have been a lot._

The ink swirled angrily on the page, sometimes splashing as if thrown against it from the other side, as if the mind contained inside wanted to curse Lucius from the paper. _This is most displeasing_ , wrote Tom Riddle. _You assured me that the bill would be defeated._

_I did, Master. I did not anticipate Potter have as good a counsel as he does, nor his extraordinary good luck in gaining the alliance of the Black Seat._

_And the prospects for repealing this law?_ Tom’s writing looked shaky and impatient.

 _There will be other opportunities, Master,_ _”_ Lucius wrote _. The vote was close. If I can find an opportunity to discredit Arthur Weasley, that would be a severe blow to such a delicate compromise. Moreover, there are alternative paths to consider. I believe I can still leverage for restrictions on muggle parents under the guise of preventing child abuse._

_You write eloquent words, as always, Lucius, but how many of your initiatives have succeeded in the past ten years?_

_Dumbledore_ _’s hold is strong, as you know, though recent events have placed it at serious risk. Even so, we have had some victories._

_Small victories._ There was a pause, but the words did not disappear, indicating that Tom was thinking about what to write next. _Continue with your pet legislation. In the meantime, investigate what hold Potter has over Greengrass. We must have a clear view of the political landscape with him involved._

_Yes, Master._

_You mentioned once that Greengrass has two young granddaughters,_ Tom mused. _Do you think a marriage proposal was involved?_

_Unlikely. As I wrote before, Potter was raised muggle, and mudbloods were the leading opponents of arranged marriages._

_Very well, but I still suspect a family matter. Even as a student, Adrian Senior always cared for family above all._

_I understand, Master._ This time, almost absently, Lucius kept the tip of his quill on the page, causing his own words to stay in place.

_Is there something else, Lucius?_

Lucius was muttering to himself, now, debating out loud the wisdom of continuing with what he wanted to write. He decided to dump his small piece of good news first: _You may be interested to know that I have secured Snape_ _’s position for the coming year: a minor compromise to silence the criticism._

_That would be more encouraging if Snape could be trusted. What did you really want to tell me?_

Lucius murmured a rude remark about his Master’s shrewdness that he would never have dared utter had he been able to hear him, but he couldn’t very well back out now.

“The plan is a good one,” he tried to reassure himself out loud. “Plant the diary on a student. It will force them to open the Chamber of Secrets, the Monster of Slytherin will clear out all the mudbloods—and Potter—and the Governors will sack Dumbledore. It’ll work—it was _his_ plan!” But of course, the plan was only to be enacted on his Master’s—his _true_ Master’s—say-so, and as much as he denied it to himself, the Dark Mark on his arm still gave him pause. Still, killing Potter would count for a lot if he returned.

 _Well?_ Tom added menacingly.

Lucius took a deep breath and started writing again: _Potter_ _’s falling out with Dumbledore has seriously weakened the old meddler’s position, and there are continued calls for an investigation into his handling of the infant Potter. His political position is more vulnerable than it has been since his falling out with Barty Crouch a decade ago. One more scandal around Potter, and I can have him removed from the castle._

The diary was inactive for quite a while, as Tom seemed to be thinking over this information. Finally, he wrote back, _What are you suggesting, Lucius?_

 _Perhaps it_ _’s time we put our plan into action, Master,_ Lucius wrote hopefully.

The page stayed blank for a long time.

_Are you sure you are not just suggesting this for your own ends, Lucius?_

Lucius was sweating at that, but he was no fool. He thought up a response quickly: _I will not deny that my own interests come into play here, but I maintain that the political winds have not been so favourable since the end of the war. You could also target Potter while you are there. He will only be a second year, and Draco tells me that he is gifted, but hardly extraordinarily so—not the great dark lord certain rumours made him out to be._

 _An interesting proposal,_ Tom replied. _But it would be a risky move. My diary must be kept safe while I do my work. We would need a target who won_ _’t suspect my diary for what it is, but will also use it and not throw it away. Preferably one with few friends and other connections in the school. A first year girl would be best._

Lucius thought for a few moments. He discarded his first impulse to give the diary to Potter himself, or his sister. They were surely being trained far too well by Black and Tonks—and maybe Dumbledore, still. But then, an evil grin crossed his face. She wouldn’t be the _most_ isolated candidate, but he might just kill two birds with one stone: _I know just the one._

As he finalised his plans, Lucius Malfoy paid no mind to the small, bat-eared creature who was watching him from the shadows _._

* * *

Albus Dumbledore, Sirius Black, and Remus Lupin were also taking action. They met in the Headmaster’s office the next day to discuss the way forward.

“Alright, Albus, you destroyed one horcrux,” said Sirius. “Now, you’re saying there are more?”

“I’m afraid so. It is the only possible explanation.”

Sirius shuddered. “Horrible,” he whispered. “How many more, then?”

“Alas I do not know. I had thought that even Voldemort was not so mad as to split his soul more than once. I must begin investigating his past again in earnest to search for clues.”

“Do tell us as soon as you find anything,” requested Remus.

“Yeah, I think you’ve been doing things on your own for too long,” said Sirius. “You’ll be better off if you have some help with it.”

“Perhaps you are right, my boy,” Dumbledore said wearily. “I will keep you informed. In the meantime, perhaps you could see if there is any additional information about horcruxes in your family’s collection of books.”

“No problem, Albus. I’ll get right on that.”

* * *

It was a busy new week for all. Even the Grangers were taking measures to help prepare for the future, although in Harry’s and Hermione’s case, it was more fun than work.

“Sensei John!” The children ran up to their old instructor at the dojo, stopping just short and bowing to him before Hermione gave him a hug and Harry shook his hand.

“Hey, there, how are two of my best students?” Sensei John said with a smile. “That Scottish boarding school of yours treating you well?”

“Yeah, school’s great,” Harry said. _Except for almost getting killed by a teacher_ , he and Hermione mentally added. “Hermione’s top of the class.”

“And Harry’s third,” she said.

“I’m glad to hear it. I always thought if you were as dedicated in classes as you are here, you’d go a long way. Now, I hope you’ve both been practising your karate while you’ve been gone?”

“Well, we’re still running a few katas and exercising daily,” Harry explained, “but we can’t really do karate properly at school, they only have…uh, fencing, so we’ve started learning that.”

“Ah, not a bad sport, there.” Sensei John only seemed a little disappointed. “It’s good to do anything to keep your reflexes up.”

“We know,” Hermione said. “But we’d like to stay in form as much as we can. We only have a month because we’re going to France, but we were hoping we could take a refresher course.”

Sensei John smiled: “You can join back in with the first dan class. Neither of you should have much trouble getting back on your game there. It’ll be good to have you back.”

“Thanks, Sensei John,” the children said.

“While you’re here, would you mind helping with a couple sessions of the beginner classes? I find it’s good to have some insights from students who started young.”

“If it’s just a couple, I think we can do that,” Hermione said.

“Excellent. The next first dan class is this afternoon.”

It was good to be doing karate properly again. Both of them had forgotten how much fun this was. To be sure, they had slipped quite a bit over the past year, but they were still in physical condition, and they were confident they could catch back up. And even teaching, what little they did, was an eye-opening experience. But this was just the start. They still had a busy summer ahead of them.

* * *

With all the other things that were going on, the Grangers could only manage a couple of day trips to see friends from Hogwarts. The first one was to Longbottom Manor. Mr. Weasley dropped off Ron, and Madam Longbottom met them at the gate, looking as formidable as ever in her stuffed vulture hat. Neville was following along meekly behind her.

Longbottom Manor was large and spacious—and empty. There were only Augusta and Neville there, now, though Algie and Enid Croaker were over frequently, and sometimes Cousin Saul stopped by.

“Good morning, Mr. Potter, Miss Granger…Mr. Weasley,” Madam Longbottom greeted them, looking down her nose a bit at Ron. “Please do come in.”

“Hey, guys,” Neville said. “How’s your summer.”

“Not bad,” Ron replied.

“Busy,” Hermione said. “But we’re having some fun. You?”

“It’s been okay. I…I’ve been trying to keep up with those exercises you showed me.”

“Yes, I must say, it’s good to see Neville finally putting in some effort to make something of himself,” Madam Longbottom interrupted.

Neville looked down at his feet. His grandmother seemed to have the same power that Professor Snape had to instantly sap him of his confidence. In point of fact, Neville looked quite a bit better than he had a year ago, standing straighter and more confidently most of the time, and he was more coordinated, too—much less prone to tripping and falling. The exercise that Harry and Hermione had coaxed him into had helped with that, and, with more regular application, it would probably start getting rid of his baby fat. He had a long way to go, but it was a good start.

At his grandmother’s prompting, Neville gave them a tour of the house. There didn’t seem to be a whole lot to do at Longbottom Manor. It looked like one of those homes designed by adults for adults. However, Neville pleaded that he enjoyed working in the greenhouse, which was very well kept and on par with one of the Hogwarts greenhouses. He mentioned that he had also been studying up on the language of flowers.

In any case, it was nice to just sit around and talk for the afternoon, especially after the difficulty of arranging a visit.

“I was hoping you could’ve made it last weekend,” Neville said. “Did you get my letter?”

“Your letter?” Hermione said. “No, it didn’t come through.”

“Really? Ron asked. “What about mine?”

“We haven’t got any letters from anyone at school,” answered Harry. “We’ve been wondering about that.”

“Huh, that’s strange,” said Ron. “I thought maybe Errol lost it, but if Neville’s didn’t go through either—”

“We should check with Cousin Andi to see if they got forwarded by mistake,” said Hermione.

“Good idea,” Harry replied.

But when the Grangers got back to Crawley that evening, they found the letters from Neville and Ron sitting in their mailbox.

* * *

The Burrow was the complete opposite of Longbottom Manor: tall and teetering instead of wide and sprawling, a little cramped, but full of life, activity, and laughter instead of solemn and empty. Harry was loving it, though Hermione thought she could do with a bit more peace and quiet, and Neville just looked overwhelmed.

“It’s good to meet you again, Mr. Potter,” Mr. Weasley greeted them.

“Just Harry, please,” Harry replied.

“Neville,” his friend added as they shook the Weasleys’ hands.

Mr. Weasley nodded. “I wanted to thank you again…Harry. We’ve already netted a lot of dark and booby-trapped articles with the Muggle Protection Act, and…” He dropped his voice to a whisper, “I get to keep my flying car.” (“Hmph,” said Mrs. Weasley.)

Harry went down the line, greeting the Weasleys with a formal handshake from Percy and slaps on the back from Fred and George until he came face to face with Ginny.

“Um, hi,” Harry said as Ginny rapidly turned as red as her hair. “You know, we’ve met each other three times, and I don’t think we’ve ever been formally introduced. Hello, I’m Harry Potter. It’s a pleasure to meet you, Miss Weasley.” And then he kissed Ginny’s hand.

Ginny fainted. Harry and Hermione reached out and caught her, quickly passing her back to her parents. Mrs. Weasley looked rather distressed, while Ron and Percy looked very embarrassed, and Fred and George were sniggering.

“Um, sorry,” Harry said.

“I think you need to tone it down if you’re going to affect all the girls like that,” Hermione teased.

“It’s not my fault the books make me out to be some great hero.”

“Sorry about that,” said Mr. Weasley. “I’m afraid Ginny’s been obsessed with those books from before she could read them.”

“Eh, don’t worry,” said George. “She’ll come around once she’s got to know you.”

“She’s really fun to be around when she’s not flipping out,” added Fred.

“Yeah. Normally never shuts up, too,” said Ron.

Ginny was laid on the sofa while the boys showed the visitors around the house. Once Ginny woke up, they all ate a very nice lunch Mrs. Weasley had prepared and then headed back outside.

“Who’s up for Quidditch?” said Fred.

“I’ve got my broom,” Harry said. (Ron had written and advised him to bring it.) Everybody but Neville agreed. Even Percy decided to join in today, and Hermione, who had improved a lot over the past year, was interested to try the game.

“We’ve got one more broom,” Ron told Neville. “You sure you don’t wanna play?”

“No, I’ll just sit this one out.”

“C’mon, Nev, we need another Chaser to make a full team,” Fred called.

“C-couldn’t you ask Ginny?”

“Ginny doesn’t know how to fly,” Percy replied coolly.

“Come on, Neville, I’ll help you out,” Hermione cajoled him.

“Um, well…okay.”

Neville definitely preferred to keep his feet firmly planted on the ground, but with Ron’s and Hermione’s help, he was no long at serious risk of getting hurt when he climbed on a broom. The Weasleys were delighted to have a full team for once. Normally, they couldn’t have managed that even with Ginny, since they only had six brooms. Afterwards, Harry started scheming about how he might be able to get them to accept a spare for Christmas.

* * *

Harry woke on the thirty-first of July in high spirits—unsurprisingly since he was having two birthday celebrations, that day, one for his muggle friends over lunch and another one for Sirius, Remus, and the Tonkses at dinnertime.

It was a beautiful, sunny day, and Harry and Hermione decided to spend the morning out in the yard before Paul and Tiffany arrived, alternately playing catch (to work on their Quidditch skills), doing their exercise routine, kicking a football around, and, in Hermione’s case, reading a book on the bench swing. As the morning went on, they started lounging around a bit more; Harry was leaning against a tree, staring absently at the hedge, when he saw it: the hedge was staring back. Two huge, green eyes, the size of colour of tennis balls, were peering through a gap in the hedge at him. He saw tiny, pale fingers pulling the leaves aside around them.

“Mione!” he called and pointed at the hedge. “Are you seeing what I’m seeing?”

Hermione looked over at the hedge just in time to see the eyes blink once and vanish.

The two of them nodded to each other. That was no hallucination. They had seen eyes of that type a few times before.

There was no noise of rustling and retreating through the hedge or of disapparating away. So, deciding what to do, Hermione stood in front of the hedge and said, “You can come out of there. No one else is watching.”

There was a small, wavering moan, and a very downtrodden-looking elf slowly stepped out of the hedge.

“Hello, can we help you?” Hermione said.

The elf gazed up at Harry reverently. “Harry Potter!” he squeaked. “Such an honour it is.” And he bowed so low that it looked as if his long nose might get stuck in the dirt. “So long has Dobby wanted to meet Harry Potter, sir.”

Hermione sighed as “Dobby” seemed to be all but ignoring her.

“Er—thank you, Dobby,” Harry said, “but how did you find me? This address isn’t listed.”

Dobby shivered: “Harry Potter must not be angry, sir. Dobby followed him when he returned from Hogwarts.”

“Oh!” Hermione exclaimed. Of course it was the obvious solution. They were pretty sure they’d never been tailed by wizards going to and from London, but elves were another matter.

“Oh, great,” Harry groaned. “Okay, why don’t you come inside? Our parents will want to know about this.” He and Hermione walked to the back door, with the elf following hesitantly. “Mum! Dad! Come here!” Harry called.

Emma came out from around the corner and said, “Harry, I have to make lunch, and…” It was an eerily familiar scene, except the bedraggled creature in front of her was not a little boy—scarred, cringing, and dressed in what looked like a filthy pillowcase, yes, but with those huge eyes and bat ears, he definitely wasn’t a little boy.

“Harry, what’s wro—” Dan started as he came into the room. “Is that a house elf?”

“Yes,” said Harry. “He said his name’s Dobby, and he apparently followed us home from the train station last month.”

“Last month? Where’s he been all this time, then?”

“He probably had to go back home,” Hermione said. “Cousin Andi said house elves don’t get out much.”

“More importantly, what is he doing here?” asked Emma.

Dobby looked up at her with large, fearful eyes: “Dobby had to speak with Harry Potter, Mistress Granger. Dobby must, even though his family would not approve. It is very important.”

Emma sighed and checked the clock. They had a little under an hour before the children’s friends arrived. Sighing softly, she said, “Okay, Dobby, have a seat. Can we get you anything?”

But to the Grangers’ surprise, Dobby burst into very noisy tears: “H-h-have a s-seat! Never…never ever…”

“I’m sorry,” Emma said quickly. “I didn’t mean to offend you. You can stand, if you like.”

“Offend Dobby!” the elf wailed. “Dobby has _never_ been asked to sit with a witch and wizard’s family, like an _equal_!”

Dan’s and Emma’s mouths dropped open slightly, appalled at the claim.

“We’re not like most witches and wizards, Dobby,” Hermione explained. “We don’t think highly of people who keep elves as slaves.”

Dobby started to nod his head in agreement, but then, a look of horror crossed his face, and, without warning, he ran at the wall, repeatedly banging his head against it and yelling, “Bad Dobby! Bad Dobby!”

Harry and Hermione grabbed him by his tiny arms and pulled him away.

“Stop that!” Hermione cried.

“What are you doing?” Harry said.

Dobby whined and wobbled on his feet. “Dobby had to punish himself, sir. Dobby almost spoke ill of his family.”

Dan and Emma gasped. “ _Punish_ yourself?” said Emma. And it looked like this was a regular occurrence, too. “It’s a miracle you can see straight. Is it legal to treat a house elf like that?”

“I don’t know,” Hermione answered. “I’d have to look it up. It shouldn’t be, though.”

“Alright, Dobby, please sit down. Kids, make sure he doesn’t hurt himself. I’ll be right back.” _I don_ _’t care_ what _the rules about house elves are,_ she thought. _I_ _’m going to get that poor creature some lavender tea._

Hermione and Harry ushered the crying elf onto the sofa and sat on either side of him so he couldn’t get away. He sat shaking on the cushion at the unfamiliar treatment. It very much reminded Dan of a young Harry sitting on that same sofa nearly seven years ago, now, except that Dobby somehow looked like he’d been treated even worse.

“Dobby,” Hermione said gently, “who is—Are you allowed to tell us what family you work for?”

Dobby shuddered at the thought of his disapproving masters. “Dobby is sorry, Hermione Granger, miss. Dobby cannot.”

“Is there anything you can tell us about them?”

He shook his head frantically: “Dobby cannot! Dobby cannot!”

“Okay! Dobby, it’s okay.”

“Listen,” Harry said, “we don’t want anyone to know where we live, so we’d really appreciate it if you didn’t tell anyone.”

Dobby looked down at his bare feet, his ears drooping: “Dobby must tell his masters if they ask, but they is not knowing to ask, sir.”

“Fine, that’s good enough.”

Soon, Emma returned, carrying a tea tray. “Dobby, I brought you some tea,” she said. “Please drink; it should help you calm down.”

Predictably, this caused Dobby to burst into tears again, as he had never been given tea before, only ask to make it, and it took considerable coaxing to get him to drink, but once he did, he began to calm down somewhat.

“Alright, so why did you need to talk to me?” Harry asked.

Dobby shakily set his teacup down on the saucer so he could face Harry’s direction: “Dobby has come to warn Harry Potter, sir, even if he must shut his ears in the oven door later, that Harry Potter must not go back to Hogwarts.”

All the Grangers blinked a few times. That was a new one. “Why not?” said Harry.

Dobby was trembling even harder now; he probably wasn’t supposed to speak of this to anyone: “There is a plot, Harry Potter. A plot to make most terrible things happen at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry this year. Harry Potter will be it mortal danger if he returns there. He must not put himself in such danger, sir. He is too important!”

“And what am I, chopped liver?” Hermione demanded, finally fed up with the elf’s hero worship.

But he turned to her and said, “Begging Hermione Granger’s pardon, miss. It will be very dangerous for her, too, and she should probably not go back, either.”

“What’s the plot,” Dan demanded harshly. “Who’s plotting it?”

Dobby suddenly sounded like he was choking. Then, he bounded to his feet and tried to jump over Hermione to grab the lamp on the end table, but Hermione’s reflexes were faster. As she held the struggling and crying elf back, she said, “He can’t tell us. That must mean his masters are involved, though.”

“Can you tell us if it has to do with Voldemort?” Harry asked.

But Dobby folded his large ears against his head and cried, “Speak not the name, sir! Speak not the name!”

“Sorry. You-Know-Who, then?” Normally, the Grangers wouldn’t tolerate that, but Harry thought it was best not to argue.

Dobby shook his head slowly, though his eyes were strangely even wider than usual: “No, not He-Who-Must- _Not-_ Be-Named, sir…”

Harry and Hermione stared at each other in confusion. _He-Who-_ Must _-Be-Named_ , _then?_

“Harry Potter must not go back to Hogwarts,” he repeated. “He is too great, too good to lose. He saved all the lowly creatures of Britain from the terror of the Dark Lord.”

“An accident,” Harry said dismissively. “Whatever you’ve heard about my greatness is…wait a minute. “The Dark Lord?’” He looked at Hermione. “I’ve only heard Death Eaters’ families call him that—Snape, Pettigrew, Malfoy, and Nott.”

Dobby looked horrified that he gave something away. He tried to jump up, but Harry and Hermione grabbed him by the arms and held him still.

“Listen,” Harry said, trying to calm him and thinking fast. “We’re not going to promise not to go back to Hogwarts, but Hermione and I were already considering transferring to Beauxbatons.” _Not strongly, but it_ _’s not a lie_. “And we’re not going to decide for sure until after we’ve seen it. But we _are_ going to tell Dumbledore about this plot. And we have other powerful allies, too—Sirius Black, Amelia Bones, and Augusta Longbottom.”

“Cousin Andi’s no slouch, either,” Hermione added.

“Right, so we’ve got a lot of people who can help try to stop it.”

The elf sniffed a little through his long nose. “Harry Potter knows many good witches and wizards,” he said, “but sir, there are dark powers at work—powers not even the great Headmaster Dumbledore…powers no decent wizard…”

He jumped up to punish himself again, and, suddenly, Harry got an idea. Instead of grabbing Dobby by the arm, as Hermione did, he reached out, lighting-fast, and grabbed the frayed hem of his pillowcase smock. As he had hoped, a small piece of it tore off without the elf noticing.

“Okay, we understand it’s a very dangerous plot,” Hermione said as she sat him back down. “But please let us talk it over with our allies and decide on our own.”

Dobby looked from one child to the other. He looked like he wanted to protest, but perhaps the lavender tea had done its work. “Very well, Hermione Granger, miss,” he said. “Dobby will let Harry Potter and Hermione Granger speak with their allies. Dobby must return to his masters now, before they knows he is gone.”

“Wait!” Dan jumped in. “Just one more minute.” He rushed out of the room to grab a camera. Upon returning he said, “Dobby, in the muggle world, when a person is abused, we take photographs so we can prove it in court. I’d like to do that for you so that maybe we can help you later. We promise we won’t show them to anyone unless they can give you legal help, so your masters won’t find out you were here.”

Despite his terror at the prospect of being found out, Dobby burst into tears of gratitude: “Harry Potter’s family wants to help Dobby…Dobby has heard of his greatness, sir, but of his goodness, Dobby never knew…”

“Well, we said we’re not like normal witches and wizards,” Emma said gently. “Well, Dan and I are muggles, but still—will you let us take the pictures, then?”

Dobby didn’t seem to trust himself to speak, so he just nodded. A few snapshots of his scarred and burnt skin, his pitiful attire, and the bruises from when he banged his head against the wall, and they were done. “Goodbye, Harry Potter,” he squeaked, and, with a snap of his fingers, he vanished.

“I wonder what it’s like to have a peaceful life,” Hermione mused.

“I wouldn’t know,” Harry replied. “I got a clue, though.”

“What?”

He opened his hand to reveal the scrap of cloth he was hiding: “I ripped off a bit of what he was wearing. Maybe it has his masters’ scents on it.”

“Careful,” his mother said, “how do you know he’s not still watching?”

“I doubt it,” Hermione said. “He really would’ve needed to go back to his masters. Go on, Harry, see if you can smell anything.”

Harry nodded and changed at once to Ratsbane. He sniffed the bit of pillowcase carefully before changing back. “I couldn’t get much,” he said. “I didn’t recognise the scent, but I don’t know that many people’s scents.”

“He probably doesn’t have much physical contact with them,” Hermione said. “Did you get anything? Maybe we can narrow it down.”

Harry closed his eyes and thought: “A man and a woman…one son, close to our age…that’s all I’ve got.”

“Well, that does narrow it down,” Hermione said. “Death Eaters or at least sympathisers, rich enough to have an elf, an only child—or at least only one child in the home—a son who’s probably Hogwarts age. There’s probably only a dozen families that could be.”

“Yeah…Sirius might know. I’ll ask him tonight.”

Dan and Emma agreed to that and also suggested that Harry and Hermione write to Neville and Susan Bones about the incident before they left tomorrow.

Half an hour later, the Grangers tried to put on a perfectly normal face as Paul and Tiffany arrived for lunch. With so many secrets, and being increasingly isolated from the muggle world, there weren’t many prospects for Harry to have large birthday celebrations, but he didn’t mind. Paul and Tiffany had been good friends all through primary school, and with such a busy summer, just the chance to hang out with them for the afternoon was a plus.

Paul was quite tall by now and had joined the football team at the local secondary school, and Tiffany had abandoned her little girl look for a more grown-up wardrobe and impeccably-styled hair. (She tried to give some styling tips to Hermione, but was met with an eye roll.)

They swapped stories about their respective school years, to lots of laughs. Harry and Hermione had come up with a code for the goings on at Hogwarts that they had started using in their letters to their friends last fall, so they could speak almost freely. Supposedly, Hogwarts School for Gifted Youngsters was a heavily science-oriented school. Potions was Chemistry, Charms was Physics, and Herbology was Biology. Astronomy and History stayed the same, but Transfiguration became Art (since they often had to be creative with their transfigured items), and Defence, for lack of an alternative, was English. But they didn’t mention that their English teacher had tried to kill them. They did, however, mention that Harry’s godfather had been exonerated of a crime he didn’t commit and finally got to meet him.

“Wow, that could be like a mystery novel or something,” Tiffany suggested.

“Yeah, I guess it could,” Harry agreed. In truth, the story was already scattered across several books, but none of them were particularly accurate, to his consternation. “Of course, it caused some trouble because he and my dad had a big feud with Snape when they were in school.”

“Snape’s your really mean chemistry teacher?” Paul asked.

“Yeah. Hermione thought he was downright evil, but it turns out he’s just really unfriendly.”

“And a lousy teacher,” Hermione added. “We’re trying to lobby to replace him, but he’s friends with the Chairman of the Board of Governors.”

“Well, that’s not fair,” said Tiffany.

“Tell me about it. The Chairman really is evil.”

Their muggle friends looked at them in confusion.

“Long story,” Harry said. They couldn’t very well change Death Eaters to the IRA in their code.

“So what’s the school like overall,” Paul asked. “It sounds really challenging.”

“Oh, you know,” Harry said, “evading monsters, aerial combat, fighting evil overlords—the usual.”

Hermione smacked him in the arm while Paul and Tiffany laughed.

“We’re even learning fencing, so we’ll be ready.”

They laughed again.

“I’m serious.”

“No, Harry, Sirius is our godfather.” Hermione said. Harry smacked her in the arm in return.

“Okay, okay,” Harry conceded. “But our friend, Remus, really is giving us fencing lessons—It’s actually really nice, the school. There’s some not-so-good teachers, but it’s a lot of fun most of the time. And I helped us win the inter-house football tournament.” (Harry was good enough at football in primary school to get away with saying that, but really nowhere near his level as a Seeker.)

They talked about their other friends and their summers, as well. Paul and Tiffany weren’t too happy about the lack of contact beyond letters. “We’ve barely seen you this summer, and now you’re going to France,” Paul complained.

“Yeah, we’re sorry about that, we’ve just been really busy with school stuff.”

“School stuff? Like what?”

“There’s a…sort of…mock Parliament thing that runs through the summer, and we visited a couple of friends from school, and we’re trying to catch up on karate, and we have our fencing lessons.”

“Wow, you two never stop, do you?” said Tiffany.

“Not really, I guess,” said Hermione.

“Well, you know how ambitious Hermione is,” Harry said.

“Prat. Plus, we have to train to defeat the evil overlord,” Hermione humoured him.

Paul and Tiffany laughed heartily at that, although it was an effort for Hermione and Harry to do the same.

Later that evening, Sirius, Remus, and the Tonkses arrived. Even Dora had got away from her Auror training for the night. She made a point of sitting next to Remus at the table, although the werewolf seemed perfectly oblivious. None of the new arrivals were very happy about Dobby’s visit.

“We probably can’t keep your address a secret forever,” Andi said. “I’m a little surprised Rita Skeeter hasn’t thought of the same thing yet. If it does leak, things could be messy for a while, but, hopefully, the Magical Law Enforcement Patrol and Improper Use of Magic Office will be able to clean things up pretty quickly.”

“I’ll tell Mad-Eye about the elf,” Dora said. “Hogwarts is the number one strategic asset in Britain with half the kids in the country there. He’ll always take a tip like that seriously. The elf didn’t say what it was or who was behind it, though?”

“No,” Harry replied. “He only said it didn’t have anything to do with Voldemort…but he said it kind of funny, like he was trying to give us a hint.”

“A Death Eater, then?” Remus suggested. “Someone associated with him?”

“That kind of what we were thinking.”

“If it’s a Death Eater and the elf’s master, that makes the Malfoys and the Notts the top suspects,” Sirius said. “Unless the whole thing’s a lie, trying to scare you away…no, in that case, the Malfoys and Notts are _still_ the top suspects. Andi, do you know what the Malfoys’ elf’s name is?”

Andi shook her head: “No, that’s not exactly the kind of thing we talk about, what little we talk.”

“Would Kreacher know?” Harry asked Sirius.

“I don’t know, but I can ask him. Kreacher!”

There was a crack, and an elf popped into existence beside the table. “Yes, Master?” he said. Since Sirius had made an effort to be nicer to the elf, Kreacher now sounded merely annoyed and not venomous and had stopped muttering insults under his breath. Sirius had also bullied him into wearing a pillowcase instead of a loincloth.

“Do you know a house elf named Dobby? Green eyes, long, thin nose?”

“No, Master. Kreacher does not know any Dobby.”

“Alright, well, tell me if you happen to hear of him. That’ll be all.”

“Yes, Master.” And Kreacher popped away.

“Well, unfortunately, a lot of people don’t let their elves out of the house,” Sirius said. “I doubt we’ll have much luck there.”

“Hmm…incidentally, Dobby was in pretty bad shape,” Dan spoke up. “And he was trying to ‘punish himself’ by banging his head against the wall. If we do find out who owns him, are there any laws against house elf abuse?”

All the other magicals in the room looked at each other in surprise. “I…I honestly don’t know,” Andi finally said. “You’d think there would be, but I’ve never heard of anybody being convicted under them…and that means even if there are, you’d have a real job nailing his masters for it…I can look into it, though.”

“Anyway, you should tell Dumbledore the next time you see him,” Remus said.

“We will,” Emma replied. “And we’ve already contacted the Boneses and Longbottoms. Whatever this is, we intend to be ready.”


	43. A Holiday in France

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: This is the land of JK Rowling, where we are now; all that lies between Harry Potter and the great castle of Hogwarts in the North West Highlands.
> 
> Despite all the variations in fanfic, I never had a good idea of how Occlumency realistically ought to work until I read Tightrope by Fang’s Fawn. I drew heavily from that when writing the description of Occlumency in this chapter, while adding some refinements of my own.
> 
> Thanks to The French Dark Lord for correcting my French. It’s been far too long since I’ve been out of French class.

Early the next morning, the Grangers were finishing their packing to drive up to Heathrow. (This will be so much easier once the Channel Tunnel opens, they told each other.) But it seemed there was one more surprise in store for them. Just as they had been the day after Harry’s last birthday, they were interrupted by the alarm on the Floo.

Hermione and Harry rushed over to the fireplace to see Dumbledore’s face in the emerald flames. “Professor!” they exclaimed.

“Ah, good, I had hoped you hadn’t left yet,” he said.

Their parents rushed over behind them “Dumbledore! What’s wrong? Is it Voldemort?” asked Dan.

“No, Mr. Granger, not Voldemort directly. However, there is some concern, as rumour of the events of last May has now reached the ears of the Death Eaters.”

“So there’s been new activity, then?”

“In a sense. Rather, a suspicious _inactivity_.”

“What do you mean?”

“Most of Voldemort’s followers have done nothing in response to the rumours, no doubt too frightened to take action. After all, they are the ones who disowned him to stay out of Azkaban. However, it has come to my attention two suspected Death Eaters, Amycus and Alecto Carrow, left on a purported trip to France nearly a month ago and have not yet returned. I believe you may know their nieces, Flora and Hestia.”

“Flora and Hestia Carrow?” Harry said cluelessly.

“I think so,” Hermione said. “They’re Slytherins a year ahead of us, aren’t they? They’re from a Death Eater family?”

“No more than your Cousin Andromeda is,” Dumbledore explained. “Anteros Carrow is nothing like his brother and sister. In fact, he fought against the Death Eaters during the war. However, Amycus and Alecto are sadistic, dangerous, and determined, and, given their protracted disappearance, I believe they are searching for Voldemort in order to help him return. How long this could take them I can only guess. Voldemort will be very weak at the moment. But we must be prepared should they try anything.”

“You said they were in France,” Emma said worriedly. “Should we cancel our trip?”

“They _claimed_ to be going to France. I highly doubt they told anyone their true destination. Moreover, there are many likelier places for them to search for him—places where I have alerted my own intelligence network. I have reason to believe Voldemort’s spirit is currently residing in Eastern Europe, so I see no danger for your current holiday.”

The Grangers breathed a sigh of relief, especially the children, even if they did have two things to worry about, now. “We had something we needed to tell you, too, Professor,” Harry said, and they explained about Dobby’s warning.

“Hmm…that is very concerning,” said Dumbledore after some thought. “It may well be another Death Eater action brought about by these rumours. We must all be vigilant as the new year begins.”

“Or could it be the same plot?” suggested Hermione. “Harry, could that have been the Carrows you smelled on Dobby’s smock?”

“I don’t think so. I would have noticed if it was a brother and sister.”

“I agree,” said Dumbledore. “Amycus and Alecto Carrow could never afford an elf. No, I am afraid there are two separate plots at work here. I apologise for disturbing your holiday. I do not believe there is cause for immediate concern, so I hope you will enjoy yourselves. I will keep you informed if anything changes.”

“Alright, Dumbledore, thank you for letting us know,” said Dan.

“Mm hmm. Good day.” The fireplace died out and went out.

“I wonder what it’s like to have a peaceful life,” Emma said.

They finished packing, for the most part, but there was one thing Hermione wanted for reading material that she couldn’t get at home. “Mum, Dad, can we go a little early and stop by Gringotts?” she asked. “I want to put _Magic of the World_ _’s Cultures_ back in Harry’s vault and pick up _Our Magical Brethren_.”

“You want to put a book _back_ ,” Harry said in mock surprise. “Did you _memorise_ it?”

“ _No_ …but I was taking notes on it, and I’m finished, now. And it’s a rare book, so…”

“What’s so special about these books, Hermione?” Emma said.

“They’re a set of two, written by Josiah Monroe. I looked him up at school. He was the leading voice against the definition of a Being established by the Ministry of Magic in 1811. He wanted all sentient creatures to be included. He wrote two books, one about wizards in other countries and one about other magical races, to ‘promote cultural understanding and equality.’”

“Well, I suppose that was very forward-thinking of him, then.” Emma checked the clock. “I guess we have time, if Harry’s okay with it.”

Harry knew better than to get between his sister and a book.

“ _Magic of the World_ _’s Cultures_ was quite fascinating,” Hermione said as they drove up to London. “Did you know that in East Asia they don’t normally use wands? They use magical amulets instead. And a lot of ancient cultures used pyramids in place of stone circles. And the Australian Aboriginals have a long tradition of wandless magic based on songs and chants. And in Africa…”

This was going to be a long day, Harry thought. Hermione was already flipping through _Our Magical Brethren_ on the way from Diagon Alley to Heathrow. “Wow, this covers _everything_ ,” she said to anyone who would listen. “There’s chapters on elves, goblins, giants, centaurs, merpeople, even acromantulas, manticores, and sphinxes. Every species that’s capable of speech, Monroe says. There’s a chapter for non-sentient creatures, too…Let’s see—trolls…” Hermione flipped to the page and then laughed out loud.

“What is it?” Harry asked.

She quoted Josiah Monroe’s words: “I normally reject the use of the pejorative 'subhuman’ for any magical race, including giants, but in the case of trolls, it is entirely accurate.”

* * *

After a few relaxing days in Paris as perfectly normal muggle tourists and a day in the magical district of the city, the Grangers finally found themselves in the French magical village of Baton Vert. The village was warm and sunny, situated in (or so they wanted them to think) a hidden valley in the Pyrenees. The whole area was a beautiful, verdant green, dotted with summer wildflowers and surrounded by craggy hills and snow-capped peaks. The little shops were flatter and more sprawling than the peaked roofs and towering chimneys of Hogsmeade, and from a distance, it could have been any old and weathered Pyrenean village.

High on a hill overlooking Baton Vert stood the majestic building of Beauxbatons Academy of Magic. If Hogwarts was a castle, then Beauxbatons could only be described as a _palace_. Two centuries younger than Hogwarts, they could see even from the village that it was an exaggerated dream of the gothic architecture of its time, just as Hogwarts was the extreme realisation of the high medieval castle. They had seen photographs of the long galleries and walls of stained glass to let in the abundant sunlight, and it was hard to argue that it was not more beautiful than Hogwarts.

Down in the village, the Grangers were examining an interesting window display of magical tapestries in the local style when they noticed a most unusual family of four coming toward them. Dan noticed them first, but the others soon followed. Without a doubt, the mother was the first person one’s eyes noticed in this family. Though middle aged, she was stunningly, inhumanly beautiful—tall and stately, with flowing, platinum-blond hair and piercing blue eyes. Next were her two daughters. One looked to be about fifteen and was nearly as beautiful as her mother—perhaps even more so, the more one looked at her, and she grinned playfully at the Grangers as she approached. The other was a tiny little girl of no more than six, and undoubtedly the most adorable little girl they had ever seen. Both of them had long, platinum-blond hair as well. The patriarch of this family was by far the least noticeable: short, plump, and dark-haired with a little, pointed beard, although he had a kindly, jovial expression on his face.

But despite their beauty, it was not usual for Daniel Granger to stare at other women, much less a teenage girl less than half his age, and his wife quickly noticed.

“Dan?” she asked, nudging him in the arm.

He didn’t respond.

“Dan?” she nudged him harder.

“Dad, are you okay?” Hermione said.

He continued to watch the girl as if in a daze as she passed him with a coquettish smile.

“Dan!” Emma waved her hand in front of his face.

“I’m happily married!” he blurted out.

The girl’s mother stopped and whispered, “ _Fleur! Arr_ _êtez_!”

“Dan! What’s go into you?” Emma demanded.

“Pardon, Madame,” the blond woman addressed her. “I am afraid zat would be my daughter’s fault. You would not know, not “aving Veela in England.”

“Veela?” Emma said in confusion.

“Oh, I know,” Hermione said, running to the front of the group. “I read about Veela in _Our Magical Brethren_. They’re an eastern European race of nymph-like beings. They affect the opposite sex a lot like Sirens.”

“About zee only zing we ‘ave in common wis zose water dwellers, but correct,” the woman sniffed. “Unfortunately, our allure can be difficult to control, even for zose of us “oo are not full-blooded—especially for zee young and _irresponsible—Fleur_.” She glared at her older daughter.

Fleur looked down at her feet. “My apologies, Madame,” she said.

Emma’s anger mostly subsided, now that she knew that her husband hadn’t gone round the twist. “I see, Madame,” she told the woman.

“My name is Apolline Delacour,” she said, shaking the Grangers’ hands. “Zis is my “usband, Jean-Claude, Fleur, and zis is little Gabrielle,” she motioned to the excited little girl.

“Emma Granger. Pleased to meet you. My husband, Dan, and our children, Hermione and Harry.”

“ _Bonjour_ ,” both children said. Harry shook Fleur’s hand, but kissed Gabrielle’s.

However, Gabrielle’s small stature gave her a unique perspective on Harry’s face, and she spotted the scar under his bangs. “ _Maman_ ,” she squealed, “ _C_ _’est ‘Arry Potter! C’est ‘Arry Potter_!” The passers-by in the street stopped to stare, but thankfully didn’t mob them.

“ _Vraimant? C_ _’est ‘Arry Potter_?” Fleur asked in surprise.

Harry sighed and lifted up his bangs to give the Delacours a clear view. All of them gasped in surprise.

“Well, zen, it is a pleasure to meet you, Monsieur Potter,” Madame Delacour said.

“ _Fleur, Fleur_ ,” Gabrielle whispered, tugging on her older sister’s sleeve. “ _Pourquoi n_ _’as-tu l’affecter_?”

“Excuse me?” Harry said.

“ _Il est trop jeune, Gabrielle_ ,” Madame Delacour whispered to her.

“ _Hmm_ _…peut-être_ ,” Fleur said, looking down at Harry haughtily.

Harry watched her warily, wondering if they knew he was fluent in French. He knew they were trying to figure out if he was old enough to be affected by the Veela allure, and to that end, Fleur leaned toward him, giving him a good view of her ample chest, and, if Dan’s eyes glazing over again was any indication, turned up her allure to the max. Harry’s eyes started to glaze over, too, and he had to fight to keep them from wandering, but he kept her eyes firmly fixed with his feline stare, and he snapped out of it completely when she said, “‘Ow old are you, little boy?”

“I’m twelve,” Harry said, “And don’t call me little boy!”

Fleur leaned back up: “Oh, Maman, I zink ‘e might be immune!”

“Stop zat, Fleur,” Madame Delacour scolded. “You ‘ad better ‘ope ‘e is immune. We do not need you causing an international incident by seducing Britain’s so-called “Saviour of zee Wizarding World.’”

“So-called?” Harry said in surprise.

“Pardon, Monsieur Potter,” Fleur said in a superior tone, “but in zee rest of the zee world, you just a minor celebrity for surviving zee Killing Curse. Albus Dumbledore is zee Saviour of zee Wizarding World. Grindelwald was far worse ‘ere zan your Vol-de-Mort.”

From the looks on Fleur’s and even Madame Delacour’s faces, it looked like they were expecting to get a rise out of the Grangers for that, but the English family didn’t even flinch. Thinking fast, Harry replied, “You actually say Voldemort’s name here?”

“But of course,” Fleur said. “We do not “old wis your British superstitions in France.”

“Well, good. It’s good to see _somebody_ doesn’t.”

If Harry and Fleur were trying to top each other, that actually seemed to impress her. A little.

Dan and Emma whispered to other for a few moments, and then Emma said, “Would you and your family like to join us for lunch, Madame Delacour? It’s refreshing to talk to someone so sensible for a change.

The Delacours looked very flattered at this, and when Fleur translated for her, Gabrielle jumped up and down, saying, “ _Ooh, Maman, Pouvons-nous? Pouvons-nous? Pouvons-nous_?”

“ _Calmes-toi, Gabrielle._ I zink we would enjoy zat, Madame Granger. Don’t you, Jean-Claude?”

“Oui, I zink zat would be very enjoyable.”

And so, the Grangers and the Delacours took lunch together in a little bistro in the village. They warmed up to each other surprisingly well as they talked. The Delacours were pleasantly surprised at how well-travelled the Grangers were, and the Grangers were eager to hear all of Fleur’s stories about Beauxbatons. Monsieur Delacour, once he opened up, turned out to be very friendly and a great joker, which was no doubt involved with how he had netted a woman as beautiful as Apolline. The fact that he was immune to her allure probably helped, too.

The one odd thing that happened at that meal was when Gabrielle had trouble cutting her steak (which was overcooked, or so the Delacours claimed). After trying for a while, the little girl frowned in frustration, and then a strange change came over her. A scaly pattern appeared on her face, looking a little like feathers, she grimaced with determination, revealing teeth sharpened to points, and her fingernails elongated into claws with which she tore her steak apart barehanded. There was also a hissing sound as heat seemed to radiate from her hands.

“ _Gabrielle! En voil_ _à des manières_!” her mother scolded.

Gabrielle blushed and changed back to normal: “ _Pardon, Maman._ _”_

The Grangers’ eyes widened. “ _Tu peux faire de la magie sans baguette, aussi_?” Harry asked.

“ _Quoi? Non_ ,” Gabrielle said in confusion.

“ _Aussi_?” said Fleur. “ _You_ can do wandless magic?”

“Um…forget I said that.”

“ _Mais tu as dis_ …” Gabrielle started.

“I’m sorry, but what just happened?” Dan asked.

“Veela are shapeshifters,” Hermione explained. “Full-blooded Veela can transform into—basically harpies, and they can control fire in that form.”

“You are very knowledgeable, mademoiselle,” Madam Delacour said. “Zat is essentially correct. Gabrielle razzer rudely showed you ‘ow much quarter-blooded Veela can manage.”

“But what about zee wandless magic?” asked Fleur.

The Grangers all looked at each other. “Well…we’d rather you didn’t spread it around,” Emma said, “but Hermione and Harry have been teaching themselves wandless magic for a few years, now.”

That led to a demonstration and an explanation of how they had done it, which, in turn, led to Gabrielle getting a gleam in her eye that made her older sister very nervous. But all in all, it was a pleasant meal. At Gabrielle’s insistence, Harry and Hermione agree to write every so often (Who could say no to a face like that?), and they were pleased that if they ever did wind up having to transfer to Beauxbatons, they would already have an acquaintance there.

All in all, it was a very nice holiday.

* * *

The last two weeks of the summer were even busier than the start. The Grangers were going to spend the final week at Grimmauld Place so that Harry and Hermione could revise their first year material and practice their duelling. But before that, they were meeting the Weasleys and Neville in Diagon Alley on the nineteenth. This time, it was Sirius and Remus escorting the family through the Alley as they listened to their stories of France.

The three families met up at Gringotts to a warm round of greetings, and the group formed and reformed over the course of the afternoon until they finally met up again at the last stop of the day, the bookshop. (The bookshop was always the last stop for the Grangers, since Hermione would take up all the available time there.) However, today, there was a very long line at Flourish and Blotts, since it turned out that Gilderoy Lockhart was holding a book signing.

“Mum’s mad about him,” Ron told his friends quietly. “Has a lot of his books already.” Indeed, Mrs. Weasley was quite preoccupied with patting down her hair, and the crowd seemed to be made up mostly of middle-aged witches.

“Lockhart…that stuck-up little Ravenclaw?” Sirius said.

“What? Whatever do you mean, Mr. Black?” Mrs. Wealsey turned to him, scandalised.

“He was four years behind us at Hogwarts,” Remus explained, “and he thought he was the greatest wizard since Merlin.”

“Well, just look what he’s done,” Mrs. Weasley said.

“Yeah, but you didn’t know him back then,” Sirius replied. “He was going after every prize and award the school had to offer, and a bunch more it didn’t.”

“Mind you, he _was_ pretty smart,” Remus said. “We never did figure out how a third year managed to carve his name into the Quidditch Pitch in letters twenty feet high singlehanded.”

“Who says it was singlehanded?” Sirius said with a grin.

“That was you?”

“Yeah, I caught him working on it in the middle of the middle of the night, and I could tell there was no way he’d finish by morning, so I just helped him out a little. You should’ve seen it. He actually took the weeks’ detention without ratting me out because he wanted everyone to think he’d done it on his own.”

“ _Well_ ,” Hermione huffed. “You have to admit he’s become a great dark creature hunter. He wrote almost the whole book list. It _would_ be nice to get his autograph.”

“Heh, new Defence teacher must be a fan,” Ron said.

“I’ll bet,” Neville added.

“Hmm…I wonder,” Remus mused.

Gilderoy Lockhart slowly came into view, with his fancy robes and winning smile, surrounded by dozens of copies of himself on the cover of his autobiography. But no sooner had he come into view than he spotted Harry.

“Why, Harry Potter,” he exclaimed, leaping from his seat. “We meet again.” Then, he pulled Harry out of line and posed for the photographer.

“Hey, that’s my godson,” Sirius protested.

But Lockhart just pulled him out of line, too, keeping a hand clamped tight on each of their shoulders, and said, “Ah, and Sirius Black. A pleasure to meet you. Nice big smiles, boys. The three of us together are worth the front page.”

“Moony, help me out,” Sirius mouthed as the camera flashed.

Remus sniggered. “Not a chance, Padfoot,” he mouthed back.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Lockhart called over the crowd, “young Harry’s own exploits are already becoming well known, but there’s always more to learn, which is no doubt why he was so interested in reading my published works, which I shall be happy to present to him, free of charge—”

“Actually,” Harry spoke up, “my sister just wanted your autograph.”

“What?” she squeaked.

The crowd laughed, and Lockhart laughed especially loudly. “Come on up, here, my dear. Let’s get another picture.”

“No, thank you,” Hermione said, red faced, but Harry pulled her out of line anyway. “I’ll get you for this, Harry,” she whispered.

“If I have to be up here, so do you,” he whispered back.

“Little did Harry and his sister know,” Lockhart continued, “that they would soon be getting the _real_ “Magical Me.” Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to announce that I will be taking up the post of Professor of Defence Against the Dark Arts at Hogwarts this September.”

“Oh, no,” Harry groaned as the crowd applauded.

“Great dark creature hunter, huh?” Harry said as they finally got away with a stack of Lockhart’s books apiece. “Here, Ginny, you can have these. I’ll buy my own.”

Ginny went rigid and wide-eyed as Harry dumped his books into her cauldron.

“Well, he did write all these books. You can’t deny he’s done some great things…You know what, Ron, you can take mine.”

“Wow, gee, thanks,” Ron said sincerely as she handed him her books, keeping only the signed copy of _Magical Me_ for herself.

“Well, well, well, Weasley, Black, Potter, and Longbottom,” a sneering voice said from behind them. It was Lucius Malfoy, with Draco in tow. “The great new power bloc of Britain all in one place. Of course, one of these things is not like the others.”

“I didn’t know you liked _Sesame Street_ , Mr. Malfoy,” Harry quipped to astonished chortling from Hermione.

“I’m sure I have no idea what you’re talking about, Mr. Potter,” Lucius replied coolly. “Now, then, Weasley, I hear that new law of yours is keeping you busy.”

“Well, there’s quite a bit of cleaning up that needs to be done in Britain, Malfoy,” Mr. Weasley replied.

“Perhaps so, in _your_ opinion.” Malfoy reached into Ginny’s cauldron and pulled out her battered secondhand (or third- or fourth-hand) copy of _A Beginner_ _’s Guide to Transfiguration_ and began thumbing through it casually. “Tut, tut, I had hoped there might be some notes in this old book to justify keeping it around…well, I suppose _some_ people might call these ‘notes’.” He turned the book all around to examine the spine.

“Give that back!” Ginny said.

“By all means, girl. It’s the best your father can give you.” And he slipped the book back into her cauldron. “Well, then, Mr. Black, perhaps you can put in a good word for Weasley, here. It’s a scandal, isn’t it, if your friends at the Ministry don’t even pay him well for being a disgrace to the name of wizard.”

“I think I speak for all of us when I say we have a very different idea of what disgraces the name of wizard, Malfoy,” Mr. Weasley interrupted.

“Indeed. An idea that happens to be winning at the moment, may I add,” said Sirius.

“At the moment,” Malfoy said icily. “Come along, Draco.”

“Well, that was weird,” Sirius said as they walked away.

“Do you think he was up to something?” Harry asked.

“Being a jerk, yes. Well, let’s get the rest of the books and head back.”

* * *

The week at Grimmauld Place was also an eventful one. Remus ran Harry and Hermione through their paces, and in between, they read Lockhart’s books and started learning the meditation exercises to start in on Occlumency. Hermione had some special lessons of her own, too.

One day, Victoria McKinnon came to the house, as she still did occasionally. (Sirius was secretly quite pleased that he hadn’t managed to scare her away.)

“Hello, Vicki,” he said. “Everyone’s up in the attic right now. My godchildren and their parents are here this week for some private lessons.”

“Remus teaching them?” she asked.

“Yep. He’s a good teacher. It’s too bad he won’t do it professionally.” (Officially, Remus refused to apply for the Defence Professorship at Hogwarts because he was too smart to tempt the curse.) “But you gotta keep him busy somehow, or he starts brooding, and then he’s no fun.”

“Unlike you, who starts causing trouble.”

“What can I say? I know what I like,” Sirius grinned. “Say, why don’t you come on upstairs. If you’re lucky, you’ll see something _really_ special.”

Vicki put her hands on her hips and said, “Now what kind of thing is that to say to a lady?”

Sirius grinned even wider: “While I’m not normally one for modesty, milady, I guarantee you it’s even more special than _that_.”

Intrigued, Vicki followed Sirius up the five flights to the attic, where they heard Remus giving out instructions.

“Now, the Tickling Charm both distracts your opponent and makes it harder for them to cast their spells correctly—one more reason to learn to cast wordlessly. Of course, you don’t have any problem with that.”

Sirius knocked “Shave and a Haircut” on the door as he pushed it open.

“Hello, Sirius,” Dan Granger said, “and…I’m sorry?”

“Victoria McKinnon.” She shook his hand.

“Vicki just happened to drop by, and I thought you might be interested in showing her your duelling practise,” Sirius said.

“Just happened to drop by, huh?” Remus asked with a smirk.

“Something like that,” Sirius smirked back. “And if none of you mind, I happen to think your…unique duelling style is quite an interesting sight.”

Vicki raised an eyebrow suspiciously. A couple of kids duelling was the very special thing he wanted to show her? But then again, one of those kids _was_ Harry Potter.

After some whispers and pointed looks exchanged among the family, they seemed to decide that it would be alright if she watched them.

 “You know, at the rate we’re going, the wandless thing’s gonna leak before too long.” Hermione said as they moved in position.

_Wait, did she say wandless?_

“Well, it’s not _that_ big a deal, is it?” Harry replied. “It’s not like we’re the only ones who can do it.”

“But Dumbledore and Voldemort are probably the only other ones who are well known.”

Vicki jumped about a foot in the air when she heard that name, but most of the others just rolled their eyes.

“Well, maybe it’ll tone down the legend if they know we can both do it,” said Harry. “Alright, Remus.”

“Good,” Remus said. “One…two…three!”

The spells started flying fast and furious. Both children dodged and weaved about with surprising speed, and it was soon quite clear that they were casting a lot of their spells silently, which was surprising enough. They were first and second-year spells, but they had good aim and power, and their duelling holsters took multiple Disarming Charms each. But then, when Hermione finally forced Harry’s wand away from him, he didn’t even miss a beat, but kept right on going, casting wandlessly.

Vicki was shocked as Sirius’s words came back to her: “even more special than _that_.” Oh, yes, this was. Not only could Harry Potter do wandless magic, but he looked as comfortable without a wand as with one. He _did_ look to be at a clear disadvantage, but he kept duelling, focusing on trying to get Hermione’s wand away from her, and then, to the surprise of much of the room, he succeeded. But Hermione also didn’t miss a beat and also kept going with wandlessly, and after another exchange of spells, she got in a lucky shot and immobilised Harry.

“And, hold!” Remus called, and he started dismantling the duelling wards.

After that display, Vicki noticed two important things about the two children. First, they were duelling at least half a year—maybe a whole year—above their level of schooling, and that was just on the merits of their spells alone. Silent casting was N.E.W.T.-level, and wandless was masters-level. Plus, few casual duellists ever learnt the importance of dodging. The second thing was that on top of their magical skills, Harry and Hermione were fast and ruthless beyond their years. In other words, these two were really going places in martial magic if they so chose.

“Good job,” Sirius praised them.

“Yeah that was really…I’ve never seen anything like that outside a professional tournament,” Vicki stammered. “And at your age…”

“Apparently, the trick is to start early,” Remus said.

Sirius beamed and gave Vicki a sidelong glance. “Well, while we’re on the subject, I think this is the perfect time for my own announcement. Cubs, your godfather is now gainfully employed.”

Remus snorted: “Gainfully employed? You’re more filthy stinking rich than Harry, and he’d never have to work a day in his life if he was careful about it.”

“Which is why I worked so hard to find a job that I liked,” Sirius shot back. “Now, I know I may not always come across as the most responsible one—” Everyone smirked at that. “—but I’ve been doing physical training and revising over the past year. I passed the exam and the physical—” _Barely_ , he thought, but he wouldn’t admit it. “—and Amelia Bones has officially taken me back on as a Hitwizard.”

“That’s great!” Harry and Hermione gasped, and they jumped up and hugged their godfather, and then, so did Vicki, who also gave him a kiss on the cheek.

“Congratulations,” Dan and Emma said, with Dan shaking his hand and Emma hugging him, too.

“Now that’s different from an Auror, right?” Dan added.

“Yes—ah, only half as much training, for one,” Sirius admitted.

“Sorry, but refresh my memory as to the distinction.”

“Aurors are the most highly-trained personnel in the DMLE,” Remus explained. “They deal with dark wizards—capturing them _and_ providing security against them. The way Lily always said it, that means they have to be New Scotland Yard and the closest thing we have to an army rolled into one. Hitwizards, like Sirius—and James—are the next level. They deal with other violent crime, like police firearms units, except they were all given Deputy Auror status during the war. And then the Magical Law Enforcement Patrol are like regular bobbies—petty crime, financial crimes, misuse of magical artifacts, violations of the Statute of Secrecy, that sort of thing.”

“Okay, that makes sense. Good luck, then.”

“I’m sure you’ll do great, Sirius,” Hermione said.

Sirius nodded confidently. Harry was the only one who noticed that his smile didn’t quite reach his eyes.

* * *

“Good news, everyone! It took some doing, but I found an Occlumency instructor for you,” said Sirius.

“You did?” said Harry excitedly.

“Yes, I did. In fact, I’ve arranged for him to come over this afternoon for an evaluation.”

“That’s great!” said Hermione. “Who is it? How did you find him?”

“Well, that’s kind of a long story. First, you should know that the Ministry has an Occlumency instructor for the Auror Corps. Occlumency isn’t required for Aurors, but it’s a big plus for promotions, and there’s certain cases that can only be taken by Occlumens.”

“Like if the criminal is a known Legilimens?” Hermione asked.

“Exactly. But the Ministry’s instructor isn’t authorised to train minors. Actually, no one is, officially, but a few do it anyway.”

“Oh…” Hermione looked crestfallen. “But you found one to train us?”

“Yeah, I really don’t wanna have to learn from Snape,” Harry added.

“Don’t worry, you won’t. But here’s the interesting part: it turns out Occlumency isn’t even magic. It’s all about mental discipline. So not only _can_ muggles learn it, but a lot of muggle leaders _do_.” Dan and Emma looked quite pleased about that. “Seems you learn something new every day. When I confidentially told the Ministry instructor who this was for, he gave me contact information for someone who teaches them. It’s all off the books, of course, since a lot of wizards look down on teaching muggles “magic,” even if it’s necessary.”

“Is this person someone we can trust, though?” Dan said.

“Better,” Sirius grinned. “There’s a little-known position called the Royal Court Magician—a holdover from before the Statute of Secrecy and not officially affiliated with either the Ministry or the muggle government. Since the Statute of Secrecy was enacted, the Royal Court Magician has had just two jobs. One is to keep the Queen apprised of developments in the magical world, like the Minister for Magic is _supposed_ to do for the muggle Prime Minster, and the other is to teach Occlumency to the Queen, the Prince of Wales, and anyone else in the Royal Family who wants to learn. The current Royal Court Magician’s name is Maxwell Barnett. His services don’t come cheap, but when I told _him_ who it was for, he didn’t need much convincing to agree to teach you—all four of you. I’d trust him more than most not to go recklessly mucking around in a kid’s head, and he’s agreed to sign a magical contract with fairly nasty curses on it to not reveal anything he finds in your heads…and he will find things, so be prepared for that.”

“That actually sounds really good,” Emma said. “Thank you so much, Sirius.”

“Hey, what’s family for?”

After lunch, Maxwell Barnett came to the door. He was an older, but upright man with short grey hair and a bearing like an old soldier. One might have expected the Royal Court Magician to be wearing the most flamboyantly wizard-like clothes around, but the Grangers were reminded that this was, in fact, the twentieth century when he arrived wearing a muggle suit. He bowed to Sirius and then to Harry when he entered, saying, “Greetings, Lord Potter. I am honoured to meet you and your family.”

“Um, greetings, Mr. Barnett,” Harry replied awkwardly. He felt an urge to bow to in return. After all, in the muggle world, Barnett far outranked him.

“Lord Potter, I hope you don’t mind that I informed the Queen that your godfather has hired my services,” Barnett said. “Her Majesty has taken a passing interest in you after your most extraordinary defeat of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. She was also very pleased by the recent passage of the Muggle Protection Act…The Ministry’s in a bit of a grey area, legally. Officially, the governments themselves split during the Glorious Revolution, but all British magicals are still British citizens and subjects of the Crown. From one point of view, we can only skirt muggle equality laws because the muggles haven’t written any equality laws about blood purity or species, and I suspect you don’t like that any more than Her Majesty does.”

The Grangers’ eyes all went saucer-sized at these revelations. The Queen herself was following the life of Harry Potter, not to mention magical politics?

“So…you’ve trained some of the Royal Family in Occlumency, then?” Dan asked.

“Quite. Her Majesty was most concerned with Occlumency as a result of seeing the havoc wreaked by wizards in the muggle world during Grindelwald’s War. At her prompting, I taught all four of her children, and I expect to be teaching Prince William and Prince Harry in a few years. I also taught Prime Minster Major last year, since Minister Fudge didn’t see fit to send him an instructor. He was most grateful. Apparently, Fudge hasn’t seen fit to contact him at all since his first day in office, and he didn’t appreciate being left so ignorant about the magical world.”

“That’s what we told Dumbledore the first time we met, Mr. Barnett,” Dan quipped.

“Yes, even the best of us can make mistakes, I’m afraid. Shall we retire to the drawing room to begin the evaluation?”

A few minutes later, they were all seated in the drawing room, and Barnett explained his art: “There are several different techniques for Occlumency, but all of them have the same fundamental goal of focusing on something else more strongly than what the intruder wants to see. For the lower-level techniques you will be learning, the trick is to focus on something with particularly strong associations in your mind to give you the advantage against an intruder who doesn’t know your mind as well.

“We won’t be doing any training today, but I hope to be able to develop a regimen of mental exercises for each of you to practise over the coming months. Different people have aptitudes for different Occlumency techniques, and so to begin, I would like to try Legilimency on each of you to determine your natural aptitudes and talents.”

The Grangers hesitantly nodded to each other. This _was_ what they had signed on for, after all.

“I’ll go first,” Harry said.

“Very well.” Barnett pointed his want at the Boy-Who-Lived and said, “ _Legilimens_.”

A flood of memories came to Harry unbidden and seemingly at random: he was riding a broomstick for the first time…he was at the Wizengamot, and Sirius had just been freed…he was eight and playing football with his friends…he was six and dead tired at the end of a particularly hard karate lesson…he was fighting Quirrellmort for the Philosopher’s Stone…

“Ahhh!” Barnett jerked back and clutched at his chest.

Sirius and Remus looked at Harry, wide-eyed. Did he really have that much natural talent at Occlumency?

But Barnett gasped out, “You _fought_ You-Know-Who’s spirit?”

“Um, yeah…” Harry muttered, looking down at the floor.

“Then Dumbledore’s right? He’s not dead?”

“Not quite, I’m afraid,” said Sirius, “but he’s working on that problem…and you may inform Her Majesty of that.”

“Oh, of course, of course. My apologies, Lord Potter. I was not able to get a good sense of your skills before that…disruption. Might we try again?” Harry nodded. “ _Legilimens_.”

Harry was seeing Hogwarts for the first time, crossing the Black Lake in the boats…he was ten and riding a roller coaster at Blackpool Pleasure Beach…he was hiding under the sofa with Hermione during the Great Storm of 1987…he was prowling around outside on four legs, looking for something to eat… _NO!_

Barnett jerked back again: “You’re an _animagus_?!”

“And _you_ _’re_ under contract,” Sirius reminded him as the Grangers all tensed up.

“Yes, I understand…but…how?”

“Accidental magic…we think,” Harry replied, trying to relax again.

“But that’s…never mind. I suppose I should expect impossible things from Lord Harry Potter. Might we try that one more time?”

Harry nodded again, though he wasn’t so sure about this whole thing, now.

“Very well. _Legilimens_.”

Harry was standing in front of the Mirror of Erised…he was five, and Mum and Dad were asking him to join their family…he was at Privett Drive the night he escaped… _You don_ _’t need to see that._ He focused on Barnett’s face and on denying him access to anything more.

Barnett jerked back a third time, but this time repelled, if inexpertly, by an act of will. “Ah, much better, Lord Potter, thank you. Now, for the rest of you…”

He tested Hermione, Dan, and Emma in turn. None of them like having their minds invaded, but none of them reacted so strongly to it, either. Harry had the biggest secrets in the family. Soon, Barnett had reached his conclusions.

“Mr. and Mrs. Granger and Hermione,” he said, “all three of you have very active minds. This can make you easy targets if you are untrained, but it can also be useful. Your natural aptitude is to harness this power using the method of loci, whereby you can redirect an intruder through a mental maze of images, ideas, and associations in place of the memories he or she wants to see.

“Lord Potter, you are very strong-willed, and you have much mental discipline, likely as a result of your karate training. However, your natural aptitude is toward expelling an intruder by an act of will, focusing on the intruder directly. This is a good start, but is, unfortunately, the weakest and least efficient technique, as it is a head-on battle of wills. The thing to do in this situation is to refine that skill into what is known as the mental image technique: concentrate on a single expansive and detailed image or scene, incorporating all five senses, if you can, which forms a barrier that an intruder cannot penetrate to reach other memories.

“I’m also pleased to see that both you and your sister have enough mental discipline that your age should not be a disadvantage. What I would like to do is test your skills over Christmas holidays and then again at the beginning of next summer. If you keep up with your mental exercises, you should only need a summer’s worth of formal training by then to be certified Occlumens.”

“That’s great. Thank you, Mr. Barnett,” Harry said. The rest of his family agreed.

* * *

On their last day at Grimmauld Place, Sirius brought in a suspiciously long and thin box wrapped in colourful paper. “Hermione,” he told the recipient of said gift, “since we won’t see each other again until Christmas, I wanted to give you your birthday present early.”

Hermione took the parcel, wide-eyed, and carefully unwrapped it. Then, she gasped, “It’s a _Cleansweep Seven_! This is rated as the best Chaser’s broom on the market!”

“That’s right. Harry tells me you have potential as a Chaser. The _Nimbus Two Thousand_ is faster, but the _Cleansweep Seven_ is more balanced in its capabilities, so it should be just what you need.”

“Thank you, Sirius! Thank you! Thank you! I love it!” And she nearly bowled him over when she hugged him. She wasn’t so sure about making the Quidditch team anytime soon, but she was at least joining the Flying Club, and it would be that much better with a quality broom.

Sirius also pulled her aside a little later for a private chat: “Your _other_ lessons have been going very well, too. I know it doesn’t look like much progress, but it’s an extremely mental discipline. The Occlumency will probably help with that even more. I think you’ll be able to figure out your form by Christmas, and then you’ll be halfway there.”

“This isn’t easy, is it?” Hermione sighed.

“I warned you it wasn’t. But you really are doing fantastic. You shouldn’t compare yourself to Harry getting there by accident. You’re doing this twice as fast as James and I did, and you’re a year younger than we were.”

“Well, there _is_ that.”

Sirius grinned: “Good luck at school, Kitten.” He kissed her on the forehead. “Not that you need it.”


	44. Second Year

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Harry Potter permits us to voyage through time, to tap the wisdom of JK Rowling.
> 
> Parts of this chapter have been quoted from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.

_“How did you find the young Lord Potter, Mr. Barnett?”_

_“As per my contract, Your Majesty, I cannot reveal what I learnt from the boy’s mind. However, I can safely say that Harry Potter is the most extraordinary young man I have ever met.”_

* * *

The Granger Family arrived at King’s Cross with plenty of time to spare, and Hermione and Harry were all set for another year at Hogwarts—hopefully a quieter one this time.

As if that were ever going to happen.

“Okay, Harry, Hermione, you first,” Emma said as they approached the barrier into Platform Nine and Three Quarters.

“Yes, Mum,” Hermione said as Harry pushed his trolley toward the barrier, and she close behind him, building up speed until—CRASH!

“Ahhh!”

Harry hit a solid barrier, and Hermione, having nowhere near enough room to stop, crashed into his back. They both went sprawling on the floor. Hedwig’s cage fell off Harry’s trolley and rolled away, leaving the owl shrieking.

“Oh my God, are you alright?” Emma said. She and Dan rushed over to help their children up.

“Oww…” Hermione groaned. Her hair was sticking out at odd angles as she brushed herself off.

“I’m okay…” Harry mumbled, even though he was all but pinned between the two trolleys and the wall. He turned and started pounding on the wall, saying, “What happened.”

“That’s what we were wondering,” Dan said.

“The barrier sealed itself,” Hermione said, trying to press on the wall herself.

“It shouldn’t do that on its own,” Harry countered.

“Do you think someone sabotaged it?” she asked.

“I don’t know…I saw other people going through it, though.”

“Could someone be trying to keep you out?” asked Emma.

“Maybe, but you’d think someone would notice…” Suddenly, Harry got an idea. “Come here,” he whispered, motioning his family closer. “Cover me.”

“Harry!” Hermione protested, but she wasn’t fast enough.

Harry crouched low so that he was completely hidden by the trolleys and his family. Very quickly, he shrank down to cat form and sniffed around at the base of the barrier. Immediately, his nostrils were bombarded with a magical scent he had smelled once before. He very nearly went out pursuing that scent on four legs before he remembered who the owner of that scent probably worked for.

Harry stood back up at once in human form and yelled out, “Dobby!”

A yelp of surprise sounded from behind a nearby pillar. Harry leapt over the trolley and ran at the sound with a speed honed by years of karate, with Hermione close behind. He whipped around the pillar and grabbed a small, skinny arm in his hand before the elf could react. In another moment, Hermione had grabbed his other arm, and they carried Dobby the house elf out into the open and set him down in front of their parents, struggling but unable to pull away. The Grangers could already see a number of other witches and wizards behind them, staring as they waited to get on the platform.

“Harry Potter!” the elf squeaked. “Harry Potter must not be angry with Dobby—”

“Dobby, did you seal the barrier?” Harry asked.

Dobby cringed, seemingly trying to hide from the enquiring eyes, and lowered his voice: “Dobby warned Harry Potter that he must not go back to Hogwarts.”

The Grangers all sighed with annoyance, but Emma crouched down in front of the elf and said, “Dobby, we know you think something bad is going to happen at Hogwarts, but we talked it over, and we warned Professor Dumbledore and some other important people, and we think we can handle anything that happens. So would you please let us through the barrier?”

“But—”

“You can’t keep us from going back,” Hermione said. “We can always go by Floo or the Knight Bus. And you’re holding up everybody else who has to get through.”

Dobby flinched as he again realised how much attention he was attracting. Harry and Hermione let go of his arms. Hanging his head, Dobby snapped his fingers, and a white glow briefly surrounded the barrier. Then, he snapped his fingers a second time and vanished.

Emma shook her head, saying, “Tsk-tsk. I don’t what’s going on with him. I wish we could something…well, you two have to go. Harry, do you want to try it again?”

Harry straightened up his trolley, keeping a firm hand on Hedwig’s cage this time, and gave it a shove. It glided through the barrier without any trouble.

The Grangers quickly said their goodbyes and loaded Hermione’s and Harry’s luggage on the train. They didn’t see the Weasleys yet, but they met up with Neville and said hello to some of the other students.

“I wonder if Luna Lovegood is here yet,” Harry suggested. “We should thank her for helping us deal with Snape.”

Hermione shrugged her shoulders: “Let’s look around.”

As they started down the hallway, Neville muttered, “I wish we could just get rid of Snape.”

“I know,” said Hermione, “but at least we got him to move a little. And we can still keep up the pressure this year.”

“Yeah. And Binns could use a kick in his ethereal pants, too,” Harry added.

“I think we’ve got our work cut out for us,” Hermione sighed.

They found Luna Lovegood sitting alone in a compartment near the front of the train, swinging her feet on the seat with her nose buried in an upside-down copy of _The Quibbler_.

“Hello, Luna,” Harry said warmly.

Luna looked up in surprise: “Hello, Harry Potter. Hello, Hermione Granger…And you’re Neville Longbottom, aren’t you?”

“Erm, yeah?” Neville said, blushing slightly. They’d only briefly met before at Sirius’s New Year’s party. Luna stuck her nose back in her magazine.

“How was your summer, Luna?” Hermione asked.

Luna looked up again: “It was quite pleasant, even though Daddy and I failed to find any crumple-horned snorkacks.”

Harry sniggered as Hermione struggled to keep her obvious response to herself. Neville just looked very confused.

“Um…snorkacks?”

“Yes,” Luna said. “They’re very skittish, you know, and good at hiding. Daddy’s been looking for them since before I was born.”

“Well…how do you know they’re there, then?” Neville asked.

“Oh, there have been sightings, of course, especially in Northern Europe. We get letters from other people who are searching for them.”

“Crank letters,” Hermione muttered under her breath.

They had been expecting to see the Weasleys shortly, but none of them showed up in the cabin until after the train started moving, when, finally, Ron stumbled in the door with Ginny tagging along behind him.

“You made it,” Harry said.

“Barely,” Ron replied. “Fred and George forgot some of their stuff, and then we had to go back for Ginny’s diary.”

Ginny said nothing to rebut this, but that was probably because being around Harry tended to rob her of her voice.

“Hello, Ginny,” Luna emerged from behind her magazine again.

“Er, hi, Luna,” Ginny squeaked softly.

“I see the wrackspurts are still giving you trouble,” Luna said. “Would you like me to write Daddy for some siphons?”

“Uh…uh…no thanks, Luna,” Ginny said as the others tried not to laugh.

“Okay, what’s _she_ doing here?” Ron complained.

“We looked for her,” Harry said. “Her father helped us try to deal with Snape last year, and we wanted to see her.”

“Well, good luck,” Ron said. “She’s dotty as anything.”

“That’s not very nice, Ron,” Hermione said. It was probably true, she thought, but he didn’t need to say it in front of her.

They talked for a while—mostly just the second years. Ginny was still too tense to speak in Harry’s presence, and Luna mostly read _The Quibbler_ , except when she put her head up for a moment to make an odd and seemingly random and sometimes uncomfortable comment.

As the day wore on, Luna was starting to try Hermione’s patience as she talked about various non-existent magical creatures and ridiculous conspiracy theories—at least that was Hermione’s assessment. Harry doubted most of the things the blond girl believed in were true, too, but he thought it was oddly endearing. Maybe he was just so used to being an oddball himself, but he seemed to be the only one who wasn’t put off by her strange comments.

The trolley rolled by, and Harry treated the whole compartment to their favourite snacks (he and Hermione were more trusted with pocket money than any of the others). But shortly afterwards, Draco Malfoy strutted into the compartment, flanked by Crabbe and Goyle.

“Bet you think you’re pretty hot stuff, don’t you, Potter?” Malfoy said. The rest of the cabin glared at him, except for Luna, who ignored him.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Malfoy, you’ll have to be a bit more specific,” Harry said calmly.

“You know what I’m talking about. You get one new law passed, and you think you can get your picture in the paper any time you want.”

“Um, not really,” Harry said. “I’m glad to have made a difference in our society, but otherwise, I was trying to lie low this summer. Perhaps you have me confused with Professor Lockhart.”

“Whatever, Potter. It doesn’t matter, anyway. You may have won this round, but don’t expect it to last.”

“Haven’t we already had this conversation, Malfoy?” Harry said. The others giggled.

“Just a friendly warning,” Malfoy replied. “You can’t expect to make it very far with the riffraff you hang out with. Not all victories will come so easily.”

Ron and Neville jumped to their feet to confront Malfoy, but Harry waved them back and stood up in front of them. “Well, thank you for the warning, but I already know that,” he said coldly, and he brushed his fingers through his hair so as to deliberately expose his scar. “Now, if you think it’ll help you so much, why don’t you go on and play with your properly-pedigreed purebred pet pugs?” he motioned to Crabbe and Goyle.

Malfoy’s goons cracked their knuckles menacingly, while the rest of the compartment sniggered at them, but then, they were all distracted by a shriek of laughter from Luna, who dropped her _Quibbler_ and nearly fell off her seat.

“That’s _funny_ , Harry,” she said, gasping for breath.

Malfoy glared at them, but he just said, “Keep your mongrels and loons away from me, Potter,” and he stalked away.

“Purebred pet pugs…” Luna said, still giggling.

“Pets gorillas, more like,” Ron added, to more laughter.

Ron was a little nicer to Luna after that, and things went smoothly until they got to the castle. Disembarking from the train, the second-years waved to Hagrid while Ginny and Luna joined the other wide-eyed first years as the huge man escorted them to the boats. The rest of the students proceeded to the carriage station, where some of the older students were also filtering in from Hogsmeade. A fifth of the population of magical Britain lived in Hogsmeade, and while it was traditional for all of the first-years to take the train so that they could start making friends and meet at the boats together, Hogsmeade residents almost never did again unless they were prefects, who were required to be there.

When they arrived, however, Neville froze in fear in front of the carriages and stared at something that apparently only he could see.

Hermione needed only a moment to realise what was happening. She leaned close to him and whispered, “It’s okay, Neville. It’s just the thestrals. They won’t hurt you.”

“Oh, um, right,” Neville muttered, and he followed onto the carriage.

The Great Hall was even emptier this year after the relatively large graduating class had left. Even after eating every meal there for nine months, the many empty seats were a sobering reminder of the cost of the war that ended eleven years ago. Ginny’s and Luna’s class, being born almost entirely in the awful year before Voldemort’s defeat, was the absolute smallest class in centuries. (The following year would have been, but it got a boost from the rash of children conceived in November of 1981 and born in August of 1982.) The Gryffindor foursome took their seats just before the first years filed in, looking very small in both numbers and size.

The first Gryffindor of the new class was a very small, mousy-haired boy named Colin Creevey who sat near Harry and looked more wide-eyed at the grandeur of the castle than any of the other first years (except Luna, who looked wide-eyed about everything). The Sorting went quickly; Luna took the longest before eventually going to Ravenclaw. Harry noticed Malfoy watching her appraisingly across the Hall the longer she took and seemingly relaxing a bit when she was finally sorted. Ginny was the last and quickest: an instant Gryffindor.

With the Sorting completed, Dumbledore was back to his usual ebullient self as he opened the feast: “Welcome! Welcome to a new year at Hogwarts. Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words. And here they are: Surcoat! Plectrum! Nim! Gelding! Thank you.”

Most of the Great Hall applauded, but Colin Creevey was confused: “Wow, is he a bit mad?”

“Yes,” Harry and Hermione said in unison.

They quickly lapsed into their usual routine for the feast: Harry dishing up the meat and Hermione dishing up the vegetables. They only got a few strange glances for that this year. However, Colin was staring for a different reason. After hearing Harry’s name spoken a few times, he spoke: “You’re Harry Potter, aren’t you?”

“Er, yeah, I am,” Harry said.

“Cool! I’ve read all about you.”

Harry sighed: “If you mean the _Harry Potter Adventures_ series, they’re complete rubbish.” Ginny choked a little nearby.

“There’s an Adventures Books series?” Colin said excitedly. “I didn’t know that. I just read about you in _Modern Magical History_ —all about how You-Know-Who tried to kill you, but you survived, and he disappeared, and you were adopted by muggles, and you still have a lightning scar on your forehead.” Ginny nodded eagerly at his description. “This place is _amazing!_ I didn’t even know the weird stuff I could do was magic until I got my letter, but—”

“Okay, Colin, calm down,” Harry interrupted. “Listen, _Modern Magical History_ isn’t all that accurate, either. The real story is that my birth mother died to protect me, and that’s what saved me from Voldemort.”

Ginny yelped in fear, and a lot of other people around them flinched.

“Who?” Colin looked around confused.

“Voldemort. That’s You-Know-Who’s name. Some of us aren’t afraid to say it.”

“Wow, that’s really brave,” Colin said in awe.

“No, it’s common sense,” Harry told him. “I was raised in the muggle world, too. Out there, I’m just a normal kid, like you.” He motioned vaguely out behind him. “You know that no one’s scared of names out there, the same as I do, and you shouldn’t be scared in here, either.”

“Huh, I guess not. I figured it was some kind of magic name or something.”

“No, it’s just people being scared.”

“Alright, Harry—say, do think I could get a picture with you when I get my camera tomorrow? You know, so I can show my parents I met you? They’d really like to see.”

Harry sighed in spite of himself.

“Did I say something wrong?” Colin said.

“Harry doesn’t really like a lot of attention,” Hermione said. “But you know what? We like to keep in touch with muggle-borns’ families. Why don’t you give us your parents’ address, and then our parents can contact them in person.”

“Really? Wow, that’d be great. Thanks a lot!”

“No problem, Colin,” Harry said.

* * *

The next day, after re-potting mandrakes in Herbology and turning beetles into buttons in Transfiguration, Harry and Hermione made it to their first Defence Against the Dark Arts class with Gilderoy Lockhart. Hermione still thought it would be a good class, but Harry had grown even more sceptical of the man after reading the books, especially when he compared the alleged time lines:

 

_“I’m telling you, Hermione. There’s no way even a wizard could have been fighting chameleon ghouls in North Africa when he was on his way from banishing a banshee from Bandon, Thailand, to ferreting out a colony of trolls in Russia at the time.”_

_“Well, maybe it’s a typo,” Hermione replied._

_“I’m telling, you, there’s something fishy about these books.”_

_“You’re overreacting, Harry.”_

_“I don’t think so. And have you_ seen _how they_ _’re written. Half of this stuff’s just about how great he is. If he teaches like he writes, I don’t know if I can take it.”_

 

So Harry wasn’t holding out much hope for quality instruction. He was mainly hoping the Defence Professor didn’t try to kill him again.

 _When the whole class was seated, Lockhart cleared his throat loudly, and silence fell. He reached forward, picked up Neville_ _’s copy of_ Travels with Trolls _, and held it up to show his own, winking portrait on the front._

 _“Me,” he said, pointing at it and winking as well. “Gilderoy Lockhart, Order of Merlin, Third Class, Honorary Member of the Dark Force Defence League, and five-time winner of_ Witch Weekly’s _Most Charming Smile Award._ _”_

Harry had a sudden urge to reintroduce himself as “Lord Harry James Potter, Order of Merlin, Third Class, likely future member of the Dark Force Defence League, and likely future winner of _Witch Weekly_ _’s_ Most Eligible Bachelor Award,” but that wouldn’t help his image as a fame-seeker.

_“I see you’ve all bought a complete set of my books—well done. I thought we’d start today with a little quiz. Nothing to worry about—just to check how well you’ve read them, how much you’ve taken in—”_

_When he had handed out the test papers, he returned to the front of the class and said,_ _“You have thirty minutes—start—_ now _!_ _”_

Harry looked down at the first question:

  1. _What is Gilderoy Lockhart_ _’s favourite colour?_



_Lilac_ , he thought, followed immediately by, _Oh, God, how do I_ know _that?_

Hermione must be rubbing off on him after all these years because he knew the answers to a surprising number of Lockhart’s fifty-four questions about himself from reading his books. For the ones he didn’t know, he just wrote down whatever nonsense he could think of:

  1. _Which product does Gilderoy Lockhart use to clean his teeth with to achieve his famous dazzling white smile?_



_Faith and trust_ _…and a little bit of pixie dust,_ Harry wrote.

Predictably, Hermione got full marks on the quiz. With that out of the way, Lockhart got on with what Harry hoped would be the practical part of the lesson and lifted a large, covered cage from behind his desk.

_“Now—be warned! It is my job to arm you against the foulest creatures known to wizardkind! You may find yourselves facing your worst fears in this room. Know only that no harm can befall you whilst I am here. All I ask is that you remain calm. I must ask you not to scream,” said Lockhart in a low voice. “It might provoke them.”_

He whipped the cover off the cage, revealing it to be crammed full of tiny, blue, winged, jabbering, elf-like creatures.

No one screamed. Several people laughed. Seamus Finnigan gave a loud snort and said, “Cornish Pixies? Are you serious?”

“Well, they _are_ class three-X creatures,” Hermione said. “They’re on the curriculum.”

“Right you are, Miss Granger,” said Lockhart, “and devilishly tricky little blighters they can be, too—so let’s see what you make of them!”

He opened the cage, and the pixies zoomed out and swarmed all around the room. They were like Peeves at his worst—smashing windows, spilling ink everywhere, shredding books, and lifting Neville up onto the chandelier. Hermione tried to beat the pixies away with her arms like everyone else for a minute before thinking to draw her wand and freeze them in midair a couple at a time.

But while most of the class were hiding under their desks, Harry was loving it. Not even bothering to use magic, wanded or not, he jumped up on his chair, hopping from one desk to the next and laughing as he snatched pixies out of the air with his bare hands. To even an untrained eye, he looked a lot like a cat jumping around, batting at a swarm of bugs. “I changed my mind, Mione, this is fun!” he said.

Hermione glared at him while she fought off two pixies that were pulling her hair. Once he had a handful of the creatures, he hopped down and stuffed them back in their cage.

“You’re doing great, there, Harry,” Lockhart beamed. “But try _this_ on for size.” He brandished his wand and bellowed, “ _Peskipiksi Pesternomi_!”

The pixies grabbed his wand and threw it out the window.

“Oh, dear…well, I’ll just let you nip the rest of them back in their cage, then,” he said, and he fled from the room. Most of the class did, too, except from Harry, Hermione, Ron, and Neville, who was still hanging from the chandelier.

“Can you _believe_ him?” Ron said.

“Well, I suppose he _should_ have taught us the Freezing Charm before he let them out,” Hermione admitted.

Between the two of them, Hermione and Harry corralled the rest of the pixies pretty quickly, until Neville was the only thing left in the air.

“Why is it always me?” he said.

“Sorry, mate, we’ll get you down,” Harry said. “Mione, give me a hand.” They both waved their hands and wandlessly levitated Neville down safely.

“Thanks,” he said, although he was still giving Harry a bit of a funny look for his antics.

* * *

That evening, Oliver Wood made the announcement in the Common Room: “Alright, listen up, Gryffindors. We’re gonna be holding Quidditch tryouts this Saturday at nine AM sharp. We’ll be trying out _all_ the positions _and_ picking some reserves because you never know when a hot new talent will come along, so everyone who wants to play, make sure you show up on time. That goes double for last year’s team—even you, Potter.”

And so, it was a pretty good-size group that made its way out to the Quidditch Pitch on Saturday morning. Hermione was there, since Harry insisted she at least try it, and Ron was hoping for a long-shot chance that he would make Reserve Keeper.

“Alright, first I want everyone to divide up by position,” Wood said, pointing in a line: “Chasers, Beaters, Keepers, Seekers.”

The group divided up as instructed, except for one large and smug-looking third year.

“McLaggen, what are you you doing?” Wood demanded.

“Trying out for Beater _and_ Keeper.”

“Fine.” He looked over at Harry, who was also standing alone. “Anyone else for Seeker?” he called. No one responded. “Alright, I guess you’re off the hook, Potter.”

Wood started out the tryouts by dividing the applicants into groups of seven and telling them to take a lap around the pitch. He weeded out a solid majority of the applicants this way, since even many of the students who were decent at flying weren’t so good at doing it in a tight formation, and there were several messy pileups.

After that, he sent out the Chaser applicants in groups of three and had them run some simple drills. Of course, the returning team members, Angelina, Alicia, and Katie, dominated the competition, but Harry cheered when Hermione performed fairly well, especially for a second year. After eliminating a few applicants, Wood sent them up for another round, this time sending Fred and George Weasley up with them to hit a Bludger around the pitch. After so many years of karate, Hermione’s reflexes were quite fast—almost as fast as Harry’s. Even Wood was impressed by that bit.

None of the hopeful Beaters were anywhere near as good as Fred and George. (“Like a pair of human Bludgers themselves,” Wood had described them last year.) Only McLaggen came close.

Finally, they had the Keeper tryouts. Wood delegated these to Angelina Johnson and dutifully took his place in the lineup. They didn’t take too long, though, as the returning Chasers only had to throw a few goals to see how good each candidate was. Only Ron, McLaggen, and a mediocre fifth year tried out against Wood, whom Harry could tell was playing at a near-professional level. Ron wasn’t bad—he had the basics down—but Harry could tell he needed some work. In the end, the choices were fairly obvious.

“Alright, everybody, I’ve made my decision,” Wood said when the group reassembled. “The starting lineup will be the same as last year.” There were a few groans. “Myself as Keeper, Bell, Johnson, and Spinnet as Chasers, Fred and George Weasley as Beaters, and Potter as Seeker. Now…Crittenden and Whitney, you’re Reserve Chasers.” The two upper year students smiled. “McLaggen…” Wood sighed. “You’re Reserve Beater _and_ Reserve Keeper.” Harry sighed softly, too. He had barely met McLaggen, but he had already shown himself to have an abrasive personality, and the double assignment would only make him smugger.

After this, most of the group dispersed, but Wood turned to a disappointed-looking Hermione and Ron and said, “Granger, Weasley, you’ve both got a lot of potential; you just need to build up your skills. Put in a year in the Flying Club, and come back next year.” Both of them looked happier with that encouragement. Finally Wood turned to Harry: “Potter, we still don’t have a Reserve Seeker, and that means you need to make sure you show up at the games. You scared me last year when you landed in the Hospital Wing a week before the final.”

“Right, I’ll make sure to fight Voldemort at a more convenient time this year,” Harry deadpanned, causing Wood to flinch.

“Alright, that’s it. Practice starts Monday at four, same as last year.”

“Sorry you guys didn’t make the reserves,” Harry told Ron and Hermione as they walked back to the castle.

“It’s alright,” Hermione said. “I wasn’t really expecting to make it. And I’m sure I’ll enjoy the Flying Club.”

“Yeah,” said Ron, “and I guess I only have to beat McLaggen next year. He doesn’t look _that_ tough.”

Harry smiled, looking forward to a good Quidditch season.

* * *

_Dear Tom, Fred and George made the Quidditch Team again today. Ron didn_ _’t, but Wood told him to try again next year. And Harry Potter did, too, but no one tried out against him._

_Good for them,_ Tom wrote back after the words vanished into the page. _You seem to have a very talented Quidditch family._

_Yes. I wish I could try out this year. I know I can fly better than Ron._

_I_ _’m sure you can, Ginny. You told me you’ve been flying longer than him._

_I have. I really wish I could, Tom. Maybe if I could get on the Quidditch Team, then Harry would notice me._

_Doesn_ _’t he notice you already? You told me he kissed your hand._

_No, he was just being polite. Harry doesn_ _’t really notice me. I can’t talk to him, and he doesn’t even know I’m there half the time._

_Well, if you can_ _’t talk to him, perhaps writing would be a better solution._

_I can_ _’t write to him. We sit three seats apart at breakfast. That would just be weird._

_Just a suggestion. If you want Harry Potter to like you, you_ _’ll have to do something to get his attention._

_I know, Tom. But it_ _’s even worse because Harry’s already done so much, and I haven’t even had a chance. Ron even says Harry can do wandless magic already._

The ink swirled on the page in what Ginny by now recognised as an expression of surprise: _He can?_

_Yes. Ron said Harry and Hermione have been practising it since they were little. I haven_ _’t seen it, though. I guess Harry doesn’t want to attract attention._

_That_ _’s silly. There’s nothing wrong with attracting attention if it’s from the right sort of people._

_I know! You understand, Tom. And why should Harry mind? He_ _’s already done so much else. He caught a Death Eater and freed his godfather, and he won the Quidditch Cup last year, and Ron said he knows all the secret passages in the castle and stuff._

There was a splatter of ink drops that signified laughter, and then Tom wrote, _Well, I_ _’m sure he’s good, but Harry’s not the only one with secrets. I bet I could show you some secrets about the castle that even_ _he_ _doesn_ _’t know._

_Really?_

_Yes. Let me show you_ _…_

* * *

About an hour later, Harry heard something strange whilst sitting up in the quiet Common Room—a soft murmuring—or maybe hissing—like someone talking into a pillow.

“Did you hear something just now?” he asked.

Hermione pricked up her ears and listened. “I don’t hear anything.”

“Huh, must have been the wind.”


	45. Luna Lovegood

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Any sufficiently advanced Harry Potter is indistinguishable from JK Rowling…maybe.

_Dear Hermione and Harry,_

_We got a chance to meet the Creeveys this weekend. It_ _’s a bit of a drive from where we live, but it’s not too far out of the way._

_Mr. and Mrs. Creevey were very friendly and were happy to feed us lunch. They were very grateful that Colin was able to put them in contact with people with a few years of experience with the magical world. Obviously, it was a bit of a shock to have their illusions corrected. It_ _’s even more clear with them than we saw at the orientation last year that Hogwarts is whitewashing the more unsavoury aspects of the magical world to the muggle-born families. Your mother thinks they might simply have a blind spot when it comes to the treatment of muggle-borns and non-human races. We have to wonder if it would be helpful to put each new muggle-born student in contact with one that’s already attending school in addition to the orientation._

_Anyway, the Creeveys are taking it pretty well, and they_ _’re eager for more information. We think we have an idea of what you’re experiencing with Colin right now. He has a nine-year-old brother named Dennis who’s at least as much of an unstoppable force as Hermione was at that age and even more excitable. If you’re lucky, being around magic for two years will calm him down some before he starts at Hogwarts._

_We_ _’re glad to hear you’re starting off strong again. Harry, congratulations on making the Quidditch Team again, even if it was unopposed. Hermione, don’t worry; we’re sure you’ll have a good chance if you work hard at it. Good luck with Professor Lockhart. It sounds like you might need it—just be careful around him. And stay out of trouble, you two._

_Love,_

_Mum and Dad_

* * *

“Hey, guys, how was Flying Club?” Harry asked as Hermione and Ron came in from the Training Grounds.

“It was a lot of fun,” Hermione said. “It’s mostly reserve Quidditch players and people who want to try out, so we played a pick-up game.”

“I did lousy,” Ron grumbled.

“You were just inconsistent,” Hermione said. “That’s what the practice is for. Oh, and Harry, guess what. Madam Hooch said Ginny did really well in her first flying lesson. I guess she really does know how to fly.”

“Yeah, I guess,” Ron said in annoyance.

They started climbing up to Gryffindor Tower, but along the way, they spotted a small, blond girl skipping through the corridors. That might not have drawn too much attention, except that they knew this particular girl, and Harry noticed that she was skipping in her bare feet.

“Hello, Luna,” Harry called.

Luna turned and skipped over to them: “Hello Harry, Hermione, Ronald.”

“Hi,” Hermione and Ron said.

“Um, Luna…where are your shoes?” Harry asked with concern.

“They seem to have gone missing,” she said. Her voice kept the same dreamy quality as always, as if nothing were out of the ordinary. “I suspect nargles are to blame.”

“Nargles?” Harry said. “Er, are you sure?”

“Oh, there could certainly be other possibilities…but on the whole, I suspect the nargles.”

Hermione gave Luna a sceptical look, which she seemed to ignore.

“Aren’t your feet cold?” said Harry.

“A little bit, but it’s still quite warm this time of year.”

“Well…do you want some help finding your shoes?” Hermione asked.

“No, thank you. I’m sure they’ll turn up before long. Well, I’m off to the library,” Luna said brightly, and she skipped away.

Ron just shook his head at the flighty girl, but Harry and Hermione both watched her go with concern.

“I don’t think it was nargles,” Hermione whispered.

“No, neither do I,” replied Harry.

* * *

After the incident with the pixies, Professor Lockhart didn’t attempt to bring any more creatures into the classroom. Instead, he preferred to read or act out scenes from his books, on the pretence that the best way to learn was by example. Harry didn’t see how the students would learn all that much if they were always the dark creature being defeated, not to mention that Lockhart wasn’t teaching them any spells or tactics, or…much of anything, really. Quirrell may have been possessed by Voldemort, Harry thought, but at least he taught them something useful.

“But of course, everyone knows how stupid trolls are. I simply drew my wand and cast _Wingardium Leviosa_ on the brute’s club, and then, while he was looking around for it, I levitated it up and…CLONK! Dropped the troll’s club on his own head!” Lockhart gesticulated animatedly as he described his troll-taming exploits. “And as everybody knows, when you get trolls together, they turn into natural herd animals, so when I dropped the biggest and toughest one, all the others decided _I_ was the toughest one and started following me.” He laughed lightly. “And _that_ is how you tame a herd of trolls. It’s a strategy that served me well for the rest of that year, and again on my journey to Tibet—for details, see _Year with the Yeti_. Any questions?”

Calling for questions was really a canard. Harry had noticed that Lockhart loved to answer easy questions about himself (mostly from the girls in the class), but he tended to dodge anything difficult, like asking for more details about the dark creatures he fought. But Harry saw an opening and took it. He raised his hand.

“Yes, Harry,” Lockhart, flashing his unnaturally white smile.

“Professor, you talk a lot about your Chinese tour in _Year with the Yeti_. I especially liked that chapter about your visit to Xanadu on the trail of the Almas.” Lockhart swelled with pride. “The thing is, according to _Harry Potter in the Empire of the Sun_ , I was in Xanadu at the same time you were when I was on my way to Japan, fighting the Mongolian death worms. Now…” Harry gave a small laugh. “…I don’t even remember that. Do you, Professor?”

Most of the Gryffindors sniggered, having heard Harry complain about how those books were made up all last year, but to his surprise, Lockhart started to sweat: “Well…um…that would be quite the coincidence. Um…I think we must have just missed each other. I don’t think I remember you being there, and I certainly don’t remember anything that you…uh…don’t.”

Harry didn’t take the chance of telling Lockhart that he’d never actually _been_ to Xanadu and certainly hadn’t fought Mongolian death worms there, but he did make his opinion known after class: “It’s one thing if he doesn’t know the _Harry Potter Adventures_ are fake. But he was acting like he barely even knew his own books.”

“Well, he’s done so much, maybe he gets it mixed up sometimes,” Hermione said.

“Come on, Hermione, are you going to defend _this_ Defence teacher, too?” Harry asked. “He may not be possessed, but he’s complete rubbish at his job, and a little creepy.”

“I admit he’s not a very good teacher, Harry, but that doesn’t mean he’s not a great dark creature hunter. You could be nicer to him.”

“I will if he’ll actually teach me something besides “managing my fame.” The git just won’t take no for an answer.”

“Harry!” Hermione chided, even though she could still understand how annoyed Harry was getting with Lockhart. He had been offering unwanted help with “managing his fame” practically every time he could get Harry alone.

At dinner that night, Colin Creevey sat down across from them with his usual “Alright, Harry?” Harry had succeeded in calming him down from their first meeting, but the little first year was still highly excitable.

“Hi, Colin,” Harry replied.

“Hey, Harry, did you really fight Mongolian death worms?”

Harry sighed heavily. That new rumour had been circulating the castle all day. “No, Colin,” he said. “I told you those books were complete rubbish.” He added, mostly to himself, “Honestly, when Voldemort’s defeated, and I can reveal my secrets, I’m gonna write _The Real Harry Potter Adventures_ to set the record straight.”

Hermione giggled at him.

“What you think I can’t write?” he said indignantly. “Don’t you think fighting Quirrellmort and all that last year would make a good book?”

“Blimey, I’d read that,” Ron said.

“It could be good,” Neville commented.

“There, you see?”

“If you say so, Harry,” Hermione said.

“I mean it. Maybe I’ll start tonight. I can see it now: _Harry, Hermione, and the Curse of the Defence Professor_.

Hermione rolled her eyes: “That’s a ridiculous title.”

“What’s wrong with it?”

“It’s a bit cumbersome, for one, don’t you think? And it’s not specific to last year. And you really don’t need to work my name into it. I didn’t do that much.”

“Sure you did. You did plenty.”

“Not as much as you. And besides, if you want to get the readers’ attention, you should make it sound more similar to the original books.”

“Fine,” Harry relented. “How about… _Harry Potter and the Philosopher_ _’s Stone_.”

Ron, Neville, and even Colin nodded their agreement. Hermione looked thoughtful: “I guess that doesn’t sound too bad. Alright, writer-boy, write me a chapter or two, and then I’ll believe you.”

Harry knew Hermione thought he was still joking, but he’d show her. That night, he grabbed a spare notebook and wrote at the top of the first page, _Harry Potter and the Philosopher_ _’s Stone…_

* * *

That Saturday, Harry ran into Luna wandering the castle barefoot a second time. But she was looking a bit bedraggled this time, mainly because her long hair was messy with no apparent attempt to style it.

“Hi, Luna,” Harry said.

“Hello, Harry,” she replied as she pinned something to a bulletin board. Intrigued, Harry took a closer look:

 

_LOST_

_School shoes (size 2)_

_A pair of pink fuzzy slippers (size 2)_

_A pair of hiking boots (size 2)_

_1 bottle of lavender-scented shampoo/conditioner_

_Turquoise hairbrush (natural re_ _’em bristles)_

_Three purple quills (woodpecker, with special markings)_

_A bottle of colour-shifting ink_

_If found, please return to Luna Lovegood_

_Thank you_

Harry’s face darkened. The missing shampoo and hairbrush explained the hair, and he knew that natural re’em bristles couldn’t be cheap. They’d have to be imported from America, for one. He quickly caught up with the girl, who was looking for a place to pin another copy of her list.

“Luna, are you missing _all_ of these things, now?” he said.

“Unfortunately, yes,” she said, somehow retaining her serene tone. “My shoes _did_ come back for a few days, but they’ve vanished again. The nargles have been very active lately.”

Harry sighed: “Luna, I really don’t think nargles did this.”

“Well, I suppose it _could_ be a practical joke. I can see how some people would find that quite funny.”

“That’s not right. You should tell a prefect, or Professor Flitwick.”

Luna turned and smiled at him whilst still starting unblinkingly: “That’s very thoughtful, Harry, but I’m sure they’ll turn up sooner or later.”

Harry watched in frustration as the little Ravenclaw skipped away. He didn’t like bullies, ever since his early childhood with Dudley. He wanted to do something, but there wasn’t much he could do if she didn’t want his help.

Suddenly, he rushed to catch up with her as a different thought struck him: “Say, Luna, we’re having a birthday party for Hermione in our Common Room. Do you want to come?”

Luna stopped and stared at him with her wide, silver eyes. Harry couldn’t help his natural reaction to stare back. “I haven’t been invited to a birthday party in a long time…” she said. “Will there be pudding?”

“Um…I don’t think so, but there’ll be cake.”

“I suppose it would be fun, if Hermione doesn’t mind.”

“No, she’ll be fine. You should come.”

“Alright, Harry, I think I will enjoy that.”

It was hard to tell with Luna, but Harry thought she did enjoy it, even if she put off some off the other guests with her messy hair, bare feet, and all-around weirdness. Even Hermione rolled her eyes behind Luna’s back, but his sister was perfectly happy with her party. It wasn’t until afterwards that Harry explained what he had seen earlier in the hallway.

“I’ll bet they’re picking on her just because she’s so strange. It’s what Dudley did to me when I was little.”

“Hmm, maybe it is,” Hermione said. “Do you want to tell Professor Flitwick? We don’t know who took her things, but he might be able to help.”

“I don’t know. She didn’t want me to, but I wish we could do something to help her. What I’d _like_ to do is give the people who did this a piece of my mind.”

“I understand, Harry, but that probably wouldn’t help, and we still don’t know who they are, anyway.”

“Yeah—if we could get into Ravenclaw Tower without being noticed…Actually, maybe I could.”

“I’m not sure it’s such a good idea to use your invisibility cloak to sneak into Ravenclaw Tower. What if you get caught at the door, or someone trips over you?”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right,” Harry said. “It’d be risky for a long stakeout…although maybe if I were smaller…”

His sister’s eyes widened as she realised what he was suggesting: “Harry, no! Anyone could recognise you from a mile away with that scar of yours.”

“But if I stick to the shadows…”

“No, Harry. It’s too risky. You know what Mum and Dad and Dumbledore and McGonagall would all say. Besides, Luna’s strange, but I can already tell she notices things other people don’t. You’ve got enough people in on your secret already. No prowling, little brother, got it?”

Harry tried to stare her down, but Hermione was as good as he was after all these years. “Alright,” he grumbled, “no prowling.”

But Harry wasn’t quite ready to give up. He didn’t really have much idea of what to do, but after mulling it over for a while, he was struck with a sudden idea. He ran up to grab his mirror and call Sirius.

* * *

“Professor, I noticed some inconsistencies between your adventures in _Voyages with Vampires_ and _Wanderings with Werewolves_ ,” Harry said.

Professor Lockhart’s face fell a bit. “Such as?” he said.

“Well, in _Voyages with Vampires_ , you say that in March of 1989, you were in Scandinavia with the Draugr Clan preparing for their equinoctal migration. But in _Wanderings with Werewolves_ , you say you were in Armenia in March of 1989.”

“I see…well…” Lockhart stammered. “Mistakes can work their way into books, even for the best of us.”

Harry flashed him a predatory smile: “That’s what I thought at first, sir, but in _Voyages with Vampires,_ you mention watching the Northern Lights during the Solar Storm of 1989, and then in _Wanderings with Werewolves_ , you mention having to deal with magical interference from that same solar storm.”

“Did I now?” Lockhart said with a nervous laugh. He grabbed Susan Bones’s copy of _Wanderings with Werewolves_ and started thumbing through it. Harry thought he was really starting to sweat this time. “Huh…I see…I…I think I must have got a couple of pages of my notes mixed up,” he said. “I do remember I was in a bit of a hurry that week. Um…five points to Gryffindor for pointing out that error.”

“Thank you, sir,” Harry said, even if he didn’t believe it.

* * *

Thing went smoothly at Hogwarts for the next week. Harry and Hermione were doing well in their classes. Professor Snape was his usual surly self, but he seemed to be coping with his larger N.E.W.T. class after being forced to accept E students. Harry was avoiding Professor Lockhart as much as he could. Neville had committed himself to joining Harry and Hermione for their exercise regimen at least three days per week and was making slow, but steady progress. Oliver Wood was scheduling what were probably excessive amounts of Quidditch practises.

And on Friday, Harry received the package he was waiting for from Sirius, and he was eager to use it. Over the course of the week, Luna had had some of her missing items turn up and some others disappear, and Harry was pretty sure he had heard some of the Ravenclaws refer to her as “Loony Lovegood,” and he was ready to do something about it.

“I got it, Hermione. I got it,” he told his sister in hushed tones that afternoon.

“What did you get?” she asked in confusion.

Harry smiled: “My ticket into Ravenclaw Tower.”

“Harry!” she hissed. “I told you—”

“No prowling, yes. Because people would recognise my scar…but they’re not going to recognise my scar.” He opened the package and show her was was inside.

Hermione raised an eyebrow: “Black henna men’s hair dye?”

“It’s perfect: if we cover up my scar, no one will recognise me. I could just be some first year’s cat. I just need you to put it on for me.”

Hermione lowered her voice to a whisper: “You want to dye your fur with a product middle-aged men use to cover up grey hair in order to sneak into Ravenclaw Tower to find out who’s stealing from Luna?”

“Yeah, now you got it. I figure it’ll be more reliable than a Colour-Change Charm.”

“Are you serious—don’t say it!”

“Fine. But Sirius did say he might try it for himself. You know he picked up some grey hairs in Azkaban.”

Hermione rolled her eyes. “And what do you think you’re going to do when you find out who’s bullying Luna?” she asked.

“Probably just tell a prefect privately. I know Luna doesn’t want to make a big deal about it, but I don’t want to just leave her.”

“This is risky, Harry. If you get caught, there’ll be hell to pay from everybody.”

“I’m not gonna get caught, Mione. No one’s gonna notice another cat roaming around besides the other cats. And besides, it’ll be nice to be able to roam the castle without being noticed for a change.”

Hermione sighed. “You’re _really_ going through with this?” Harry silently challenged her to a staring contest, and this time, he won. “Alright, I’ll help you. I don’t want you trying to get Ron to dye your fur—as funny as that would be. But let the record show that I don’t approve.”

“Your disapproval is noted,” Harry said. “Let’s try my dorm. I doubt there’ll be anyone up there.”

Harry climbed the stairs to the second year dorm, with Hermione following. Sure enough, it was empty.

“Alright, let’s get this over with,” Hermione said, grabbing a few tissues and sitting on Harry’s bed.

Harry sat across from her. “Hmm, I wonder if the charm against boys going into girls’ dorms works on animagi,” he mused.

Hermione froze. “It had better,” she said nervously. “Otherwise, what would your dad and Sirius have done?”

“Yeah, probably. Alright, let’s do this.” Harry pitched forward onto his hands and knees and transformed into Ratsbane. His kitten form (if he could still call it that) had got a little larger over the past year and was maybe pushing eight months in cat years, but his appearance was the same as ever: black with white paws, the brightest green eyes his family had ever seen on a cat, and a white streak in the fur on his head in the same lightning-bolt shape as his infamous scar.

It was this white streak that needed to be covered up for him to be able to roam the castle freely without being spotted. The bright eyes might give him away if someone was looking for him, but there was no reason for anyone to be. Taking the tissues in hand to clean up any mess and keeping one eye on the door to make sure no one came in, Hermione used the hair dye brush to being covering over the white fur, but the moment she did, Harry jerked back, shook his head violently and covered his nose with his front paws.

Hermione put and free hand on her hip and said, “Harry, I don’t think you’ve quite thought this plan through. It’s going to smell. If you want to do this, you’re going to have to deal with it.”

Harry meowed grumpily at her. In cat language, he was roughly saying, _Just do it_ , but Hermione didn’t know that.

She kept going, carefully covering up the scar bit by bit. “I suppose I should have seen this coming,” she said. “Ratsbane, the next generation Marauder—of _course_ you’d go wandering about the school on four legs, looking for trouble.” Harry meowed something she couldn’t translate, but she knew her brother well enough that she didn’t need to. “Don’t try to deny it. I know this is for a good cause, but I’m sure you’ll be out there causing trouble sooner or later. It’ll be your own fault if you get caught by Professor McGonagall. I’m sure she’ll spot you, even if no one else does.”

Harry meowed again.

“You know, as soon as I become an animagus, you’re gonna get it.”

Harry caterwauled in protest.

“I don’t care what animal I’m going to be. You’re gonna get it “cause I’m sure I’ll be something that can give it to you.”

Harry made a noise that sounded like a challenge.

“Yes, I guess we’ll see, won’t we…Oh, Merlin, look at me, I’m having a conversation with a cat.”

Harry hissed at her.

“Well, same to you.” Hermione capped the bottle of dye and waved her hand, casting a wandless Drying Charm on Harry’s fur. The smell diminished—not entirely, but enough to be bearable. Harry didn’t think a human would be able to smell it unless they got right up in his face. “Alright, furball, you’re all set,” she said.

The black cat with white paws, green eyes, and a now-solid black forehead meowed happily and padded out the door. Hermione stowed the hair dye in his trunk away from prying eyes. They were just in time, as they met Neville coming up the stairs. The rather clumsy boy nearly tripped over Harry as the cat descended and after that nearly ran into his sister.

“Oh, h-hi, Hermione,” he said in surprise. “What are you doing up here?”

“Just, um, getting something for Harry,” she said quickly. “See you later.” She quickly rushed down the staircase, following the cat to the Common Room.

Not seeing very many people around, Harry decided to try the girls’ staircase anyway. He padded up to it carefully, slinking along the edge of the Common Room. Hermione whispered for him to stay back, but he was determined to try it. Taking one last look around to make sure no one was watching him (Hermione was covering him, anyway), he cautiously put both of his front paws on the first step. The alarm didn’t sound just for that, but he could feel the hostile magic priming, and he immediately jumped back, hissing. It definitely wouldn’t let him go up.

“Told you,” Hermione said.

Harry gave her an annoyed-sounding meow and proceeded over to the portrait hole. Hermione grudgingly pushed it open whilst whispering, “Be back by curfew, Ratsbane.” He nodded and leapt gracefully out the door.

Exploring the castle was very different in cat form—Harry hadn’t really appreciated it during his brief forays last year. To feline eyes, colours were subdued, especially the reds, but the wider field of sharp vision, the exquisite motion detection, and the sevenfold better vision in low light more than made up for this. It was a whole new perspective on the castle. He could see all the little details he normally missed—the dust and cobwebs in the corners, the elaborate decorative moulding on every wall and baseboard, some of them actual bas-reliefs with stories worked into them, all the mice scurrying across the floors—since when were there this many mice in the castle?

Harry’s feline ears added still more. Cats could hear an octave and a half above the range of a human and an octave above even the range of a dog. He could hear the squeaking of mice, the chattering of bats, and the buzzing of insects far more clearly than in human form, not to mention the distant sounds of students roaming the halls.

But smell—that was by far the most interesting. Even after all these years, it still put Harry on the verge of sensory overload. Humans could only detect a few scents at a time before they all washed each other out, but a cat could hone in on a particular note—a single human’s scent trail out of the many who passed through the area—almost as well as a dog. At any given point in the castle, Harry could smell a short recent history of the people and animals that had passed by. And he was constantly awash in the magic of the castle. It filled his nose and clung about him like a mist, but he could also smell specific spells through it that had recently been cast in the area.

Harry could have spent all night exploring the cat’s version of Hogwarts, but he had work to do. After a few minutes, he made a beeline for Ravenclaw Tower. It wasn’t far, even for a kitten, but he passed several people along the way—thankfully without a second glance. His disguise was working. Soon, he reached the entrance to the Tower, where he met his main obstacle. Unlike at Gryffndor Tower, there was a door, but there was still no doorknob—only an eagle-shaped bronze knocker. He sat beside the door, meowing occasionally, as if he were some Ravenclaw’s cat who had got locked out.

After a few minutes of this an older student came to the door and knocked the bronze knocker once.

The eagle’s beak opened, and it spoke, “One Two Three Cat and Un Deux Trois Cat had a swimming race from England to France. Who won?”

 _That_ _’s ridiculous_ , Harry thought. _No self-respecting cat would enter a swimming race—Wait, there_ _’s no password?_

“One Two Three Cat,” the Ravenclaw said. “Because Un Deux Trois Quatre Cinq.”

“Admirable accent,” the knocker replied, and the door swung open.

The Ravenclaw held the door open for Harry, who hissed indignantly at the knocker before slipping inside.

The Ravenclaw Common Room was airier than the Gryffindor Common Room, with high, arched windows and rolls of blue an bronze silk hanging between them over tall bookcases. Straight ahead, in a small niche, was a marble bust that Harry took to be Rowena Ravenclaw.

Harry leisurely padded around, wandering between human, table, and chair legs, observing the students. He spotted Luna sitting alone against the wall, doing her homework. He felt a little sorry for her, sitting alone like that, but he restrained himself from approaching, in case the perceptive girl recognised his distinctive eyes. Instead he stuck to the limited shadows himself and looked around to see who was looking in Luna’s direction the most. At the moment, no one particularly stood out, and it was quite possible that her main tormentors weren’t in the room. Still, he had plenty of time before curfew. He found a convenient vantage point and sat and waited.

Within minutes, he realised his mistake. It had been too long since he had spent an extended period as a cat. Cats slept twelve to sixteen hours per day and could slip into a “cat nap” at the drop of a hat. After dozing for a few minutes, he jerked awake and shook his head in confusion, to the amusement of a couple of third year girls sitting nearby. He got up and tried to let his feline instincts take over, wandering around the Common Room and playing like a kitten—a shy one; he quickly slipped away whenever somebody tried to pick him up—whilst keeping his ears open for Luna’s name. He heard it a few times, as often as not rendered as “Loony,” but only in isolated, offhand comments.

Finally, as he was really running out of time—he heard it. Two of Luna’s roommates entered the Common Room and, among other things, began discussing their little “pranks’ in hushed whispers.

“Hey, look, Loony found her shoes again,” a girl with a strong Irish accent said. From conversations with Colin and what he could get out of Ginny, Harry was able to identify her as Dierdre Cholmondeley.

“Yeah, it’s kinda creepy,” whispered another girl, whom Harry was pretty sure was called Melanie Maxwell. “I didn’t think she’d ever find them after Marietta got through with them, but it’s like Loony’s even better at finding weird, random places to look for her stuff than she is.”

“Probably from wandering off all the time,” Cholmondeley said. “Where does she even _go_?”

“Who knows?” said Maxwell. “Probably hunting nargles or something.”

“Oh, Merlin. What are nargles supposed to be anyway?”

“I don’t know and I don’t want to know. I might catch her craziness. Anyway…” Maxwell leaned close and whispered in Cholmondeley’s ear, but Harry picked it up: “I think I can get hold of some of that weird jewelry of hers.”

Cholmondeley giggled and whispered back, “Great. Do you think we should just chuck it this time?”

“Nah, it’s funnier to watch her looking for them all over the place.” Both of them giggled.

Harry fumed that Luna’s roommates could be so cruel. He listened to them for a few more minutes, until they (mostly) changed the subject, and the news didn’t get any better. He could tell there were other people involved, some he could identify and some he couldn’t, but based on what he knew from watching Luna, these two seemed to be the worst offenders. At that point, he decided it was time to go, and he sat by the door and meowed a few times, and pretty soon, someone let him out of the tower.

Being short on time, Harry didn’t waste time exploring more and headed straight back to Gryffindor Tower. Unfortunately, his luck was not as good as he had hoped because along the way, he passed Professor McGonagall in the corridor, and both of them made the mistake of stopping and staring.

They both walked on before they could attract unwanted attention, but McGonagall ducked into a nearby alcove and transformed out of sight before coming out and walking up alongside Harry.

She meowed at him, _Boy-Kitten, what are you doing?_ It was hard for a cat to sound distinctly stern, but she pulled it off.

Harry slowed his pace to a stroll and meowed back, _I help Girl-Child-Friend with bad human-children_.

Not missing a beat, the grey tabby replied, _You let teacher-humans deal with bad human-children_.

Harry whined slightly and replied, _I won_ _’t use magic. Want to find out who they are_.

 _You should not be in halls as a cat_ , McGonagall said.

 _Humans won_ _’t know me like this._ He motioned to his forehead with a paw. _Helper-Sire and Old-Sire_ _’s-Friend and Girl-Litter-Mate helped._

McGonagall rolled her eyes. _You be careful or I will stop you._

_Yes, Teacher-Cat._

The tabby’s eyes narrowed. It was an easy guess where he had been from the route he was taking. _You should not go where not allowed. Should not be in Bird-Of-Prey-House,_ she said. This was a corruption of the feline word for “house,” but it was understood by the two animagi.

Nominally, yes, Harry thought, but he was still confused about the entrance to Ravenclaw Tower: _Bird-Of-Prey-House does not need hidden-word. All smart human-children go in._

She snorted in annoyance: _Bird-Of-Prey-House does not fight other houses like Big-Cat-House and Snake-House. Human-children should stay in own houses._

Harry lowered his head and grumbled, _Yes, Teacher-Cat_.

_Good. Go back to Big-Cat-House before end-day-time._

Harry nodded and kept walking while Professor McGonagall went the other way. He was disappointed, but not surprised that the professor wanted to curtail his feline wanderings. He would probably catch flak from Mum and Dad for this whole thing before it was over, but it was worth it in his mind. _Someone_ needed to do something for Luna. And there was really no harm in exploring the rest of the castle this way as long as he kept his eyes and ear open.

It was those ears that picked up a whining meow shortly before he reached Gryffindor Tower, and before he could react, around the corner came the one creature in Hogwarts he wanted to meet less than Professor McGonagall.

To humans, Mrs. Norris looked unhealthy: scrawny and dust-coloured like her owner with scruffy fur and bulging yellow eyes. Many humans would have guessed she was much older than her actual age of five years. But on a cat’s level, she actually looked a lot better: lean, but not underweight; unkempt, but not mangy. Harry thought she smelled a lot like an outdoor cat: very physically active and prone to roaming in common areas of the castle and sometimes out in the grounds. And despite her appearance, she smelled surprisingly healthy, and, of course, she had the strong scent of Filch on her, easily identifiable as the only squib in the castle.

When Mrs. Norris spotted Harry, she walked toward him, meowing, _New cat. Strange cat._ She sniffed him carefully: _Know your scent. Magic smells like Woman-Cat. Scent smells like bad boy-human._

Harry watched the cat warily and replied, _I am not being bad._

Mrs. Norris kept circling around him and said, _Human-Servant no like your human-servant._

He realised that without seeing him transform, her feline brain couldn’t make the connection that he _was_ the human-servant and not just a strange-smelling cat. And he didn’t much appreciate the comment. _Your human-servant does not like any humans_ , he shot back. _Human-children don_ _’t like him._

She probably only got the gist of that, but she still replied, _Human-Servant hunts bad human-children. I help._

Harry cocked his head in confusion at this insight into Mrs. Norris’s mind. Students sometimes joked about Filch being married to his cat, and he’d occasionally heard a callous sixth or seventh year laugh about how sad the man had been when his last cat died. Harry had been _that close_ to telling them off on general principle. He didn’t like Filch, but he’d never mock a cat-lover. But no one had ever speculated about how Mrs. Norris felt about Filch, only complained about how well he had her trained. Struck with a sudden twinge of curiosity, Harry asked, _Do you like your human-servant?_

Mrs. Norris stared at him. _Good Human-Servant_ , she said. _Takes good care of me. Enjoys hunting bad human-children. I help hunt._

Harry was taken aback. _Enjoys_ might have been too strong a word, since cats weren’t very big on empathy, but it was the same kind of language he would use to describe playing with Hermione in cat form. This was a whole other side to Mrs. Norris. He didn’t need to ask if she also enjoyed hunting errant students—she was a cat, after all—but the fact that she had such a strong bond with Filch was surprising. _What is your name?_ Harry asked, genuinely interested.

Mrs. Norris meowed something that couldn’t be strictly translated, but evoked her ability to stalk the castle at night and sneak up on unsuspecting students.

 _I am Death-To-Rats_ , Harry replied, as his Marauder name _did_ translate decently into cat.

In acknowledgement, Mrs. Norris gave Harry a slow blink. He returned the gesture, and she finally went on her way.

 _I just made friends with Mrs. Norris,_ he thought. _Weird things happen when you_ _’re a cat_.

His wandering done for the day, and just in time for curfew, Harry meowed loudly beneath the portrait of the Fat Lady and knocked on the bottom of her frame three times with his paw. A few seconds later, the portrait opened, and he leapt inside, straight into Hermione’s arms.

“Socks! Where have you been?” she said indignantly, alerting Harry to the fact that there were other people in the Common Room. Harry meowed in protest for her to put him down.

“Is that your cat, Hermione?” asked an older girl nearby. “I didn’t think you had one.”

“No, he’s not mine,” Hermione said quickly. “I think he’s kind of adopted me, though. Hmm…I wonder if Mum and Dad would let me get a cat of my own.” Harry meowed again. “We have a cat, but she’s too old to come to Hogwarts.”

Hermione put Harry down, and he bolted up the boys’ staircase, into his dorm room (luckily only Ron and Neville were in there, and they weren’t paying attention), and then into the bathroom, where he untransformed and shut the door. He looked in the mirror. He had a thick streak of black dye on his forehead over top of his scar. And then, he realised his other mistake: it didn’t come off with soap and water. The colour lightened after several washings, but he needed it to _disappear_ in order to avoid arousing suspicion. In desperation, he tried wandlessly casting the charm to remove ink stains. It was probably ill-advised to cast that on his own head, but, thankfully, it worked. Even so, he decided he should probably look into getting a water-soluble dye, or maybe just test the Colour-Change Charm over long periods. He didn’t know what effects that charm might have on skin with repeated use. Still, he was able to exit the bathroom dye-free.

“Harry?” Ron said. “I didn’t know you were in here,” Ron said.

“Oh…well, I am,” Harry said.

Ron’s eyes narrowed suspiciously, wondering what exploits Harry was getting into now. Neville just looked confused.

* * *

Hermione demanded to hear all the details of Harry’s feline excursion as soon as they got a private moment. She was equally incensed by the callous behaviour of Luna’s roommates, although she made him promise not to do anything drastic about it. She registered a firm I-told-you-so in response to his being caught by Professor McGonagall, and she was as surprised as he was by his conversation with Mrs. Norris.

Harry also got a stern talking to from McGonagall later in which she warned him about the dangers of going wandering about in cat form, but didn’t outright forbid him from doing it again, so long as he didn’t go out of bounds, including the other houses’ common rooms.

In the end, Harry decided to do two things about Luna. The first thing was to politely mention to Mandy Brocklehurst that Luna Lovegood didn’t seem to have any close friends and might benefit from having a second year girl show her the ropes.

The second thing was to talk to a prefect in private. The Ravenclaw prefect Harry was most acquainted with was Penelope Clearwater, the sister of the actress from the Diagonal Theatre. He was reasonably sure that she wasn’t involved in the bullying—if she was, it was a far bigger problem, and he would have to take it straight to Professor Flitwick—so the first chance he got, he caught her with her friends in the library and said, “Excuse me, Miss Clearwater, could I speak with you in private for a moment.”

He knew Penelope was a muggle-born and so wouldn’t be as impressed by his formal tone and his Boy-Who-Lived status, but she _had_ been steeped in the magical world for five years, now, and her pureblood friends would be far more ingrained with the Harry Potter legend, which, for once, he was counting on to help him if necessary.

“What is it, Mr. Potter?” Penelope said after they moved off to an isolated corner.

“Miss Clearwater, it has come to my attention that Luna Lovegood is being bullied by her housemates and two of her roommates in particular. They’ve been stealing her things and hiding them, and a number of people have been calling her ‘Loony Lovegood’.”

Penelope’s face darkened: “Miss Lovegood told you this?”

“No, she didn’t actually tell me. I figured it out on my own. She doesn’t want to make a big deal about it, which is why I’m telling you privately.”

“Well, I’m afraid that’s not much to go on…”

“I understand that you can’t do anything without evidence. I’m just asking you to keep an eye on them.”

The prefect sighed. She didn’t like bullying, but it would be nice to have more than this to work with. “Alright, who are they?” she asked.

“There are a number of people involved,” Harry said, “but the main ones are her roommates, Dierdre Cholmondeley and Melanie Maxwell.”

“Okay, I’ll keep an eye on them, Mr. Potter, and I’ll deal with them if I find anything. I have to ask you not to take matters into your own hands.”

“Of course not. Thank you for your help.”

“Certainly.” Penelope turned to leave, but she stopped for a moment and said, “By the way, if Miss Lovegood didn’t tell you, how do you know all this?”

Harry smiled at her: “Please, Miss Clearwater…I’m Harry Potter.”

Over the next week, a strange new set of rumours began to circulate the castle about Harry Potter, and rather more hushed ones than usual. They said that Harry Potter was a seer, or a mind-reader, or a magical spy, or that he was sneaking into people’s dorms invisibly, and that he had embarked on a one-man anti-bullying crusade. Hermione was at the same time dismayed at the misinformation and impressed by the use of plausible deniability for Harry’s real trick. But when nothing overt happened for a few days, the rumours died away, replaced by a new round of gossip. The only thing that happened was that Luna Lovegood found all of her missing possessions suspiciously fast.


	46. The Duelling Club

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Any JK Rowling can predict Harry Potter.

That week, notices were posted in the four house common rooms that a Duelling Club would be starting on Thursday night. Harry and Hermione were especially excited by the news.

“It’ll be nice to finally get some professional instruction in the subject,” Hermione said to anyone who would listen. “We asked Professor Flitwick about setting up a club last winter.”

“Yeah, except he said he’d need some help to do it,” Harry commented. “I hope he didn’t get Lockhart.”

“Why not? I’m sure Professor Lockhart is a great duellist with all the things he’s done.”

“He _says_ he’s done,” Harry countered.

Unfortunately for Harry, Lockhart was indeed Flitwick’s assistant. The Duelling Club met in the Great Hall, where a long duelling platform had been set up with permanent ward stones set up at the corners that would allow people to pass through, but not spells. The turnout was good, with first years up through seventh years looking excited to learn the art and a few (like Malfoy) bragging about their own independent training.

To begin, Professor Flitwick hopped up on the stage. “Good evening, good evening,” he squeaked, “and welcome to the Duelling Club. It’s good to see so much interest in this noble sport. The last Duelling Club at Hogwarts sadly fell apart nearly thirty years ago, but when a couple of students suggested we restart it last year—” He glanced at Harry and Hermione out of the corner of his eye. “—I knew it was an idea whose time had come. Duelling is an excellent sport to learn advanced spells, quick thinking, tactics, and the elements of self-defence. Of course…I may be biased.” Many people laughed at that. “Now, as I am sadly very busy, I shall merely be popping in for lessons from time to time, while the regular meetings will be organised by Professor Lockhart, whom I am… _sure_ is quite skilled at the sport as well.”

Flitwick’s voice went very sarcastic on that last sentence, and he looked rather unhappy with the choice, but Lockhart didn’t seem to notice. He bound up on the platform, flashing his trademark smile, and swept his arms over the Hall. “Hello, hello! Gather round!” he said. “Can you all see me? Can you all hear me? Excellent! When Professor Flitwick approached me with the suggestion to start a Duelling Club, I was delighted. It’s a _little_ outside my field of expertise, of course, but duelling isn’t _too_ far removed from defence, and I am happy to help teach you to defend yourselves from both wizard and beast, as I have done on countless occasions—for full details, see my published works.”

Flitwick visibly rolled his eyes.

“Now, of course, we’ll be following student duelling rules in this club: no dark spells, no serious injuries, that sort of thing. They’re much more limited rules—more narrow, admittedly, but that’s in order to ensure your safety, of course. In a full honour duel, the rules are much looser—anything goes short of death, maiming, and Unforgivable Curses. Yes, honour duels are far more serious business than anything we’ll be doing here.

“ _But_ , we will still be abiding by the Duelling Code—honour, professionalism, and all that. So let’s have a demonstration, shall we? Let me introduce my assistant, Professor Snape.”

At that, a dour, dark-robed figure stepped up from the edge of the Hall, glowering at the Defence Professor, no doubt unhappy at being called anyone’s assistant. “What’s Professor Snape doing here?” Hermione whispered to Harry.

“Maybe he wanted the first crack at Lockhart,” Harry whispered back.

“Maybe they’ll finish each other off,” Ron muttered.

“Nah, Snape’s an ex-Death Eater. He’ll wipe the floor with Lockhart,” said Harry.

“Professor Snape tells me he knows a tiny bit about duelling,” Lockhart said. The Slytherins all sniggered behind his back. “And he has sportingly agree to help me demonstrate the forms. Not to worry, you’ll get your potions master back in one piece when I’m through with him.”

Snape sneered at Lockhart, and even Flitwick was smirking at the pompous Defence Professor. He still didn’t even notice, despite the truly frightening look he was getting from Snape. “Now, watch carefully. In the standard form, you stand at the centre of the duelling platform, like so…” he said. Snape stood opposite him, mirroring his actions. “Brandish your wand…” He held his wand in front of his chest and then swung it down by his side. “Bow to you opponent, then turn and pace off to the end of the platform. This demonstrates that you obey the Code of Honour not to hex someone in the back, and trust your opponent to do the same.”

Harry was impressed—a little that Snape was actually following the Honour Code and a lot that Lockhart actually knew it. But then again, as much as he disliked the man, Harry had to admit that the one thing Lockhart _did_ know was how to work the media, and that meant he had to be very familiar with the customs of honour and etiquette.

“Now, once you are in place, raise your wand in one of the accepted combative stances,” Lockhart said. He held his wand out in front of him like a fencing _épée_ , while Snape held his over his head, as if ready to swing it down like a cutlass. “Once you take your stances, the referee will count you off, and you cast your first spells on three. Professor Flitwick, if you would, please?”

Flitwick stood in the middle, just off the platform, and cried, “One…two… _three_!”

Both men waved their wands, but Snape was a good deal faster with his cry of, “ _Expelliarmus_!” A jet of red light struck Lockhart so hard he was knocked off his feet. Many of the Slytherins cheered, and Harry suspected that a lot of the others (like himself) were thinking about it.

“Do you think he’s alright?” Hermione asked.

“Who cares?” Harry and Ron said in unison.

Lockhart staggered to his feet, dazed and wobbling. He took his wand back from Lavender Brown, who all but swooned at his touch. “As you can see,” he said with a slight slur, “that was a Disarming Charm. Simple, but effective, although if you don’t mind my saying so, Professor Snape, it was quite obvious what you were about to do. It would have been all too easy for me to block you, but I thought it would be instructive for the students to see—” He trailed off as Snape glared at him hard enough to get even his attention. “Well, then, now that you’ve all seen it, why don’t we try it out, shall we?” he switched gears. “We professors will divide you up by year and then put you all into pairs…”

Harry automatically tried to stay close to Hermione (and she to him), since she was one of the few people in his year who was near his level, and the only one of those he trusted.

But Snape had other ideas. He made a beeline for the pair and said, “No need to make a mess of things with sibling rivalry, now. Mr. Potter, why don’t you pair off with…Mr. Malfoy, come over here. And Miss Granger, you can partner with Miss Greengrass.”

Now partnered against probably the two best duellists in their year (with the possible exception of Theo Nott), Harry and Hermione had their work cut out for them, even if they were probably more advanced at dodging. Daphne Greengrass inclined her head politely to Hermione, but Draco Malfoy only smirked smugly at Harry, looking eager to try the duel he had been denied last year and was confident he would win.

“On my count, I want you all to cast your Disarming Charms at your opponents,” Lockhart said. “Disarming Charms _only_.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Hermione saw Flitwick watching her and Harry closely.

“One…two…”

“ _Everte Statum_!”

Hermione snapped her head around to see that Malfoy had started early and not used the Disarming Charm—the little cheater! She was relieved when Harry dodged, but then, she just had time to half-see and half-magic-sense Daphne’s Disarmer coming toward her. She ducked, and the spell just cleared her head.

“ _Expelliarmus_!” she cried. Daphne tried to dodge as well, but she wasn’t quite as fast. Her wand went flying through the air, and Hermione caught it one-handed.

“ _Rictusempra_!”

“ _Tarantellegra_!”

“ _Colloshoo_!”

“ _Slugulus Eructo_!”

Harry and Malfoy were still going at it, neither one gaining an advantage over the other. Flitwick ran over to them: “Stop! Stop! Enough! _Finite Incantatem_!”

The two boys’ spells stopped, leaving them reeling. Around the Great Hall, in was chaos, as many other pairs had suffered unintended side effects or intentional jinxes and had to pick themselves up off the floor.

“I know you have both had training, but you _will_ be expected to follow the Duelling Code here, Mr. Malfoy,” Flitwick squeaked. “And the task was to disarm _only_ , both of you. Five points from Gryffindor and ten points from Slytherin.”

“My apologies, Professor,” Malfoy said, looking most unapologetic. “I was overexcited.”

“Now, now, Professor Flitwick,” Lockhart jumped in, “it seems these two are prodigies. Perhaps an exhibition duel is in order.”

Harry’s eyes widened a bit, and he glanced at Hermione. He had never been in a serious duel with anyone other than his sister, and Draco Malfoy in front of the Great Hall would not be his first choice, not least because there was a good chance Malfoy was still better than he was.

“I think that is an excellent idea,” Snape said with a twisted smile that indicated he also expected Malfoy to win. Harry started to sweat a bit.

“I suspect that Miss Granger is her brother’s superior in this matter,” Flitwick interrupted, to some surprised murmurs.

“Oh, there will be plenty of time for that,” Snape said. “Mr. Potter, Mr. Malfoy—on the platform, please.”

“Ready to do this _fairly_ , Mr. Malfoy?” Harry asked as they officially faced off this time.

Malfoy thought his small test might have been ill-advised. It only confirmed what he already suspected—that Potter wouldn’t be taken by surprise. Still, he was confident in his skills, and he answered, “Of course, Mr. Potter. Are you scared?”

“You wish.”

Lockhart counted them off, and the spells started flying—at the correct time, this time. Harry saw (and Hermione also saw from the floor), that Malfoy duelled the same way he spoke and generally carried himself: quick, cutting, and precise. There was a certain grace in his stance, his careful wand handling, and his economy of movement. He had mastered the Simple Block Charm, _Contego_ , which produced a small shield that didn’t cover the whole body and would only absorb one spell on a cast, but was nonetheless effective. In other words, he was well-versed in the traditional style.

Harry, on the other hand, was a very active duellist, dodging and weaving around Malfoy’s spells and wasting as little time as possible trying to block them. He shot spells back in quick, predatory strikes of two or three at a time in hopes of getting one past the Slytherin’s blocking spells.

A lot of the students were cheering almost at once, even many of the older ones, at the classic Gryffindor versus Slytherin grudge match—and that between two sons of Noble Families, even if they _were_ only second years. Hermione noticed that Professors Flitwick and Lockhart looked most pleased with the display, while Snape was frowning, probably because Malfoy wasn’t doing better.

It looked like a pretty even match. Perhaps Malfoy was a shade more skillful, but Harry made up for it with sheer nerve—that was, until with a particularly grand flourish of his wand, Malfoy bellowed, “ _Serpensortia_!”

A long, black snake exploded from the end of Malfoy’s wand—a European adder, Harry recognised—the only venomous snake in Britain. It fell heavily on the floor between them, raising its head to strike. All three professors moved to intercept it, but Harry didn’t give them the chance.

He wasn’t sure why he did it. It was ludicrous to expect the snake to listen to him, and he could think of several spells that might stop it from attacking, but it seemed like the most natural thing in the world. He opened his mouth and commanded, _Stop!_

Except what everybody else in the Great Hall heard was, “ _Sai-achass_!”

The adder stopped.

Everyone else stopped, too.

Harry looked almost hypnotised by the snake, or maybe he was the one doing the hypnotising. He didn’t seem to register the entire hall staring at him, including his sister and friends, nor Snape giving him a shrewed and calculating look, nor Malfoy wide-eyed in horror. But then, he pointed at Malfoy and said, “ _Haashee seeheth_!”

The adder turned and started slithering back towards Malfoy, whose eyes grew even wider. He staggered back and looked like he was about to bolt from the Hall.

“Hold still, Mr. Malfoy,” Snape ordered. He pointed his wand: “ _Vipera Evanesca_!”

The snake vanished, and it was only then that Harry looked up, registered the stares and the deep silence filling the Hall, and realised what he’d just done. “Oh, Merlin’s pants,” he said, “I just spoke Parseltongue, didn’t I?”

Hermione, Ron, Neville, and Luna Lovegood a little ways down were the only ones with the presence of mind to nod in confirmation (Neville was looking very pale). Harry couldn’t fathom how now, after twelve years of life, he had suddenly picked up the snake language, an incredibly rare ability best known for being shared with Salazar Slytherin, of all people, and other dark wizards. It looked like nobody else knew why either, by the sounds of the ominous muttering from around the Great Hall.

“I think it would be best if we adjourned for the night,” said Snape, and he, Flitwick, and a confused Lockhart starting shooing students from the room. In the shuffle, Hermione grabbed Harry the ear—by the _ear_ —and dragged him from the platform.

“Ow! Hey!” Harry protested, pushing her away, but Hermione still grabbed him by the wrist and pulled him from the Great Hall and into the annex where the first years always waited to be Sorted. He looked with dismay to see Snape following them, no doubt to interrogate him, but Hermione beat him to the punch.

“Harry James Potter! If you knew you were a Parselmouth all this time and didn’t tell me—”

“I didn’t! I didn’t! It just sort of…happened.”

“You just _happened_ to realise you could speak another language?”

“Yes! I didn’t even know I was doing it—or why. The thought just popped into my head.”

Hermione slowed down in confusion: “You spoke Parseltongue without knowing it?”

“Yeah…it was like…some kind of magic.”

Hermione sighed in frustration. Things could never be simple around her brother.

“Mr. Potter,” Snape said. Harry and Hermione jumped and spun around to face him. “Are you quite certain you never knew you could speak Parseltongue before?”

“Yes, sir. It’s not like I see that many snakes around, Professor, and even at the zoo, I never felt the urge to talk to them.”

“Very well…You may go for now, but the Headmaster may wish to speak with you about this.” Snape turned and strode from the room.

“I have a bad feeling about this,” Harry said.

“Come on, let’s get back to the Tower,” Hermione said.

They climbed up the seven flights to the Common Room, arriving just as the Duelling Club participants were explaining what had happened. As soon as the pair climbed through the portrait hole, all eyes turned to Harry, and the chatter of voices dropped to whispers. Most of them (some Gryffindors _they_ were, he thought) seemed to be afraid to approach him. One of the few exceptions was Ron, who actually looked angry.

“Harry, why didn’t you tell us you were a Parselmouth?” the redhead demanded.

“I didn’t know,” Harry told the room. “That was the first time it happened.”

“That was awesome, Harry!” Colin Creevey gushed. “The way you sicced Malfoy’s snake back on him—” He made a striking motion with his hand. “I wish I’d brought my camera.”

“Cool it, Creevey!” said Cormac McLaggen. “Talking to snakes is really dark magic.”

“It is not!” Parvati Patil said in a huff. “Parselmouths are highly respected in India. You should visit sometime, Harry, my cousins would love to meet you,” she added in a tone that made Harry a bit nervous.

“Well around here, snakes are considered dark,” Seamus Finnigan retorted. “Haven’t you heard of St. Patrick banishing the snakes from Ireland?”

“Seamus, there never _were_ any snakes in Ireland,” Hermione said flatly.

“It’s still a Slytherin power.”

“Obviously not,” Harry spoke up. “I think we can all agree I’m the furthest thing from a Slytherin.”

“Kick Malfoy’s arse in the first Quidditch match, and we’ll believe you,” Fred Weasley quipped half-jokingly from the back of the Common Room.

“Oh, don’t worry. I will,” Harry said fiercely. “I don’t know how this happened, but I’m not a dark wizard or a Slytherin or anything like that. I just have bad luck with being normal, okay?” A few people laughed at that, and it cut off the worst of the murmurings. He and Hermione sat down by Ron and Neville, and Parvati came over and hung close by.

“Are you okay, Neville?” asked Hermione.

The round-faced boy still looked pale, but he faced the two of them and said, “Yeah…that was just really creepy.”

Harry sighed in exasperation, but Hermione added, “Yeah, it kind of was. I knew you couldn’t be doing anything too bad, but it was still kind of disturbing hearing you hissing like that.”

“Yeah, well I’ll avoid talking to snakes again, okay? How often would I need to talk to snakes, anyway?”

No one had anything to say to that.

* * *

Severus Snape was reeling as he rushed up to the Headmaster’s Office. That boy—Lily’s boy—a Parselmouth! It didn’t seem possible. He was certain he would have known if Lily had had the ability, and while James would never have admitted to it, one would think there would have been _some_ mention of it in his family tree.

That left only one explanation (well, technically two, but it was clear from the boy’s body language that he was acting from instinct, not book-learning). He had to admit it _was_ satisfying to see Potter interrogated by his sister like that, but it was small consolation for the much larger problem that he had “inherited” an ability that could only have come from the Dark Lord himself.

 _Potter, why must you make things so bloody difficult?_ he thought.

“Sherbet lemon,” he grumbled when he reached the seventh floor, barely slowing down enough to give the gargoyle time to step aside. He rushed up the stairs and into the office, finding Albus sitting at his desk, doing paperwork.

The Headmaster immediately rose to his feet when he saw his breathless Potions Master. “Severus,” he said, “what is wrong? Was there an injury at the club?”

“No, Albus, although that might have been preferable.” The old man’s eyebrows shot up. “I fear we may have a more serious problem.”

* * *

Lucius Malfoy took the envelope from the family’s eagle owl with concern. It was unusual for Draco to write at this time of day, which bespoke something unusual and urgent. Perhaps his Master had made his first move. When he opened the letter, his concern grew when he saw the unusually blunt note, the uncharacteristically shaky handwriting, and the entirely unexpected topic:

 

_Dear Father and Mother,_

_Harry Potter is a Parselmouth! He just revealed it to the whole school (I think by accident). He was acting like it was the first time he found out._

_Is Potter the Heir of Slytherin? If so, how could he possibly enact a plan we would support, and if not, what will this mean for the real Heir?_

_And should I approach Potter? I don_ _’t think he’s in a friendly mood. He just set my own conjured snake on me in the Duelling Club._

_Your loving son,_

_Draco_

 

Lucius immediately went to his liquor cabinet and poured himself a double. This complicated matters.

* * *

Unbeknownst to her, Ginny Weasley’s handwriting was even shakier than Draco Malfoy’s as she wrote in her diary: _Dear Tom, we had the Duelling Club today, but you_ _’ll never guess what happened. Harry is a Parselmouth!_

There was a very large ink-splash of surprise, then some scribbles that indicated Tom didn’t know what to say. Finally, he wrote back, _How did this happen?_

Ginny explained about Harry’s and Malfoy’s duel, going on at length about how well Harry had duelled and how impressive the fight was. Tom was interested enough in that that he didn’t stop her, but the most interesting part was how Harry had turned Malfoy’s snake back at him just by hissing at it.

_And you are certain he didn_ _’t know about this before?_

_Yes, he said it was the first time it happened._

_That_ _’s very unusual,_ Tom wrote. _Parseltongue is very rare and usually inherited. What do you know of Harry_ _’s family?_

_He_ _’s a half-blood. His father was from an old light side family, and his mother was a muggle-born. I don’t see how he could have got dark magic like that from his family._

_Parseltongue is not dark magic, Ginny,_ Tom wrote patiently. _Anyone can inherit it. Magic is not light or dark, anyway. It is merely the exercise of the power given to us as witches and wizards._

Ginny regarded this statement with confusion. It went against all the stories her parents and brothers had told her. Whether or not all those books were true, the one thing everyone agreed on was that Harry was a great light side wizard, especially after everything he did to help pass her father’s bill last spring. On the other hand, Harry had just used what was supposed to be dark magic in front of half the school.

 _I_ _’m not sure what to think, Tom,_ she finally wrote back. _I think at least some magic really is dark, like the Unforgivable Curses. But I don_ _’t think Harry would ever use any of those._

Tom let her words linger on the page, mulling over whether to launch into a philosophical discourse on the merits of the so-called Unforgivable Curses, but he decided that was a discussion for another time. _Perhaps not,_ he replied. _He sounds very noble, as you describe him._

_Oh, he is, Tom. I told you all the things he did last year, and that_ _’s just what he admits to._

_Back to the matter of his family, though, I remember a Charlus Potter. He was a sixth-year Gryffindor prefect in my first year, and he was dating Dorea Black, who was a seventh-year Slytherin prefect._

_A Gryffindor was dating a Slytherin?_ Ginny wrote in surprise.

_It wasn_ _’t so uncommon in my day, although Dorea Black was one of the less traditional members of her family. If she was Harry’s grandmother, it could be a latent trait of the Black line._

_I don_ _’t know,_ Ginny replied. _I_ _’ve never heard of any other Parselmouths. Of course, the only Black left is Sirius Black, and he was a Gryffindor, and he’s Harry’s godfather._

Another ink swirl of surprise: _So many old families have fallen from grace since my day. But no matter; perhaps you can ask Harry about his family._

Ginny quivered with the tip of her quill on the page. She could barely talk to Harry already, and this—she didn’t think he’d like it. _I don_ _’t know if I can_ , she wrote slowly, hesitantly. _I don_ _’t think he’ll want to talk about it. But I can listen if he says anything._

_That will work. Thank you, Ginny. It_ _’s good to have eyes and ears in the castle again._

_You_ _’re welcome, Tom. I’m glad I have you to talk to._

* * *

_Our beloved son,_

_This news is most disturbing. We will be wanting a full account of your dispute with Potter. Your father is certain, based on his sources, that Potter is not the Heir of Slytherin—at least not the one referred to in the legend. Parseltongue is not unique to the Slytherin line, although we cannot speculate as to whence he might have acquired such an ability._

_After careful consideration, your father has concluded that the presence of another Parselmouth in the school will likely make the Heir more cautious and may slow down his plans, but it could also be useful. If Potter is, indeed, a novice Parselmouth, he will not be a great threat, but the Heir could plausibly implicate Potter when he makes his move and will likely do so as a cover. Anything you can do to encourage this belief without tipping the House of Malfoy_ _’s hand would be beneficial to our cause._

_We believe that it would not be beneficial to approach Potter at this time. He has already shown his colours. Continue to deal cautiously with him and Granger._

_Father and Mother_

* * *

The next morning, Harry was getting more stares in the corridors than he had got since he first started at Hogwarts, but unlike then, when everyone had wanted to get a look at the Boy-Who-Lived, now a lot of people were avoiding him. Apparently, quite a few people thought like Seamus Finnigan and Cormac McLaggen, that Harry was some kind of dark wizard because of his newfound Parseltongue ability. Hufflepuff was actually the biggest source of this attitude, being the most “light” house after Gryffindor, which mostly sided with Harry out of house loyalty.

The most interesting reactions came from Slytherin. Unusually for the house of the snake, they didn’t seem to have a unified message. Some of them taunted Harry for being a “dark wizard,” not because they _weren_ _’t_ dark themselves, but because they knew it would annoy him. Others accused him of being a traitor to Slytherin House for not being Sorted there as a Parselmouth, and a few of them sounded like they meant it. A couple of them mocked him for blowing his “perfect plan” of secretly being some kind of super-Slytherin, but hiding it by being Sorted somewhere else, and a group of wide-eyed first years asked him if he was the Heir of Slytherin for some reason, which he politely, but firmly denied.

However, the students with the closest ties to suspected Death Eaters, like Malfoy and Nott, seemed to be carrying on as if nothing had happened. They didn’t confront Harry, but they didn’t avoid him or ignore him, either. They just sneered at him, as usual, and that was that.

In the meantime, while Harry and Hermione were walking to breakfast, Luna Lovegood appeared seemingly from nowhere and motioned them into an empty classroom. Once inside, Luna let out a hissing sound that made Hermione jumped about a foot in the air and that sounded to Harry like someone speaking with a shower running loudly in the background. The words he heard were, _You no say me you speak Snake-tongue._

 _I didn_ _’t know_ , he replied until he realised it didn’t feel quite right and snapped back to English: “Wait! What the—”

“Luna, _you_ _’re_ a Parselmouth?” Hermione said in disbelief.

“Unfortunately not,” Luna said with inexplicable disappointment. “Mummy only taught me the basics.”

“What? Your Mum _taught_ you?”

“Oh yes. You can learn Parseltongue just like any other language. It’s much more difficult, though. The human voice isn’t really designed to produce it. How was my accent, Harry?”

“It…it was pretty thick,” Harry admitted.

“I was afraid so,” Luna replied. “Do you think you could help me improve?”

Harry was stunned: “What? You…you’re saying you want me to teach you Parseltongue?”

Luna’s already high voice rose a couple of pitches as she answered, “Yes, I think that would be very pleasant.”

“Even though people think it’s dark magic?”

Luna cocked her head and stared her unblinking stare at him: “Do _you_ think it’s dark magic, Harry?”

“Well, no, it’s just a language I can speak for some weird reason, I guess.”

“Exactly. It’s just a language like any other. Mummy loved languages. She taught me a bunch of them. I know Mermish, Gobbledegook, Giant-Speak, and Parseltongue. I learnt Mermish and Gobbledegook pretty well, but there’s not a lot written about the others. Parseltongue is hard to learn because there are so few native speakers who can describe it.”

“That could actually be pretty interesting, Harry,” Hermione jumped in. “The phonology alone would have to be like nothing in human languages. Maybe you could write up a description of it using muggle linguistic techniques.”

“Oi! Now, _you_ want me to get into this Parseltongue thing, too, Hermione?”

“Why not? You just said yourself it’s not dark magic.”

“Yeah, but it’s got everybody staring at me again.”

“Well, I hate to say it, but there’s not much you’re ever going to be able to do about that,” she replied. “You might as well put it to good use.”

Harry thought about his wild idea to write an autobiography at age twelve. This was completely different, but he couldn’t deny he felt a little bit of a pull from it. With a sigh, he said, “Eh, I guess it’s worth looking into…but I can’t even tell when I’m speaking it, though. It all sounds like English to me.”

“Well, you can probably learn to tell them apart,” Hermione said. “We can work on that. Say, do you could teach us a little Gobbledegook while we’re at it, Luna?”

“Ugh, don’t you think we’re already doing enough stuff, Hermione?” Harry asked.

“We’re only in two clubs each, plus our exercise routine. That’s not as crazy as what some people do. And a _de facto_ magical language club could be very interesting.”

Luna giggled: “I think that sounds very nice, Hermione. Perhaps we could meet on Saturdays, those usually aren’t very busy.”

“Where’s Ron when I need him. I’m outnumbered!” Harry groaned, eliciting more giggles from the girls. “Okay, okay, you win. We can do your Linguistic Study of Parseltongue, or whatever. Let’s go get breakfast.”

“Okay,” Luna squeaked as they left the classroom. She started skipping down the hall. “I hope there’s white pudding,” she added.

“Oh, and Luna, um…thanks for not asking about all of this in public,” Harry said softly.

Luna stopped skipping and stared at him again: “You’re welcome, Harry. I thought you might want to discuss this privately.” Then she blinked slowly.

Harry blinked slowly in return, and he caught a nervous look on Hermione’s face. But for some reason, the gesture comforted Harry more than it worried him. He was sure there was no way Luna could have noticed his feline form (and after all, she had done the same thing at New Years’ when she first met him). He was pretty sure that was just Luna being Luna.

“By the way, Harry, your nargle-removing efforts were very effective,” the little Ravenclaw said as she skipped. “None of my things have gone missing this week, so thank you. How did you do it?”

“Uh, sorry, Luna; that one’s a family secret.”

* * *

Remus Lupin arrived at the gates of Hogwarts and quickly made the trip to the castle and then up to the Headmaster’s Office.

“Ah, Remus, good morning,” Albus said a little too cheerfully for Remus’s liking when he entered. “I thought I might receive a visit from you and Sirius today.”

“Yes, well, Sirius would have been here, but he couldn’t change his shift on such short notice,” Remus said dismissively, “and we wanted to talk to you before this hits the papers tomorrow. He told me to say—and I concur—“How do you want to explain _this_ one, Albus?’”

Albus sighed: “It _is_ quite the puzzle. Please sit, Remus. Sherbet lemon?”

“No, thank you.”

“I was most surprised when Severus told me last night that Harry could speak Parseltongue,” Albus said more soberly. “It is unfortunate that he had to discover this ability in such a public fashion.”

“You think?” Remus said. “How did this happen? It can’t be a family trait. We can trace Harry’s family back five generations, and there’s no sign of a Parselmouth.”

“I would not want to speculate. I can only guess that it has something to do with what happened on the night when James and Lily were killed.”

“Albus, you don’t think…” He couldn’t bring himself to even think the words. “If it could have something to do with…with the thing we discussed before.”

“I said that I would not want to speculate, Remus,” Albus said sharply. “There are any number of phenomena that could cause a transfer of magic knowledge or skills like this. A bout of Legilimency gone wrong is only the most mundane explanation. Or perhaps it could truly be latent from Lily’s side. Or, with the prophecy involved, it may yet be something that even I have not imagined.”

Remus relaxed a little bit. At least there were reasonable alternatives. “How can you find out, then?” he said.

“By continuing my research—along a number of avenues. Having certain artifacts in hand would be a help, as would certain instruments I am hoping to acquire or construct. Please do not doubt that I will pursue all avenues to ensure that Harry is not harmed by this, however it came about.”

“I should hope so. You’ve got a lot of people to answer to, especially Sirius.” The thought of an angry Sirius Black was enough to give even Albus Dumbledore a bit of a chill. “By the way, have you made any progress with that…other issue?”

Albus settled into his seat: “Only a little, but I will tell you what I know…”


	47. The Chamber Is Open

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: One more Harry Potter for the great JK Rowling.

The next Duelling Club had been postponed for a week pending a reorganisation. The rumour was that Flitwick didn’t trust Lockhart to run it after his clueless first attempt (although, ironically, Harry thought the ponce could have done much worse), and Snape had clearly only been there to blast Lockhart in public. Some of the older students did the maths and decided that the next best duellist in the castle who actually had the time to run the club was Professor Vector, the Arithmancy teacher, of all people. Flitwick apparently thought the same thing, and he managed to recruit Vector for the club.

“That could actually be a good combination,” Harry said one day as he and his friends talked the situation over with Hagrid. “Lockhart’s incompetent, but he knows the forms really well, and Vector’s supposed to be good with the spells, so if you put them together, they might actually be good at teaching duelling.”

“If Vector doesn’t kill Lockhart first,” Ron said.

“Nah, I think Professor Vector likes him, fer some reason,” Hagrid said.

“For now,” Harry quipped.

“Yeah,” Neville added. “I don’t know about Professor Vector, but Gran’s been telling anybody who’ll listen how much she doesn’t like him. I think people think he gets annoying pretty fast.”

Hermione scoffed: “I really don’t think you two are giving Professor Lockhart enough credit—Harry, I know he’s not such a good teacher, but you can at least respect him for his skill with dark creatures.”

“But we only have his word on that,” Harry countered. “I’ve been looking around, and there’s hardly any corroborating accounts for any of his books. I’m starting to wonder if he made a lot of that stuff up.”

“Harry! How can you say that? I’m sure Dumbledore wouldn’t have hired him unless he was sure about him.”

“Um…” Hagrid started, “‘fraid teh disappoint yeh, Hermione, but Dumbledore didn’t have much choice. Lockhart was the only man who applied.”

“What? No one else wanted the job?” Hermione said.

“Nah, they didn’t. It’s that ruddy curse—keeps gettin’ harder teh find Defence Professors, “specially after Quirrell died.”

“But he was possessed by Voldemort!” Harry protested.

Hagrid flinched, but he answered, “Don’ matter. It’s always somethin’ happenin’ to the Defence Professor. One o’ these years we might not get anybody, an’ then the Ministry’ll probably send somebody they pick.”

Hermione set her glass down with a look of intense concentration on her face.

“Er…somethin’ wrong, Hermione?” Hagrid asked her.

“Hagrid…that’s _brilliant_!”

“Huh? What?” the boys said.

“Well, o’ course it is,” Hagrid said, blushing. “Erm…what’d I say?”

“Sending someone from the Ministry to teach Defence.”

Harry stared at his sister in confusion: “Uh, Hermione, do you really think getting the Ministry involved would make things better?”

“It would if they send an Auror.”

Harry’s eyes went wide: “Hagrid, that’s brilliant!”

“Okay, I’m lost,” Ron said.

“Think about it,” said Harry. “We’re getting basically no instruction in Defence Class because nobody who’s any good will take the job.”

“Right,” Hermione added. “I asked the older students, and apparently, Quirrell was the best Defence Professor they’ve had in years, and he was evil. And even though all the Defence Professors are on one-year contracts already, bad things still happen to them. But if the Ministry sends a different Auror every year on a rotation—”

It finally dawned on Neville: “And he never has any intention of staying another year because he knows he’s going to be reassigned.”

“Then we might be able to get good teachers who don’t get hurt by the curse,” Harry concluded. “I can’t believe no one thought of that before.”

“Well, Dumbledore don’ like to get the Ministry teh get too involved,” said Hagrid, “but I s’pose an Auror wouldn’t be too much trouble.”

“Wow, that could really work,” Ron said in surprise. “That’d be neat, learning from an actual Auror who’s done it all before.”

“Yeah,” said Hermione. “If Mum and Dad like the idea, we should tell Dumbledore and then talk to Susan about asking her aunt.”

They headed back soon after that to start writing their letters. Neville was also going to suggest the idea to his grandmother. Snape seemed to be pretty well entrenched, but if they could do something about the Defence Professorship, it could do wonders for the quality of instruction at the school.

They were startled from their thoughts by a call of “Hey, Harry,” as they entered the castle, and they turned to see Parvati Patil greeting him.

“Oh, hi, Parvati,” Harry said offhandedly.

“Are you coming to the next Duelling Club meeting?” she asked. Parvati had been hanging about Harry close ever since that first chaotic meeting over a week ago.

“Of course. I just hope it will be less eventful than the last one.”

“Oh, I don’t know, I thought the last one was pretty interesting,” Parvati said with a smile.

“Not for me,” Harry grumbled.

Parvati laid a tentative hand on his shoulder and said, “You shouldn’t listen to those people who’re saying you’re a dark wizard, Harry. Parseltongue is just a—”

“I know, it’s just an ability that some people have.” He kept walking, pulling away from her. “It’s just that I’ve already got enough to be famous for.”

“Well…I guess…but you should embrace your abilities, Harry,” she said, sounding disappointed. “Just look what you’ve done with Quidditch.”

“Yeah…well…I’ll think about it, Parvati,” he said, continuing on his way. “What’s her deal anyway?” he asked softly when they reached the Common Room.

Hermione gave her brother a patronising look and said, “Oh, Harry, I think Parvati has a crush on you because you’re a Parselmouth.”

“What? Seriously? How do you figure?”

“Because I’m not blind—and I _do_ room with her. Do you remember how she said Parselmouths are respected in India? I think it’s a little more than ‘respected’.”

“Oh, great. Just what I need: someone else who likes me for something I have no control over.”

“Come on, Harry, what’s your problem?” Ron said. “It’s great that girls like you.”

“But they don’t like _me_. They like the person they think I am. And Hermione’s just Harry Potter’s sister to a lot of them—the boys, too. You guys actually hang out with us after you’ve got to know us. I like that a lot better than hero worship.”

Neville nodded hesitantly in understanding as his words. Ron looked a little surprised, even after this much time, but he wisely held his tongue about it for the moment.

“Harry, I know you might not have feelings for Parvati,” Hermione cut in, “but you should try to be nice to her. She was going against a lot of the school to stick up for you like that. And I hear Padma was saying the same things, too.”

That was too good for Ron to pass up. “Blimey, _twins_ , Harry,” he said, wagging his eyebrows. Harry threw a cushion at him.

“Anyway, you’re going to have to learn to live with it,” Hermione said. “Parvati’s not the only one, after all. You know Ginny has a crush on you because you’re the Boy-Who-Lived.”

“Oi!” Ron protested.

“Yeah, her and half the other girls in school,” Harry groaned, although he knew ( _everyone_ knew by now) that Ginny had it the worst for him. “And then there’s Luna…well, it’s kinda hard to tell with her, but she did ask me to teach her Parseltongue and stuff.”

“No, I actually think that was just academic interest there,” Hermione replied.

“Really?”

“Really. I think Luna was just…being Luna.”

* * *

“Good evening, and welcome to the second meeting of the Hogwarts Duelling Club,” Septima Vector addressed the Great Hall. Gilderoy Lockhart stood beside her, looking as primped as ever, while Flitwick supervised. “I thought we’d go over the Duelling Code in a little more detail, since I was informed there was some confusion last time—” she watched the Slytherins in the group carefully. “—and then try some practise duels with basic disarming and blocking.” Flitwick nodded approvingly. “Professor Lockhart, perhaps you would like to explain the procedure for a challenge to a duel?”

“Of course, Professor Vector,” Lockhart replied, flashing his brilliant smile. “It’s really quite simple, of course. Any proper duel, whether a formal honour duel or an informal duel, begins with a publicly issued challenge. In the case of an honour duel, the challenger will demand satisfaction in response to some insult or dishonourable act on the part of the challenged, and will give him or her a chance to apologise in lieu of actually duelling. If the challenged person accepts, he or she has the right to set the rules for the duel, while the challenger has first right to propose a location and time. Each party will also appoint a second who will first attempt to reconcile the dispute beforehand, and then will ensure that the rules of the duel are followed.”

A few of the younger students (including Ron) looked surprised to have some of their misconceptions about duelling corrected, and. Harry was sure Hermione would be taking notes if Remus and Cousin Andi hadn’t explained all of this before.

“Thank you, Professor Lockhart,” Vector said cordially. “Both the duels we’ll be doing here, and most honour duels, unless a different rule is specified, will be following Tournament Rules. Tournament Rules vary by your level of expertise, but they universally prohibit physical contact and, at minimum, Unforgivable Curses, death, and permanent maiming. They also specify the most usual stopping condition: the duel ends when one party is incapacitated, that is, for whatever reason, they are no longer able to duel.”

Harry’s and Hermione’s ears pricked up. That standard was a little different for them than it was for most people.

“If either party wishes to stop the duel before the stopping condition is met, they may verbally declare that they yield, although it’s considered dishonourable to do that in an honour duel.”

“What if you’ve been silenced, Professor?” one of the older students asked.

Lockhart smiled again and spoke up: “A clever little rule adapted from the muggles called “tapping out.” Simply strike the ground twice with your hand in order to declare that you yield. If you can’t speak _or_ tap out, then you’ve probably lost, anyway.” Many of the students laughed.

“Quite right,” said Vector. “Now, perhaps a demonstration is in order. Professor Lockhart, I challenge you to an informal duel.”

“I accept,” Lockhart beamed. “And as a further demonstration of what we’ll be teaching tonight, I declare that only Disarming and Blocking Charms will be allowed. Note, students, that I can set the rules any way I want, even if it is very unusual.”

Harry scoffed silently. He had a sneaking suspicion that Lockhart had spent quite a bit of time practising those two charms just so he could set the rules like that and give himself a level playing field, considering he hadn’t shown himself to be much of a spellcaster in class.

“Very well,” Vector said. “Professor Flitwick, if you would?”

“Ahem,” the little Charms Master said, “Wands at the ready…one…two…three!”

“ _Expelliarmus_!”

“ _Expelliarmus_!”

“ _Contego_!”

“ _Expelliarmus_!”

“ _Contego_!”

Lockhart and Vector were both shooting spells fast, but Lockhart’s were visibly weaker, and his movements a little slower, and Harry recognised the look on Vector’s face: she was toying with him—what most people would say was like a cat playing with a mouse, although that wasn’t quite right. But whatever one called it, she easily blocked all of Lockhart’s Disarming Charms. Lockhart looked like he thought he was holding his own at first, but suddenly, Vector whipped her hat off her head and tossed it in the air. Casting, “ _Contego!_ ,” her shield struck her hat and knocked it across the platform, straight into Lockhart’s face. “ _Expelliarmus_!” she cried while he was distracted, and Lockhart was knocked flat on his back and wandless.

The entire Hall laughed, and the Ravenclaws and Slytherins and a few Gryffindors cheered. Harry thought Vector had really impressive aim.

“Ah…yes,” Lockhart stammered as he pulled himself to his feet. “An excellent demonstration, Professor Vector. Creative use of the Simple Block Charm. As you can see, even the most restricted duels can allow for some surprising tricks.”

 _Wow, this guy is_ really _good at spin,_ Harry thought. _He just got his arse handed to him, and he_ _’s still digging himself out with (literally) a wink and smile._

After that, Professor Vector made sure everyone could cast the two spells (some of the first years had a bit of trouble and had to sit it out) and then divided the students into pairs for practice duels. Harry and Hermione were paired with Zacharias Smith and Hannah Abbot from Hufflepuff.

“Ready for this, Mr. Potter?” Smith asked.

“Of course, Mr. Smith,” Harry replied. “But are _you_ ready.”

“I’m always ready, Mr. Potter. Let’s duel.”

“Wands at the ready,” Professor Vector called. Harry and Smith bowed to each other and took their stances. “One…two…three!”

Harry felt a little sorry for Hannah Abbot. _He_ could barely hold his own against Hermione, so Hannah never really stood much of a chance. Zacharias Smith, on the other hand, was the scion of a Noble House, and he had actually had some duelling training. However, Harry had the advantage of being more comfortable with dodging, which freed up precious seconds for him to fire more Disarming Charms, and it wasn’t long before Smith was disarmed.

Professor Vector praised both Hermione and Harry for their quick wand work and quickly decided that to give them fairer competition, they should be partners with third years. (Draco Malfoy and Theodore Nott also made the cut.) She paired them with two Ravenclaws: Eddie Carmichael and a pretty girl named Cho Chang. When she counted them off again, Harry realised just how far they had to go. Hermione was better than he was, and she just barely prevailed over Cho, but he himself had never duelled anyone as good as Eddie before. He quickly found himself on the defensive, casting mostly Simple Block Charms to stop Eddie’s flurry of Disarming Charms. In that position, even with the duelling holster for an extra line of defence, it wasn’t long before his wand was wrenched from his grip.

“Ah! I yield!” he said quickly, as he technically needed to do under the Code as a wandless magic user, although Eddie didn’t know that. He hoped that he could just pass it off as a slip made in surprise.

* * *

Things calmed down over the next two weeks, at least inside the castle. Outside, a heavy, driving rain pounded against the walls for days on end. The duelling club went smoothly as the next meeting, with Harry and Hermione continuing to show themselves to be among the top duellists in their year and the equals of the average third year. Quidditch practice, on the other hand, was an ordeal.

Harry didn’t think that Kwikspell courses were likely to do Filch any good, but he was smart enough not to say it, not when he narrowly escaped detention with the man. It was a real stroke of luck that Nearly-Headless Nick was interested enough in his well-being to persuade Peeves to smash a vanishing cabinet right above Filch’s office.

“I wish I could do something to help you out with the Headless Hunt,” Harry said in return as he started back to Gryffindor Tower.

Nick stopped (literally) cold. Harry barely managed to dodge around him.

“Well, there is one thing that you might be able to do,” Nick ventured. “But no, it would be asking too much…”

“What is it?” Harry said.

Nick drew himself up to his most dignified state and said, “This Halloween will be my five-hundredth deathday. It’s quite a momentous occasion, you understand. I’ll be holding a party in the dungeons—friends coming from all over the country, of course…and it would a great honour if I could have _live_ guests.”

“Oh…” Harry’s face fell. He couldn’t possibly…he just hoped he could break the news gently. “Well, you see, Nick…” he said, “the thing is, Halloween is also my parents,” uh, deathday.”

“Oh dear,” Nick replied disappointedly. “I’m terribly sorry.”

“Thank you. You see, I wasn’t even sure if I was going to the regular feast. I may just eat in the kitchens with Hermione and Neville—you know, get away for a quiet dinner.” _Well, as quiet as the elves can make it, anyway_.

“Of course, of course, I understand,” Nick said. “I wouldn’t want to keep you from your private memorial.”

“Thanks for understanding. I hope the party goes well.”

“Thank you, Harry. So do I.” Nick glided away dejectedly, his head wobbling on his shoulders.

Harry watched him go sadly. If it were any other night, he would humour the ghost, but he didn’t think he could manage Halloween. He really did wish there was something else he could do for him. Suddenly, a thought struck him.

“Say, Nick?” he said.

The ghost turned around.

“I think I know one or two people who might be interested in a deathday party…”

* * *

“I hope Sir Nicholas doesn’t mind that we’re late,” said Luna Lovegood. She looked around interestedly at the tall black candles burning blue and the orchestra of musical saws.

“Well, in the muggle world, people are always talking about being ‘fashionably late’ to parties,” Colin Creevey replied, looking equally wide-eyed at the setting. “I’m glad Hermione warned us to grab a bite at the feast first. I guess ghosts wouldn’t have food at their parties. Ghosts _do_ show up on camera, don’t they?”

“They do,” Luna said. “It’s only vampires who don’t—and heliopaths, but that’s because they’re so bright that they overexpose the film.”

“Huh. Good to know.”

* * *

Ginny Weasley felt dizzy as she sat under the live bats and giant pumpkins of the Halloween Feast. Colin had already taken off to go to some ghost party, and she was starting to think taking off early might be a good idea herself.

Ginny wasn’t sure what was wrong with her this month. Percy thought it was a cold, and her roommates thought she was just homesick. But she couldn’t help feeling there was something deeper. She wasn’t sleeping well, her slumber being frequently interrupted by disturbing dreams that she could never remember afterwards. She found herself carrying her diary with her everywhere and writing in it at odd times, like in class or sometimes under the table at meals. She felt like Tom was the only one who understood her. It helped that she could tell him everything, and he wouldn’t—couldn’t—tell anyone else.

Tom was such a good friend to her, she thought. He always seemed to know what to say to her and never judged her like her brothers seemed to do (especially Percy). Lately, she felt like she could even hear his voice when he wrote back to her in the diary.

 _I don_ _’t feel so good, Tom,_ she wrote, or she was pretty sure she wrote it. In her daze, she couldn’t say one hundred percent that she’d written the words after they disappeared or just imagined it.

 _If you_ _’ve already had enough to eat, perhaps you should go up to bed early,_ Tom replied, his voice filled with concern—no, that was just how she’d imagined his voice. He didn’t have a voice. He just wrote the words on the page…she thought. She wasn’t entirely certain she’d seen those words either after they, too, vanished.

 _Yeah, maybe I should_. Ginny excused herself and started up towards Gryffindor Tower, but before long, she got distracted, wandering the corridors aimlessly until she found herself outside the second floor girls’ bathroom once again. She didn’t know why her wanderings kept bringing her to this place. No one even used this bathroom because it was haunted by a ghost named Moaning Myrtle.

“What am I doing here?” she said. “Why do I keep coming here?”

 _Don_ _’t worry about it, Ginny_ , Tom whispered in her head—if she were fully aware of what was going on, she would have noticed that he was whispering in her head, but right now, it seemed perfectly normal.

“I’m not supposed to be wandering around during the feast,” she muttered to herself. “I could get in trouble.”

 _You could wait here until the feast is over and then rejoin the crowd,_ Tom suggested.

“Yeah, maybe…” Just then, she heard the chilling sound of a predatory meow behind her. She turned around to see a lean and scruffy-looking cat staring at her. “Oh, no! That’s Filch’s cat! She’s spotted me! Tom, what am I gonna do?”

 _You_ _’ll have to put her out of commission_ , Tom whispered in her head. _The thing I showed you before. In fact, it could be a good thing. That_ _’ll be one less creature snooping the rest of the year._

“But I don’t want to hurt anyone.”

_Very well. See the water? Use the reflection._

“I don’t understand. What am I supposed to do?”

 _Let me show you_ …

What happened after that, and even the conversation leading up to it, was nothing but a blur for Ginny. In fact, by the time it was over, she didn’t remember anything after leaving the feast early because she was feeling ill, but _something_ had gone on in the school during that time.

* * *

Sirius Black and Remus Lupin stood in a graveyard in the West Country, waiting for the few memorialisers to move on. There were a lot fewer people here than last year, on the tenth anniversary of that horrible night, and most of those who did pay their respects in the town only stopped at the cottage or the statue. Only a handful sought out the simple grave stone in the back of the graveyard.

One thing Sirius had not done before tonight was to pay his respects to his fallen comrades. He had visited the graveyard once, over last Christmas holidays when Harry and his family had come, but only being out of Azkaban a few weeks, he didn’t think he was ready for that, so he had hung back. After that, he just kept putting it off and putting it off, usually with the excuse that he was too busy, even when it was an obvious lie. Some lion-heart he was. But now, after nearly a year, on the night they died, he couldn’t put it off any longer, for his godson’s sake.

He approached the grave with Remus steadying him. Seeing their names etched in stone there hurt like they were cut into his own heart as all those years of guilt and pain came rushing back to him.

“James…Lily…” he whispered. “I’m so sorry…” He dropped to his knees a few steps away. “I’m sorry…”

Remus, though he was on the verge of collapse himself, knew he was there in part for moral support, and he couldn’t allow his friend to wallow in despair for very long. “It wasn’t your fault, you know, Padfoot,” he said.

“Getting arrested was,” Sirius mumbled. “Going after the Rat like an idiot was. I should have been there for Harry…”

“What’s done is done, Padfoot,” he said tearfully. “When I heard how he fared with his…I knew I should have been there for him, too, and I had less excuse than you did. We can’t change the past, but we have a chance to make it up to him now—and to help out a wonderful muggle-born girl whom he loves dearly and who’s clearly better off for having him in her life. At least that good’s come out of it.”

Sirius raised his tear-stricken face to his friend and let out a chuckle: “Moony, it’s so weird that you’re describing his sister and not his girlfriend.”

“Well, when he gets a girlfriend, I’m sure I’ll be able to say something similar. Hermione’s been good for him, too, you know. I’m sure you’ve seen that she brings out Lily in him—knocks off some of James’s rough edges.”

“I know,” Sirius said wistfully. “He looks so much like James, but…it really is all in the eyes, isn’t it.” He sighed and sank back to the ground.

“Alright, Padfoot, you know what Prongs would say right now,” Remus told him sharply.

Sirius looked up again: “He’d say to get off my arse and quit feeling sorry for myself.” He pushed himself to his feet.

“Exactly. Now, our friend Ratsbane is expecting your mirror-call, and I suggest you don’t keep him waiting.”

“Right.” Sirius took the communication mirror off his belt and spoke, “Harry Potter.”

A moment later, Harry’s face appeared in the mirror in front of the familiar background of the Hogwarts kitchens. “Hey Sirius, hey Remus, how are you doing?” he asked.

“Better having Moony here to tell me to get off my arse. How are you holding up?”

“Eh, we’re doing alright,” Harry said.

“Yeah? Who’s down there with you.”

“Just Hermione and Neville.” The three children huddled around the mirror so they could all be seen. “And a bunch of elves.” The squeaking of busy elves could be heard in the background.

“Ah, it’s good to see you’re not alone for this,” Sirius replied. “You know could have gone on to the feast, Harry. We could have called you afterwards.”

“I know, but after what happened last spring…I felt like doing something a little more private.”

“Perfectly understandable,” Remus said. “Did you…um…want to say something to your parents, now?”

Neville gave Harry and Hermione an uncomfortable look. “I can go, if you want.”

“No, no, it’s okay, Neville. I trust you. I think you get it—better than most people, anyway.”

Neville said nothing, but he nodded and stayed in his seat. When Harry nodded his agreement, Sirius turned the mirror around to face the gravestone.

Harry blinked back tears as he saw the white marble. There were fewer flowers than in previous years, and the grass was not as well-kept, but the words were still clear. “Hey Mum, hey Dad,” he said with trembling voice. “It’s…it’s been a wild year here. I…I won the Quidditch Cup. That was a lot of fun. And I got all E’s and O’s on my exams—even history, somehow…you can thank Hermione for that.” Hermione’s face flushed magenta. “It’s been crazy, though,” he continued. “I found out last spring that Voldemort’s still out there.” There were squeals of horror from around the kitchens. “Sorry, that’s just the kitchen elves. But he’s still out there, and I’m…” He glanced at Neville, who did not know about the prophecy. “Well, I’ve got a feeling that I’m gonna have to fight him again. He was possessing the Defence Professor last year. It’s too bad—he was actually a pretty good teacher.” He laughed ironically.

Harry rambled on for a while, talking about what he had done in the previous semester and the summer and how the new year had started off and how annoying Lockhart was, in no particular order. He was hesitant even in that situation to mention that he was a newfound Parselmouth. “I know it’s a Slytherin thing, Dad,” he said apologetically, “but apparently it just happens to some people. We don’t really know why. And it’s well-respected in India—at least, that’s what Parvati and Padma keep saying. Anyway, I guess I can’t just be normal.”

Harry kept going until he ran out of words and started to run out of voice. It was getting late, and they had to go soon, but Hermione said a few words before Sirius signed off, and Neville, with some encouragement, said even fewer words, but it meant a lot to Harry that he joined in their little ritual, and Harry told him so. In the end, he felt that it was a cathartic experience for all involved, if a tiring one.

“Alright, good night, cubs,” Sirius concluded. “I’ll see you later. Mirror off.”

By unspoken agreement, the three Gryffindors decided it was time for bed. The elves had already brought down the entrees to the long tables in the kitchen and sent up the dessert platters, so they knew the feast would be ending soon. They picked themselves up to leave the kitchens and hopefully beat the crowd.

Just as they reached the doors, Harry stopped and said, “Hey, did you hear something just now?”

“Hear what?” said Neville.

“All I hear is the elves,” Hermione added.

“I thought I heard this weird voice—I guess I must have imagined it.”

They climbed up to the Entrance Hall, from where they could hear the lazy murmurings of the feast winding down from the Great Hall, and started up the Grand Staircase. Neville still looked uncomfortable as they walked. “You didn’t have to invite me,” he said.

“We wanted to,” Harry replied. “This night means practically as much to you as it does to us.”

“Well…I _could_ introduce you to my parents sometime, if you want.”

Harry and Hermione exchanged a surprised glance. Neville never even talked about his parents if he didn’t have to.

“You don’t have to if you don’t want, Neville,” Harry told him. “We know it’s different for you.”

Neville considered his reply, but he didn’t get a chance to say anything because as they walked down the second floor corridor, Harry suddenly stopped cold, his back hunched over, his hands stiff in front of him, and his eyes wide as he let out a plaintive whine.

“Harry, what is it?” Hermione said urgently, but he gestured with one finger, and when she looked where he was pointing, she gasped. Filch’s cat, Mrs. Norris, was hanging by her tail from a torch bracket, frozen stiff as a statue.

Harry whined again and took a quick, fearful look around. Neville was concerned. The only time he had ever seen Harry more scared than this was when Quirrell kidnapped Hermione. Not even that one time when Quirrell pointed a muggle gun at him had done it. But before he could process this further, he spotted something else: “Merlin’s beard, look!”

They looked where he was pointing, and Hermione, at least, wondered how she had missed it at first. Above Mrs. Norris, a message was written in foot-high red letters:

 

THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS HAS BEEN

OPENED. ENEMIES OF THE HEIR, BEWARE.

 

“The Chamber of Secrets?” Hermione said. “What does that mean?”

“What could do that to a cat?” Harry said with a shaky voice, not even listening to her.

Suddenly, there was a loud rumble and chatter as students began coming up from the feast and poured into the corridor where the three stood. They also heard the sound of a few feet running back down the stairs. Nervous whispers broke out among the crowd, particularly among the Ravenclaws, who started staring and pointing at Harry ominously. Harry’s stance became even more defensive, and he started to back away. Harry had no idea why they were pointing at him, but he didn’t think it was good.

Just then, Argus Filch pushed his way to the front of the crowd and saw just about the worst possible scene he could see: Mrs. Norris hanging from the torch bracket, Harry Potter standing at the scene of the crime, and all the other students apparently fingering him as the culprit.

“Mrs. Norris! Mrs. Norris!” the caretaker cried in grief and rage. “You murdered my cat!” He lunged to throttle Harry.

“No, I didn’t!” Harry yelled. He staggered back until he bumped into the wall, throwing up his hands to defend himself. There were even more murmurs of confusion at the sight of Harry Potter cowering in fear from Argus Filch.

“Heir of Slytherin! Right under my nose!” Filch roared. “I’ll kill you!”

“Mr. Filch, no!” Hermione cried, trying to hold him back. “Can’t you see he’s terrified?”

“I’ll kill you! I’ll rid the world of your filthy—”

“ _Argus_!”

Dumbledore and the other teachers poured into the corridor, having been summoned by the students who had run back down the stairs, and the crowd parted for them. Behind them were a selection of Hufflepuffs and Slytherins, who had apparently also been informed by the runners.

“Enemies of the Heir beware,” Theo Nott, read off the words of the message. “Ha! _Now_ , we’ll see what’s what. Not looking so smug _now_ , are you, mu-muggle-borns?” It looked like it was an effort for him not to say “mudbloods” in front of the teachers.

“That’s enough, Mr. Nott,” Professor McGonagall scolded sharply. It was no surprise that she looked particularly ill herself at the sight of Mrs. Norris.

Draco Malfoy also watched the scene carefully, but he said nothing. Potter certainly didn’t do it, but it looked for all the world like he’d been caught in the act, and Filch was doing an excellent job of accusing him already. It was anyone’s guess why Potter was acting so scared, though.

Dumbledore picked up Mrs. Norris from the torch bracket and summoned Harry, Hermione, Neville, and Filch to Professor Lockhart’s office nearby. Filch was sobbing with grief the whole way, and Harry’s hands were shaking. Hermione wrapped an arm comfortingly around his shoulders. Neville was shaking for a different reason: he didn’t relish the thought of a continued encounter with an angry, distraught Filch.

Dumbledore took some time inspecting Mrs. Norris, during which Filch continued sobbing, Harry continued shaking in his seat, and Lockhart was recounting the story of his supposed exploits during a similar incident in Ouagadougou in his usual conceited fashion. Harry was _this close_ to shouting at him to shut up, which would probably be unwise, under the circumstances, when Dumbledore spoke up.

“She’s not dead, Argus,” he said.

“She’s not?” Filch said hopefully.

“She’s not?” Harry echoed in an eerily similar tone.

“She has been petrified, although I am afraid I cannot determine the cause.”

“Ask _him_!” Filch bellowed, lunging at Harry again. “He did it!”

“No!” Harry yelped. “I’d never do that to a cat!”

“You saw what he wrote—he’s the Heir of Slytherin! He came for me first—he saw—in my office—he knows I’m a squib! You’ve got to get rid of him before he goes after the muggle-borns!”

“What?” Harry said, flinching under Filch’s rage. “Why am I—I’m not the—And I wouldn’t—”

“That’s enough, Argus,” Dumbledore said calmly. “No second year could have done this alone, not even Mr. Potter. It would require, at the very least, a powerful magical artifact and outside help.”

“I know he did it. I caught him red-handed with that message. He went for Mrs. Norris because he saw my Kwikspell letter.”

“I did not!” Harry shouted. “I figured out you were a squib a year ago.” (“What?” Filch screeched.) “It’s kind of obvious. I’d bet half the school’s figured it out. And I’m telling I’d you never…” He choked with tears suddenly. “…I’d never do that to a cat.”

Neville continued to sit in silence, but he was becoming more and more confused as he watched the exchange. Most of the students would love to give Mrs. Norris a swift kick. He knew Harry was the selfless and noble type, but it seemed odd that even he would cry over her.

“Harry’s the biggest cat-lover I know,” Hermione explained, trying to calm her brother down again. “He’d never hurt one if he could help it. We were eating dinner in the kitchens because we wanted some privacy. We were coming upstairs, and we just found her like that. That’s all we know, Professor.”

“Yeah,” Neville finally spoke up. “Hermione and I were with Harry the whole time. He couldn’t have done it. All the elves will tell you where we were.”

Filch still looked furious. “But Potter’s a Parselmouth, Headmaster,” he growled. “He’s already showed the whole school. He’s obviously the Heir of Slytherin.”

“I’m not the Heir of Slytherin,” Harry insisted. “Why am I supposed to be the Heir of Slytherin? There’s gotta be other Parselmouths around. Besides, if I _was_ the Heir of Slytherin, do you really think I’d write it on the wall?”

“We have no proof that Mr. Potter is the Heir of Slytherin, Argus,” Dumbledore said. “And we have reliable testimony that he was _not_ involved in what has happened to Mrs. Norris.”

Filch collapsed into a chair in despair as his argument unravelled.

“We will be able to cure her, Argus,” Dumbledore assured him. “Professor Sprout was lucky enough to acquire a crop of mandrakes this year. As soon as they mature, Professor Snape will be able to use them for a restorative draught that will revive her.”

“But won’t that be in the spring, Professor?” Harry said. “Couldn’t you just buy the potion from an apothecary?”

“I’m afraid not, Harry. Mature mandrake is extremely rare and expensive, and more to the point, the potion has a short shelf-life and can only be made when the mandrakes mature. The only option we currently have would be to import a batch from the Southern Hemisphere at an even steeper price, and I’m sorry, Argus, but I have little hope that the Board would approve such a purchase for a cat.”

There was a very awkward pause as Filch started weeping again, albeit not as loudly.

“You may go,” Dumbledore told the three children.

Neville and Hermione were quick to leave the office, but Harry stopped at the door and turned to face Filch. “She really cares about you, sir,” he said.

“What? What did you say?”

“Mrs. Norris. She really cares about you.”

“How would _you_ know?” Filch said bitterly.

“I know cats, sir. You can see it from how she’s always at your side when you’re giving people detention. I know we don’t get along, but I have a lot of respect for a man who treats his cat that well.” Harry forced himself, against his instincts, to give Filch a slow blink, even if the man didn’t consciously understand the gesture.

Filch’s lip quivered, and he managed to choke out, “Thanks, Potter,” before turning away.

* * *

“Harry nearly had a panic attack when he saw her,” Hermione said. “Filch was yelling that Harry did it, but Dumbledore convinced him he didn’t.”

As soon as they could find an isolated place alone, Harry and Hermione called Sirius back up and told him about the attack on Mrs. Norris.

“I can imagine it was hard for you to see that, Cub,” Sirius told Harry. “To this day, I still start growling if I see someone being mean to a dog.”

“Sirius, what do you know about the Heir of Slytherin and the Chamber of Secrets?” Harry asked.

“It’s an old legend in Slytherin House,” he said solemnly. “Andromeda might know more than I do, since she actually lived in their dorms. The story goes that Salazar Slytherin didn’t want to teach muggle-borns at Hogwarts, but the other Founders wouldn’t go along with him. So he built a secret Chamber under the school and hid some kind of monster in it, and someday the Heir of Slytherin would come and release the monster and purge the school of all the muggle-borns.”

Harry gave Hermione a nervous look: “‘Purge’ as in petrify?”

Sirius shook his head: “Not in the version I heard.”

Both children shuddered. “Sirius, was the Heir of Slytherin supposed to be a Parselmouth?” Hermione asked.

“That’s one of the more popular theories—that no one’s found the Chamber of Secrets in the past thousand years because only a Parselmouth can get in.”

“And since everyone knows I’m a Parselmouth…” Harry started.

“They’re gonna think you’re the Heir? Could be.”

“But they know I’m not against muggle-borns,” he protested. “What else did we fight for all last year?”

“I know, Cub, but people will talk anyway. Try not to let it faze you too much. Focus on what’s really important.”

“Sirius, do you think someone’s trying to set me up?” Harry said suddenly.

“I don’t know. I’d almost say it was an elaborate prank, but even I don’t know what could have petrified that cat so hard that even Dumbledore couldn’t fix her without a mandrake draught. Just be careful, both of you.”

“Always,” Harry said. “Thanks, Sirius.”


	48. Harry Writes Harry Potter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The enemy’s gate is JK Rowling.
> 
> Parts of this chapter are quoted from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.

The next morning, all anyone could talk about was what had happened to Mrs. Norris and the message on the wall. Between the crass comments about her, the constant stares, and the nervous whispers about himself, Harry felt like he was on the brink of losing his mind. Granted, many of the muggle-borns were very worried with good reason, as they were already informing themselves about the Chamber of Secrets: even Colin Creevey seemed a little less excited today; but it was little comfort to Harry.

All in all, he wasn’t in a mood to talk to anyone today, and he was glad Hermione was generally fending them off. Neville did, too, before long, quickly taking the hint. Harry noticed that many of the teachers were also looking more subdued, and Professor McGonagall looked almost as shell-shocked as he felt, unsurprisingly. Oddly, the one other student who looked as shell-shocked as Harry was Ginny Weasley, who was staring into space and barely even touching her breakfast. She jumped and nearly fell out of her seat when Colin sat next to her and said, “Hey, Ginny, are you okay?”

“Ahh! Oh, sorry, Colin. I…I just c-can’t believe what happened to that c-cat,” she stammered.

Harry looked up from his own food and blinked at her. “Yeah, I know—it was pretty awful,” he said.

“Yeah, my sis is a big cat-lover,” Ron said. “You don’t know Mrs. Norris, though. Trust me; we’re better off without her.”

“Ron!” Harry snapped. “That’s not nice!”

“Wha—?”

“Ron, you _know_ how much Harry loves cats,” Hermione said pointedly. Ginny looked at Harry with interest, as did Neville and Colin.

“Right, sorry,” Ron mumbled.

“Hey, there…Harry? Can I ask you something?” Harry’s head snapped up to see Justin Finch-Fletchley approaching the Gryffindor Table, looking fearful.

Harry sighed: “Hi, uh, sure, Justin.”

“Um, you’re not _really_ the Heir of Slytherin, are you?”

“No, Justin, I’m not,” he groaned.

“Oh, good,” he said with relief. “‘Cause the other guys in Hufflepuff are saying you must be because you’re…”

“Because I’m a Parselmouth?” Harry asked. Justin nodded. “Look, I don’t know how I’m a Parselmouth, but I didn’t attack Mrs. Norris, and I’m definitely not going after the muggle-borns. I mean, come on, my sister’s a muggle-born, and everyone saw how hard I fought for the Muggle Protection Act. I don’t hold with anything the Heir of Slytherin believes in, whoever he is, so you can go tell them that.”

“Uh, right, Harry,” Justin said, still looking intimidated. “I will.” He quickly made his way back to the Hufflepuff Table.

“I wonder who Slytherin’s Heir is, though,” Ron said. “I bet it’s Malfoy. Everyone knows he hates muggle-borns.”

Harry shrugged his shoulders. “I bet this is what that elf was warning me about,” he said darkly.

“Harry,” Hermione whispered, “we said Dobby belonged to Malfoy or Nott. What if it _is_ one of them?”

“Yeah, it could be. I don’t know how we could find out for sure, though—unless I sneak into the Slytherin Dorms,” he suggested.

“You told McGonagall you wouldn’t. Besides, we have no idea what got Mrs. Norris.”

Harry flinched: “Yeah, there’s that. I don’t know what else to do, though.”

“I guess we should just wait it out and be careful,” Hermione said. Harry could agree with that for now.

* * *

“ _Nice loud howl, Harry_ —”

Harry smirked, then threw back his head and let out a piercing, “Aaarrrhhh-OOOOO-ooooo-OOOOO-ooooo!” that made Professor Lockhart flinch and half the class shudder. He hadn’t thought it very interesting at the time, but he was glad now that Remus had taught him how to howl properly. A good wolf (or werewolf) howl wasn’t supposed to be in-your-face scary. It was supposed to be shivers-down-your-spine scary, and looking at his classmates, he thought he had succeeded.

“Erm…just like that, Harry,” Lockhart collected himself. “ _Now, if you can believe it, I pounced—like this_ —” He thrust his hand up under Harry’s chin, as if forcing his jaws away. “Slammed _him to the floor_ —” He pushed Harry down, banging his head against the floor.

“Ow!” Harry protested. He inadvertently hit Lockhart in the arm with a wandless Stinging Jinx.

“Ah!” Lockhart said, quickly pulling his hand away and shaking it out, but he immediately replaced it. “ _Thus—with one hand, I managed to hold him down—with my other, I put my wand to his throat_ —” Lockhart did just that to Harry, who immediately went on high alert. This _was_ the cursed Defence Professor after all. It was only because of his superior magic sense that he held back. The slightest glimmer of magic pulsing through Lockhart’s wand, and he’d blast him across the room. He was sure Hermione was on high alert, too, even though her opinion of the man was still inexplicably higher than his.

But Lockhart didn’t cast a spell. He just continued his story: “ _I then screwed up my remaining strength and performed the immensely complex Homorphus Charm—he let out a piteous moan—go on, Harry_ —” Harry put on his best imitation of Padfoot in one of his moods. “Perfect— _the fur vanished—the fangs shrank—and he turned back into a man. Simple—yet effective—and another village will remember me forever as the hero who delivered them from the monthly terror of werewolf attacks._ Any questions?”

This was Harry’s chance. He would never have even consented to act out the part, except for this opportunity. As he pulled himself to his feet, he remembered the conversation he’d had with Remus in that week at Grimmauld Place after he read that chapter.

 

 _“What the_ heck _? Moony!_ _” Harry marked his place and slammed shut his copy of_ Wanderings with Werewolves _before running off to find his honorary uncle._

_“What is it, Ratsbane?” Moony replied when he found him, following the general convention of reciprocating Marauder names._

_“Moony, I was reading about Lockhart’s capture of the Wagga Wagga Werewolf, and he says he used a spell called the Homorphus Charm to change him back to human form. Is that a real spell?”_

_“Ahhhh…” Moony sighed. “Yes, it is…I am quite familiar with that spell.”_

_“Well, what is it? I thought…I thought there was no cure.”_

_“The Homomorphus Charm,” he said slowly, “is an invention of the early twentieth century. It is a spell that can temporarily change a werewolf back to human form for purposes of identification or containment. However, it’s extremely difficult to cast, very painful for the werewolf, and, of course, if you fail, you’re in big trouble. But the worst part is that the werewolf builds up a resistance to it with repeated use. The first time, it’ll last all night, but after that, it’ll last less and less time with each use…It’s also used on people who are unfortunate enough to be bitten as children. The healers used it with me to “ease me into lycanthropy,” so to speak, but it’s only a temporary solution. By now, it only works on me for about forty-five minutes—long past the point where the extra pain makes it not worth it—and that’s if it’s cast properly.”_

“Professor Lockhart,” Harry said innocently, “I was intrigued by your description of the Homorphus Charm to change a werewolf back to human form. I happen to have met a werewolf through a mutual acquaintance, and I was wondering if there was any way that charm could benefit him.”

Lockhart winced a little and laughed nervously. “Well, uh, Harry,” he said, “the Homorphus Charm is very useful in principle, but I’m afraid that it is an ancient spell of great arcaneness, and the wizard who taught it to me swore me to secrecy.”

“Ah, of course, sir.” Harry pretended to accept it, since he wouldn’t be able to easily explain how he knew as much about that spell as he did, but he didn’t hold back once class was over: “That settles it,” he told Hermione. “The man is a total fraud. You can’t say he just got that mixed up. It’s like the most important thing in that book.”

“No, you’re right, Harry,” Hermione replied reluctantly. “I was hoping he’d be _some_ good, but he obviously has no idea what he’s talking about…I don’t get how he can get away with saying he did all those things though.”

“No idea. Might be worth keeping an eye on him about that. Wouldn’t want him taking credit for beating Quirrellmort, now, would we?”

Hermione rolled her eyes at him.

* * *

Harry sat at the edge of the Common Room, eyes closed, legs crossed, and his face frowning deeply in concentration. In fact, he looked downright agitated.

“Knut for your thoughts?” his sister interrupted him.

Harry sighed in annoyance and opened his eyes: “I was trying to meditate on my mental image.” Harry and Hermione had both been trying to work on their Occlumency techniques regularly. Harry’s “image” was a large and detailed representation of the Hogwarts grounds, partly built in his mind by examining the Marauder’s Map and partly by flying high over the grounds on his broom. In principle, it should be pretty good, he thought.

“Oh,” Hermione said, catching on herself. “How’s it going?”

“Not well. I just can’t picture it today for some reason.

“You’re worried because of Mrs. Norris,” she replied. It wasn’t a question.

Harry nodded: “I still can’t believe what happened to her—and that message…Anyway, I just can’t focus. It’s not coming to me.”

“Well, Mr. Barnett did say Occlumency is more difficult when you’re emotional. That’s why we have to practice.”

“Yeah, I know, and he wasn’t kidding,” he said. Occlumency was as much about blocking out your own mind as an intruder’s. Indeed, since the main thrust of Legilimency was reading whatever was on top (though ideally called up at the Legilimens’s behest), it was almost the same thing. In Harry’s case, other recent memories kept “breaking through” and disrupting his mental image. “How are you doing at it?” he asked.

“Okay, I guess. Things have been pretty hectic, but I think I’m still keeping track of everything.” Hermione, Mum, and Dad all had been working on their methods of loci, also known as a memory palace. The thing with the Occlumency version of the concept was that it was a memory palace that was impossible to navigate and filled with useless junk—all kinds of thoughts and ideas—mundane ones—that didn’t give any information and, most importantly, weren’t strongly associated with any sensitive memories. Use the wrong association, and a Legilimens could break through what Mr. Barnett had called “trap doors’ into one’s mind.

Mum and Dad were doing well enough at the technique according to their letters, but Hermione seemed to have taken to it like a fish to water. Using her prodigious memorisation skills (just because Harry had talked her out of memorising her course books didn’t mean she couldn’t have), she had built an impassible labyrinth filled with an astonishing variety of concepts, knots of conceptual geometry impossible in the real world, blind alleyways tied to the Fibonacci Sequence or lists of kings and prime ministers, mnemonic dead ends, and lines of thought that doubled back on themselves when you least expected it.

For Hermione, the image of a playground ball in flight might be connected to that slightly muddy smell one got in the spring, which might be connected to a specific bird call, which might jump over to facts about dinosaurs—an association that no wizard would understand—and then to the Greek and Latin etymologies of their names. As long as there was some association between the concepts in her mind, either existing or newly-imposed, it would force an intruder down that path. Taking a different turn, the muddy smell might also link to the frosty smell that always heralded the first sign of winter, then the smell of autumn leaves, then the muggy smell of a warm summer night, and then back where you started—or it might jump in a deliberate non-sequitur to a philosophical discourse on the Problem of Other Minds to try to confuse an intruder into thinking they were reading their own mind. That was a little corny, but just because it wasn’t physical, she reasoned, didn’t mean there couldn’t be booby traps. In the same way, a disembodied bitter taste or foul odour would be more likely to be momentarily mistaken for a real world stimulus and disrupt the Legilimens’s thoughts than a more conventional image or sound.

Harry wished his mind were that agile—it sounded a lot more fun—but Mr. Barnett had assured him that a strong will paired with a solid and detailed mental image was just as good, and anyway, he could try another technique once he’d mastered the first one. So to that end, he joined Hermione in the Flying Club when he could and flew around the castle, memorising every turret and window.

And none of it was helping him today.

“Eh, I’ll worry about it later,” he muttered to himself. “Hey, d’you wanna come up to my room, Mione? I wanted to show you something.”

Hermione groaned and leaned closer to him. “Harry, if you’re planning to prowl around again—” she started.

“No! Why do you think it’s always that?”

Hermione gave him her best do-you-really-need-me-to-say-it look.

“Okay, so it’s usually that, but this is different.”

“Alright, alright, let’s go.”

Harry led her up the stairs to his dorm and started digging to the bottom of his trunk. Hermione raised an eyebrow—that usually meant something fairly secret, like the invisibility cloak or the Marauder’s Map. But this time, he dug out a notebook. He looked up and said, “I had something I wanted you to read over for me,” before handing it to her.

She took the notebook in hand and examined its contents. It appeared to be a story of some kind—a story that quickly looked very familiar. “Harry, what is this?” she asked.

“It’s the first two chapters of _Harry Potter and the Philosopher_ _’s Stone_.”

Hermione’s mouth hung open a little. “Harry…” she said without a hint of teasing, “you actually wrote it—or started writing it?”

“Yeah, I did,” Harry said self-consciously. “I really wanted to try it. I really would like to be able to set the record straight someday.”

“Well, that’s nice, but…” She kept flipping through the pages. “Huh…I never really pictured you as the writer type.”

“Yeah, I’m sure you thought that was your job,” Harry teased.

Hermione glared at him, but she said, “To be honest, kinda yeah. I mean, I’m, uh…me, and you’re…you.”

“And what’s _that_ supposed to mean?”

“It means I never pictured you as the writer type, Harry. We established this.”

Harry gave her his cat-like I’m-ignoring-you gesture, and Hermione looked back at the notebook to take a closer look. Then, she realised what part of Harry’s life those chapters were describing. “Harry, this is all about the Dursleys and how you escaped from them and met me and Mum and Dad,” she said in surprise.

Harry looked back at her: “Yeah, well, I have to give some background, don’t I? I’m just gonna skim over the stuff before Hogwarts. We were pretty normal for most of that.”

“Oh, please, _you_ were _never_ normal. But still, I’m surprised you’re comfortable writing all this down.”

“Yeah, I know. I wasn’t sure about it myself, but the thing is…I think it helps to get it all down on paper—helps set things straight in my mind and makes it easier to deal with, sort of. It’s definitely easier to write about the Dursleys than talk about them…”

“Hmm…I can see what you mean…” Hermione again took a close look at the words on a page. “Harry…This is actually pretty good,” she said. “Needs a lot of work, too, and probably a lot more detail, but…I think you actually have some talent at this.”

“Always the tone of surprise,” Harry replied in annoyance.

“I’ve always had faith in you, little brother,” Hermione said half-teasingly. “I’ll need time to properly read this, of course. And you should really get an adult to help you do it really well. I’m sure Mum and Dad will love to see it.”

“Yeah, but I kinda wanted to clean it up more before I show it to them. I figured I’d have Remus help me out. Sirius says he needs more stuff to keep him busy, anyway.”

“That could work. Good luck with the rest of it. It _would_ be good to set the record straight if we ever get the chance to reveal it someday.”

“Thanks, sis.”

Hermione turned to go, but she stopped just before she reached the door and turned back. “Harry, I understand if you don’t want to do the study of Parseltongue, now,” she said. Hermione had continued to express interest in writing that as a book of her own over the past few weeks, but their few forays into the subject had consisted largely of failed attempts at getting Harry to speak Parseltongue on command and equally failed attempts to figure out how Luna’s mind worked.

“Yeah—” Harry started. “I mean no—no, I mean…not right now. Maybe a little later. I mean, it’s not like things can get much worse, right?”

Hermione shuddered at that and said, “Harry, don’t jinx it…Just remember, you can take more time about it if you want to.”

“Uh huh. Thanks.”

* * *

Most of the school quietly hoped through all of the breathless speculation that what happened to Mrs. Norris had been a one-off—a particularly cruel prank by an older Slytherin, meant to scare everybody, but not do much serious harm. And as the first Quidditch match of the season approached, one week after Halloween, talk at the school gradually shifted to that topic.

Harry was on pins and needles both because of the match and because he was still worried over Mrs. Norris. It didn’t help that something dangerous (well, more dangerous than usual) had happened around two out of the three matches last year. It took him a real effort for him to focus on Quidditch practice and prepare for the match. Oliver Wood wasn’t happy, but there was no reserve Seeker, so there wasn’t much he could do.

A few other people were also taking things pretty badly. Ginny Weasley was still very disturbed by what had happened. Percy claimed she was worried Harry would be expelled because he was a Parselmouth, despite his and Harry’s own assurances to the contrary. Percy himself was more on edge than usual, ostensibly over Ginny, but Ron claimed that he’d been snapping at his brothers, too, and was worried someone in his family might do something to somehow prevent him from becoming Head Boy next year. Harry and Hermione weren’t sure whether Percy really was that paranoid or if Ron was just making stuff up because he was annoyed. Neither would have surprised them.

Colin Creevey, on the other hand, seemed to have bounced back completely.

“Alright, Ginny?” he said, sitting next to the redheaded girl at breakfast.

“Ahh! Oh, hi, Colin,” Ginny said, quickly snapping her diary shut.

“Hi. Are you alright? I haven’t seen you much this week.”

“Um…uh, yeah,” Ginny said, trying to sound cheerful. “Hey, uh, ready to see the Quidditch match?”

“Oh, yeah!” Colin said excitedly, looking down the table at where the Gryffindor Team was seated. “I can’t believe we’re gonna see our first Quidditch match! It sounds really cool, everybody flying around on brooms and stuff. I’m gonna get lots of pictures.”

“Right…it’s very cool,” Ginny replied uncomfortable.

“Hey, Ginny, d’you think I can get a picture of you with your brothers before the match? Hermione said she thinks you’ll be on the team someday, so I thought it’d be cool to get before and after pictures.”

“Eep! Sh-she did?”

“Yeah. Besides, everybody knows you’re the best flyer in our class. She says you’re sure to make starting Chaser before you graduate.”

“Wow…I guess…sure, I can ask Fred and George—maybe Ron, too. I think think he still wants to try for Keeper.”

“Nice. Thanks, Ginny.”

Ginny ate her breakfast fast, listening to Colin’s occasional over-eager comments about Quidditch. When she was done, she pulled her brothers aside out of courtesy so that Colin could get a quick picture. She didn’t quite understand why he wanted one, but he was muggle-born, and she’d seen him taking pictures of odder things, including a few that secretly worried her, like the older students’ Self-Writing Quills, the mysterious message on the wall from Halloween, and snapping candid shots of various people, including her. She tried to get away from him after breakfast to get a private moment to write in her diary.

 _Sorry about that, Tom,_ she wrote. _Colin snuck up on me again._

 _It_ _’s alright, Ginny,_ Tom replied at once. _I_ _’m getting a little worried about that Creevey boy, though._

 _What_ _’s wrong with Colin?_ she replied with a dose of false bravado.

_He was making you uncomfortable._

_I know, but he_ _’s just really excited is all. He doesn’t know about magic, so he goes crazy about everything._

_Yes, muggle-borns tend to be like that,_ Tom wrote dryly—or that was how Ginny interpreted it, although she still wasn’t sure why she always sensed such a clear tone from Tom. _But I_ _’m more worried about him getting into something that’s none of his business. The way he’s always snooping around with his camera, it makes you wonder if he’s on to something, doesn’t it?_

Ginny started to shake. Colin couldn’t know what she’d been doing, did he? He barely even knew about the diary, much less what it did. And as for Halloween, well, she still couldn’t remember what had happened herself, nor what had happened the time she’d woken up covered in feathers. But Colin couldn’t possibly know more than she did, or he would have said something…wouldn’t he? _He_ _’s not snooping Tom,_ she wrote, although she was mostly trying to reassure herself. _He just likes taking pictures._

_But still, the way he does it—sneaking around, taking people by surprise. It_ _’s risky. He might see something he shouldn’t._

She twitched at that. If Colin snuck up on her at the wrong moment and saw…actually, she wasn’t really sure what she was so afraid he would see, but somehow she knew instinctively it would be bad. _Tom, what do I do?_ she wrote breathlessly. _I know Colin means well. I don_ _’t want to get him in trouble._

 _It_ _’s okay, Ginny,_ he replied. _We_ _’ll worry about him later. Just enjoy the match for now. I know you’re excited to see it._

_Oh, yes! It_ _’ll be so great to finally see Harry play!_

_You_ _’ll have to tell me all about it afterwards. It sounds like Harry is very talented._

_He is! He went 3-0 last year, and he broke the school record for the fastest Snitch catch against Ravenclaw._

There was an ink splash of surprise on the page. _That_ _’s_ _very_ _impressive. It sounds like Harry has all sorts of unexpected talents. I hope he does well in the match._

_Me too, Tom._


	49. The Rogue Bludger

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: JK Rowling didn’t write Harry Potter by getting through all her life not having done anything.

Harry himself didn’t know about the unusual encouragement being offered in a secluded corner of the castle, but he certainly had his own share of well-wishers trying to settle his nerves. Draco Malfoy had been looking particularly smug over the past week and was sure to have been practising hard after his narrow defeat last year, so this would be far from an easy game. Meanwhile, Oliver Wood was very keen to win the Quidditch Cup again, which wasn’t helping _anyone_ _’s_ nerves. “Get the Snitch or die trying” didn’t sound like particularly good advice, especially after Harry nearly got himself killed last year with Quirrellmort cursing his broom.

Something else that made Harry that much more nervous was that his live audience this year included four more people who were very close to him. Sirius and Remus had smacked themselves in their heads over the summer when they remembered that Hogwarts Quidditch matches were covered on the Wizarding Wireless Network. (With Remus’s former lifestyle, he didn’t listen to the wireless much, and Sirius’s family never went for that “newfangled muggle contraption”). They immediately bought a set and got one for the Grangers too. It was nice that his family would be able to hear the match live, Harry thought, but Quidditch was a violent game, and he didn’t want to think about how his parents would react if something went wrong.

The Gryffindor Team walked onto the pitch, to boos from the Slytherins and cheers from everyone else. The Slytherin team met them with the roles reversed. There was a hint of thunder in the air—not a good sign, for while they had practised in all weather, all three of last year’s matches had been in good playing conditions.

“All set, Potter?” Malfoy grinned at him. “Wouldn’t want to have a panic attack in the air, now, would we, scaredy-cat?”

Harry’s heart skipped a couple of beats, and he very nearly set the grass on fire with accidental magic, but he forced the jolt down. Malfoy couldn’t possibly know his secret. He was just mocking him for freaking out about Mrs. Norris last week. He refocused the energy into a controlled pulse of magic that he hoped would be intimidating. He thought he saw Malfoy twitch, but the Slytherin had excellent control. “I’m ready, Malfoy,” he replied with a threatening stare. He wished he had a tail to twitch at him. “Are you ready to lose again?”

“No, I’m ready to win, Potter,” Malfoy glared back. “You got lucky last year, but it won’t happen again.”

“We’ll see.”

“On my whistle…” Madam Hooch called. “Three…two…one…”

“And they’re off!” Lee Jordan announced over the roar of the crowd. “Katie Bell of Gryffindor with the Quaffle. Gryffindor’s definitely got a great veteran team this year—Quidditch Cup winners last year, in case you’ve been living under a rock. Passes to Johnson—then Spinnet—whoa! Back to Bell and dodges Flint of Slytherin—I didn’t even _see_ that. Bell shoots—she scores! Ten-nought, Gryffindor!”

The crowd roared far below as Harry looked down on the stadium. Getting the first goal of the year was always a good start, but he had bigger fish to fry.

“Of course, the big show this year is the rematch between Gryffindor’s star Seeker, Harry Potter and Slytherin’s Draco Malfoy. Potter went three-nought last year, including beating Malfoy to the Snitch by inches, despite an apparently malfunctioning broom. Now, we’ll see if he can repeat his performance, hopefully without the malfunctioning broom part.”

Malfoy didn’t look too happy about the attention Harry was getting, but he wisely kept circling the pitch opposite Harry, scanning intently for the Golden Snitch. As the two of them looked, they heard a familiar song wafting up from the crowd: “Harry Potter is our king! Potter can catch anything!”

“And it looks like we’ve got plenty of Potter fans here today,” Lee said. “I think it’s gonna be a good match.”

Wood narrowly blocked a goal from Adrian Pucey in the midst of a long back-and-forth between the Gryffindor and Slytherin Chasers. But just then, Harry saw a flash of scarlet moving in his direction. He looked down and saw George Weasley racing up to meet him. A split second later, he saw a growing black dot—a Bludger heading straight towards him, picking up speed as it climbed to his great height. He pulled a lightning-fast barrel roll and dodged it.

“Close one, Harry!” George yelled as he zoomed by and smacked the Bludger back down into the action.

 _That was strange_ , Harry thought. _Bludgers don_ _’t normally come this far from the main crowd._ But then, as he watched it go, the impossible happened. The Bludger slowed down, turned around, and sailed back toward him.

“Oh, come on!” he yelled, and he took off in a dash to the other side of the pitch.

“Uh-oh, looks like Potter’s got a Bludger tailing him,” Lee commentated. “Wow, it really doesn’t wanna let him go.”

Harry could see that. The Bludger was charmed against his magic sense, but he could hear it whistling through the air behind him—and a good thing, too, since he wouldn’t have to keep looking over his shoulder that way. Yes, it was definitely following him, which it was definitely _not_ supposed to do.

“Gotcha!” Fred yelled as he met Harry going the other way and smacked the Bludger away from him two-handed. But Harry’s fears were confirmed when it got halfway down the pitch, turned around again, and came back at him. He took off at full speed.

The good thing about the Bludger was that it wasn’t as manoeuvrable as a broom, so Harry was able to dodge it with a roller coaster ride of tight turns and steep climbs and dives.

CRASH! The Bludger went off the edge of the pitch and smashed through one of the wooden towers of the structure, but it barely even slowed down.

“Ooh! That’s gonna need some cleanup!” Lee said. “And Pucey scores,” he groaned. “Sixty-twenty Slytherin.”

Harry remembered that Slytherin was still all on _Nimbus Two Thousands_ , while he was the only one on the Gryffindor Team who had one. That plus Fred and George having to shadow him meant they were playing at a significant disadvantage.

“Someone’s tampered with the Bludger!” Fred yelled. He smacked the iron ball away again.

“Ya think?” Harry yelled back. “I can’t see!” he complained. He pulled ahead of the Twins a bit.

“Harry, watch out!” George called.

There it was. The Bludger was coming straight at his chest, with no Beaters close enough to reach him. He might be able to dodge it, but he suddenly got another idea. Since the full list of Quidditch fouls had never been published, Harry didn’t know if anyone had ever bothered to actually make a rule against wandless magic. It was definitely against the spirit of the game, but he didn’t think that was particularly important at the moment. Harry held his hand out in the direction of the Bludger and discreetly cast a wandless _Contego_ inches from his body.

CLANG! That wasn’t what it sounded like, but it _was_ what it felt like when the Bludger slammed into his Simple Block Charm and bounced off. He could feel his magic _ringing_ from the impact. Unfortunately, it didn’t bounce all that far, and he would have to recast the block every time it came at him. He definitely couldn’t do that for the whole match. He went back to dodging.

Lee Jordan was trying to figure out what had just happened: “What the heck was that? Did Potter block that somehow…? No, I think that Bludger’s just gone completely nuts.”

Harry threw up another _Contego_ to reflect a blow he couldn’t dodge. He was surprised no one was making the connection that he was using wandless magic. With adequate dodging, he thought maybe he could make it, but it wasn’t a good situation. “Time out!” he yelled, flying within earshot of Wood.

“Time out!” Wood repeated.

Unfortunately, he knew there wasn’t much they could do. Substitutions were only allowed in Quidditch if the game ran longer than twelve hours, and substitutions of equipment were permitted only if it was physically broken. On top of that, a light rain had begun to fall. It wouldn’t bother most people, but even light rain could be very unpleasant when flying at high speeds. Harry’s glasses at least kept it out of his eyes, but it would be good to end the game quickly, before things got much worse.

Thankfully, the Bludger stopped pursuing Harry as soon as his feet touched the grass, but even then, it still circled above him ominously, like a vulture, which only made the Slytherin Team point and jeer at him more.

“Do you see anything, Hermione?” Neville asked nervously as he watched from the stands.

“No,” she replied disappointedly, still scanning with her binoculars. “None of the teachers show any sign of jinxing the Bludger. I’m looking at the older Slytherins, but I think whoever did this must have tampered with it before the game started.”

“No way!” Ron insisted. “All the game balls are locked in Madam Hooch’s office between matches. No one can get in there. The team even uses a different set to practice.”

“Could someone have switched the balls before the match?” asked Neville.

“From right under Madam Hooch’s nose?” Hermione said. “Maybe with a Switching Spell, but that’d be just as hard as jinxing it.”

“Look, I think they’re getting ready to start again,” Ron pointed out.

Hermione turned her binoculars back down to the pitch, knowing full well what her brother would do. “Please be careful, Harry,” she whispered.

“Look, I can out-fly it on my own. You two focus on the Chasers,” Harry argued with Fred and George on the pitch.

“You won’t get the Snitch very well that way,” George pointed out.

“It’s better than dropping out completely. That’s why you need to focus on the Chasers. I’ll take care of myself.”

“You heard him,” Wood declared. “Let’s go.”

They were in the air again, and from that moment, the Bludger went back to chasing Harry. He glanced behind him and saw it flying hot on his tail through the rain. “I hate being the prey,” he grumbled. He started flying on his roller coaster course again. He knew he must look pretty foolish by now, but what choice did he have?

“Hey, Scarhead, are you playing Quidditch or training for ballet?” Malfoy mocked him as he flew by.

Harry’s blood boiled at that one, and he got an idea. “I’ll show you ballet, Sparrow!” he called, and he raced after him. _Sparrow? Really? Well, it_ _’s an insult for a cat_ , he thought _._ But his plan was more than just the insult. Harry snap-judged his angles and did a barrel roll around Malfoy as he passed—one that put the Slytherin directly between him and the rogue Bludger.

“Ah!” Malfoy yelled and pulled back hard on his broom to avoid the iron ball. “Potter, you lunatic!” he yelled.

 _Ha! Who_ _’s the prey_ _now?_ Harry thought. He immediately capitalised on his new strategy and headed straight for Adrian Pucey, who was trying to get past Wood again. Pucey was forced to dodge the Bludger and dropped the Quaffle. Angelina Johnson snapped it up in a blink.

“And Potter’s playing Beater!” Lee exclaimed, assuredly confusing everyone who was listening on the wireless. “Gets the Quaffle away from Pucey to Johnson. I don’t know what’s going on with that Bludger, but Potter’s using it against Slytherin—buzzes Flint—Whoa! Nearly got him there! And Johnson scores! Seventy-thirty Slytherin.”

The crowd roared as Harry entered the active play. The Bludger’s single-minded pursuit of him made it easy to predict where it would go and direct it. And with that tool in his arsenal, in addition to dodging and the Block Charm, he thought he might actually have a chance of getting through this game in one piece. He looped around the Slytherin Chasers and even the Beaters, forcing them to dodge both him and the Bludger, while still trying to keep an eye out for the Snitch. There was a higher chance someone would foul him with those antics, but it was definitely slowing down the Slytherin Team and keeping him from getting pummelled, so he called it a win-win. And of course, he buzzed Malfoy at every opening he got, although Malfoy was a good enough flier himself that he always got out of the way.

Contrary to popular belief, cats do not play with their prey before eating it. Instead, they smack their prey around to weaken and tire the small animals before going in for the kill, thus reducing the risk of bites and scratches. It was brutal, but Harry thought nothing of doing this to rodents and small birds when he was younger. After all, it was just what he needed to do to survive, and they were a lot less intelligent than most of the animals humans eat. But on the other hand, if you take that same cat, add a human mind, and pit him against his archenemy…well, in this instance, Harry was _definitely_ playing with his prey.

“And Spinnet lines up her shot…” Lee commentated. “Bletchley’s getting ready to block…Wait, what’s Potter doing? He’s rushing the scoring area! He’s stooging—! Wait, turns around. WHAM! BRILLIANT! Sends the Bludger straight into Bletchley! I can’t believe he could aim it like that.”

“How’s _that_ for ballet, Sparrow?” Harry yelled at Malfoy as he buzzed him again.

“What the hell, Scarhead? What does Sparrow even mean?” Malfoy yelled back as he dodged the rogue Bludger.

“Oi, you called me ‘scaredy-cat’ first!” Harry retorted.

Malfoy was about to respond to that when he spotted it: the Golden Snitch. _Yes!_ he thought. _Time to beat that mudwallowing nutter!_ He pulled a sharp turn and raced after it.

“Uh-oh, Malfoy’s seen the Snitch!” Lee said, to the dismay of three-fourths of the crowd.

Harry’s heart jumped into his throat when he saw that it wasn’t a feint. He laid out flat and pushed his broom to the limit, but Malfoy was closer, and on an equally good broom…

“Yaaahh!” Malfoy was thrown off course when he had to swerve to avoid the _other_ Bludger—both Seekers had almost forgotten about it—as Fred hit it his way. That also happened to send it in Harry’s direction, but it went wide. At the same time, Harry’s Bludger was gaining on him.

Fred started to say, “Go get ‘im Har—”

CLANG!

That _was_ what it sounded like when the two Bludgers collided. The ringing sounded across the pitch like a huge bell and carried little ripples of magic with it. Harry thought the Bludgers might be broken when he looked back for a second and saw both of them corkscrewing through the air. He turned his attention back to Malfoy, who had righted himself, but the Snitch had zigged away from him, and Harry was closer now. He reached out and started forward—

WHAM!

Harry had underestimated that cursed Bludger. It corkscrewed straight into his arm. He could hear and feel his bones break with a sickening crack. But even then, he fought through the pain and kept his eyes on the prize: get the Snitch in the next few seconds, and it would all be over.

“OUCH! That’s gotta hurt!” Lee said. “Bludger finally got him—but wait, he’s still going for it. He’s neck-and-neck with Malfoy. HE’S GOT IT! Potter’s got the Snitch—and Merlin’s beard, with a broken arm, I think. Final score two-forty to one-twenty, Gryffindor.”

Harry hit the mud hard, rolling onto his back and groaning in pain, but it was okay. That debacle of a match was finally over, and they’d won. He opened his eyes to the sky and saw the rogue Bludger still circling above him—though wobbling now, but Fred and George snatched it out of the air and started to wrestle it back into its box. He relaxed his grip on Snitch with his good arm, and it began fluttering around his head much more pleasantly. Yes, everything would be okay soon enough…

But then things got considerably less okay as he saw a blond head with gleaming white teeth hanging over him.

“Oh no, not you!” he groaned.

“Poor boy doesn’t know what he’s saying,” Lockhart said with a grin. “Don’t worry, Harry, I’ll fix your arm.”

“Professor, no!” Hermione ran up to the team, followed by half of Gryffindor crowding around him. Harry could hear the clicking of Colin Creevey’s camera. “He needs to go to Hospital wing,” Hermione said desperately. There was no way she was going to let that fraud cast a spell on her brother.

“It’s alright, Miss Granger. I’ve used this charm countless times.”

“No, no, I want a licensed Healer,” Harry said through clenched teeth.

But Lockhart wasn’t listening. Harry prepared to throw a wandless _Flipendo_ at him as drew his wand, cleared his throat, and said, “ _Brachium_ —”

“ _Contego_!”

Harry turned his head and saw Hermione had her wand out. She’d saved him having to reveal their wandless magic skills for another day. There was a flash of light as Lockhart’s spell splashed off her Simple Block Charm. Unfortunately for him, with his wand hand so close, it splashed right back up onto his arm. At once, a grimace came over Lockhart’s face. His wand slipped from his fingers, and then the crowd gasped as his entire arm turned limp and rubbery and flopped around sickeningly. Lockhart had removed all the bones from his own arm.

“Ahh!” he said in a falsetto squeak. “M-M-Miss G-Granger, th-that was r-really unnecessary.”

“You’ve used that charm countless times, Professor?” Hermione said sceptically.

“Well, um, this can happen sometimes, but, um…not to worry. I’m sure Madam Pomfrey will fix this…right…up…” Lockhart took another glance at his de-boned hand and looked like he was about to pass out.

* * *

Harry and Hermione were on their way to dinner that evening as the party in the Common Room began to slow down. Harry’s arm had been fixed in a trice by Madam Pomfrey, who was extremely put out by Lockhart’s antics, especially now that he would have to stay in the Hospital Wing overnight. But as the pair were walking, they heard a small squeak and saw a flash of bright yellow-green dart behind into an unused classroom. Putting two and two together, they quickly ran after it, their fingers poised to draw their wands.

“Dobby!” they said when they ran inside and spotted the elf.

But the battered house elf was just standing there with tears in his eyes, wringing his hands. “Harry Potter should not have come back to Hogwarts,” he whined, turning in place so that Harry and Hermione weren’t sure if he was addressing them or talking to himself. “Dobby warned and warned him. Why did Harry Potter not heed Dobby?”

“Dobby,” Harry snapped. The elf stopped and turned to look at him. “You sabotaged that Bludger, didn’t you?”

Dobby didn’t respond directly, but he made a funny whining sound. Hermione gasped.

“So your idea of keeping me safe is trying to kill me, now?” Harry demanded. His magic started to get away from him. The desks rattled around him.

“Harry, stop!” Hermione whispered, pulling him back.

Dobby felt the pulse of magic, though, and he staggered back in fear, holding his hands up as if to shield himself from a blow. “Dobby never meant to kill,” he said. “Dobby only meant to maim or seriously injure. Better to be sent home, or even to St. Mungo’s, Harry Potter, sir, than to remain here.”

Harry wasn’t buying it this time. “How did you even think that would work?” he demanded. “Putting me in St. Mungo’s isn’t gonna keep me away from Hogwarts all year. I may be muggle-raised, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have the full resources of the magical world at my disposal. I _am_ Harry Potter, after all.”

“Harry, that’s enough,” Hermione scolded.

“What? He needs to learn his lesson. I don’t want to tell on him to his master, but—” Dobby jumped and squeaked in fright at the prospect that Harry might know who his master was.

“Harry James Potter, you will do no such thing,” his sister ordered. “Can’t you see he’s got it hard enough as it is? I apologise for my brother, Dobby. He tends to get aggressive when people push him too hard. We appreciate that you’re trying to keep him safe, but you’re not going to convince us unless you can show us some real proof of this plot you keep warning us about.”

“B-b-but Harry Potter and Hermione Granger has already seen the dark deeds beginning here at Hogwarts, miss,” the elf said.

“Dark deeds? You mean that Chamber of Secrets thing?” she asked

Dobby nodded, and then his eyes went wide. He grabbed the nearest desk by the leg and banging his head against it. “Bad Dobby!” he yelled. Harry and Hermione grabbed him by the arms and pulled him back. “Bad Dobby. Very bad Dobby,” he muttered dizzily.

“So the Chamber of Secrets is some secret of your master’s?” Hermione reasoned. Dobby quivered in their arms. “And the Heir of Slytherins is plotting against…”

“Muggle-borns,” Harry told her worriedly.

“And you, apparently,” she countered. “Well, that’s one more thing to tell Dumbledore. But Dobby, you can’t keep doing this.”

Dobby shook his head profusely: “Harry Potter and Hermione Granger must not meddle in this, miss. It is being too dangerous. Go home, sir and miss.”

“We’re not going anywhere,” Harry insisted. “If the Heir’s after muggle-borns, then we’ve got other friends who are in danger here, too. We’re gonna do whatever we can to help Dumbledore stop him.”

“Harry Potter is so noble to protect his friends,” Dobby said, “but he must save himself. He is too valuable to—” He stopped cold as Harry flared his magic into the room again. He knew that kind of power and control was the mark of a great wizard—and an angry one—not someone he wanted to cross.

“Harry,” Hermione scolded, but he ignored her.

“You see, Dobby?” he said harshly. “You have secrets? Well, so do we. We have more resources than you know.” He thought of his communication mirror, the emergency Floo connection to home, and their ins with the DMLE, not to mention their own hidden abilities. “We can take care of ourselves. I told you—” He punctuated this with another flare of magic. “I’m Harry Potter.”

The elf gulped and nodded reluctantly. “Dobby must go,” he said. “Please stay safe, Harry Potter, sir…and Hermione Granger, miss.” And with a snap of his fingers, he vanished. Harry sighed with relief and reigned in his magic before he tired himself out.

“You shouldn’t talk to him like that,” Hermione groused, crossing her arms. “And you shouldn’t be exploiting your fame like that.”

“Hey, I got him to go away, didn’t I?” Harry retorted. “He just needs a firm hand is all.”

“Are you kidding? You saw him. He’s obviously had enough of a ‘firm hand’ to last a lifetime.”

“Well, if we figure out who his master is, then maybe we can help him. Come on, let’s go get dinner.” He strode out of the classroom in a dark mood that scared a couple of first years who were walking nearby. Hermione reluctantly followed, hoping he would calm down by the end of the day.

* * *

_And then Hermione cast a spell that reflected Lockhart_ _’s spell and de-boned his entire arm!_

A large splatter of ink drops indicated that Tom was laughing hysterically. Ginny herself might be painfully boring, he thought, but news of Harry Potter’s antics was both informative and entertaining. He had apologetically told Ginny that he didn’t know what might have made the Bludger behave so oddly (which was true, although he could devise some theories). But it was the way Potter had not only adapted to the challenge so well but also turned it to his advantage that really interested him. Things like that were at least potential clues to the mysteries surrounding the boy.

 _Incredible,_ he wrote back _. Lockhart_ _’s even more incompetent than I thought. Perhaps I should teach you instead. You might actually pass your exam that way._

 _Maybe,_ Ginny wrote. For some reason, something felt a little funny about that, like an unpleasant tingling in the back of her mind.

 _So what happened next?_ Tom asked.

_They both went to the Hospital Wing. Harry was out in time for dinner, but Lockhart has to stay there overnight and take Skele-Grow. Yuck! And I hear he got a long talking-to from Madam Pomfrey about practising Healing without a license._

_Ah, well, good to see somebody is competent around here._

They wrote back and forth for a while. Tom was particularly interested in the fine details of how Harry had handled the Bludger, and Ginny was only too happy to tell him everything she knew. Tom himself wasn’t much of a Quidditch fan, but he had a few interesting stories to give back to her.

 _Tom, how did I get here?_ Ginny wrote suddenly taking a look around.

 _You walked, or so I assume,_ Tom replied. _I_ _’m afraid I can’t actually see._

She didn’t know how she had wound up wandering the corridors so close to curfew, writing in her diary as she walked with a Self-Inking Quill. Nor did she know why she kept gravitating towards the second floor girls’ loo—and the one that was always out of order at that, nor what that weird hissing sound was that seemed to be following her around, but the most important thing was that she didn’t think she could get back to Gryffindor Tower in time.

 _Tom, I_ _’m gonna be late getting back_ , she thought fearfully—or did she write it? That funny, half-remembered feeling of not being sure whether things were happening in the pages of her diary or in her own head had returned. _I could get in big trouble, Tom._

_Don_ _’t panic, Ginny. Everything will be fine if you get back to the tower without being seen._

_Right—you_ _’re right, Tom. Silly of me,_ she thought. She started heading back to Gryffindor Tower. She still felt a little disoriented, but she was doing alright until she suddenly heard someone call out to her.

“Alright, Ginny?”

“Eep!” _Oh no, it_ _’s Colin! What do I do? What do I do?_ “C-C-Colin? What are you doing out here?”

“Taking pictures.” And with that, her small classmate raised his camera to his face, and a blinding flash went off.

“Ahh! Colin, stop it!” Ginny snapped, covering her face with her hands. _Tom, what do I do?_

“Oh, sorry. I thought you didn’t mind.”

 _He_ _’s seeing too much,_ Tom said. _I_ _’m afraid we’ll have to_ take care _of him._

“Well, I do,” Ginny told Colin, “so cut it out.” _Do we have to, Tom? I told you I don_ _’t want to hurt anyone._

“Okay…So what are you doing out here?” Colin asked.

“M-m-me? I, uh, I got lost—yeah, that’s it.”

_We won_ _’t hurt him—we just need to take him out of the—heh—picture for a while. We can’t take it too far, after all. A dead student would be grounds to close the school._

_Tom, please, why are we even doing this?_

_To reform Hogwarts to reach its full potential._ (Which by his own estimation was true, if not his primary goal.)

_I don_ _’t like this, Tom. Isn’t there some other way?_

_No, Ginny, there_ _’s not. Now please do as I say…_

“I’m sorry, Colin,” Ginny said. “I just wasn’t ready. Here, how about if I pose for you so you can get a better shot.”

“Really? Gee, that’d be great,” he said excitedly. “Thanks, Ginny.”

“No problem. How about…over here.” She leaned casually against the wall beside the bathroom door.

“Looks good.” He raised his camera to his face and looked through the lens. “Say ‘cheese.’”

Ginny hissed instead.

* * *

“Did you hear something just now?” Harry asked in the Common Room.

Hermione cupped a hand to her ear: “Nope, I don’t hear anything.”

“Huh. Must have been the wind.”


	50. Prowling and Paranoia

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I must not fear JK Rowling. Fear is the mind killer.

It was Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil who delivered the news the next morning: “There’s been an attack!”

“What?” the Common Room gasped.

“We went to visit Professor Lockhart before breakfast—”

“And he was there!”

“The little first year—the one with the camera.”

“Colin Creevey!” Hermione gasped.

“Yeah, him—all stiff and frozen, just like Mrs. Norris!”

“Lockhart said they brought him in the night.”

“It’s too bad he was laid up, or he might have been able to help him, _Hermione_ ,” Lavender glared at her.

“Hey, I was just trying to protect Harry,” she defended herself. “And if you can’t see how incompetent he is from _that_ little episode, then I give up trying to convince you.”

“Lavender, Parvati,” Harry said softly before the girls could make a scene, “do the professors know what happened?”

“I think Lockhart does,” Lavender said. “He doesn’t want to tip them off, but I think he thinks the Chamber of Secrets is real, and it really is the Heir of Slytherin who did it.” Harry and Hermione strongly suspected Lockhart was bluffing.

“Oh, and he said Colin’s camera was all melted inside,” Parvati added. “What kind of thing does _that_?”

No one had an answer to that, nor to what could petrify people (and cats) like that.

“C’mon, let’s go to breakfast,” Harry mumbled to Hermione. They quickly left the Common Room. “Just what I need,” he groaned when they were out of earshot, “another mysterious evildoer causing trouble at school. Isn’t Hogwarts supposed to be the safest place in Britain?”

“I’m sure the professors are doing the best they can,” Hermione said, although she was looking a lot more nervous than before herself.

“Well, _something_ needs to be done. Colin’s a friend—sort of, anyway, and there’s still Mrs. Norris to think about…” He leaned in close and whispered, “I think it’s time I tried going into the Slytherin dorms.”

“What? Harry, no, you musn’t,” Hermione hissed.

He shook his head: “I know McGonagall said not to, but this is important. If someone in Slytherin gives me a clue, maybe we can figure out who’s behind the attacks. Besides, this’ll give me an opportunity to get a whiff of Malfoy and Nott—ugh, as much as I don’t want to.”

“But what if you get caught?”

“I’ll just have to not get caught. Come on, we know the Heir’s not going after cats in particular, now. If he’s going after students, things could get really bad really fast. I’m sure _you_ _’re_ on his hit list.”

“Eep!” Hermione said in spite of herself, and she reluctantly nodded. She knew that full well, of course, but she’d been trying not to think about it.

“And I’m muggle-raised, and I’ve come out as one of the biggest muggle-lovers in school, _and_ there’s what Dobby said,” Harry continued. “I could be on his list, too. I think it’s worth the risk.”

“Well, I guess…please be careful, though, Harry.” She hugged him tight.

“Always,” he said. “I want to go tonight. They’ll be most likely to be talking about it then.”

“Alright, tonight it is,” she agreed.

The pair met up with Luna just before they reached the Great Hall. Even her expression was drooping a little this morning. “Hello, Harry. Hello, Hermione,” she said, her voice sounding rather flatter than normal. “Did you hear the news about Colin Creevey?”

“Yes, we did,” Harry said.

“It’s too bad,” Luna replied. “He was quite nice to me, especially for coming to Sir Nicholas’s party with me.”

“Yeah? Well, hopefully he won’t be out for too long. Dumbledore said they might be able to import some potion from the Southern Hemisphere to help him.”

“That would be nice…”

She walked—not skipped—away to the Ravenclaw table and sat sullenly by herself, and Harry and Hermione took their seats. Harry considered joining her, but at Hermione’s behest, they sat a fair distance away from the blond Ravenclaw.

“Harry,” Hermione whispered, gazing over at the girl.

“What?” he whispered back.

“I hate to say it, but do you think _Luna_ could be the Heir?”

“What?” Harry said incredulously. “No way. Why would she do that?”

“Well, she _does_ speak Parseltongue—”

“So do I,” Harry snapped indignantly.

“I know. I’m just saying we need to consider all the possibilities. How many other Parselmouths do you think there could be around here?”

“I don’t know,” Harry said in annoyance. “There’s so much prejudice here that most of them are probably smart enough to keep their mouths shut. Luna’s a lot of things, but she’s not evil. And she just said Colin was nice to her.”

“I know, but you know how strange she is. That could be the perfect cover.”

“Okay, _now_ who’s being paranoid, Hermione?”

“Well…well…maybe I am. I don’t like someone going around an attacking muggle-borns any more than you do.”

Harry sighed. He had to admit his sister had every right to be worried. But still, it wasn’t helpful. “Hermione,” he whispered, “trust my feline sixth sense, okay? It’s not Luna.”

“It’s not foolproof, you know,” she whispered back. “McGonagall didn’t suspect Quirrell for a long time. And Sirius’s canine sense never tripped for the Rat.”

“Fine, so it’s not perfect,” he replied. “There’s still a lot more likely people in this school to be the Heir of Slytherin than Luna Lovegood—well, wait a minute. She was at Nearly-Headless Nick’s party when Mrs. Norris was attacked—and with Colin. The ghosts can all confirm it.”

Hermione brightened considerably at that. “You’re right, it couldn’t’ve been her, then,” she said with relief. “And hopefully, we’ll find out tonight.”

“Yeah, hopefully.”

* * *

The Hogwarts Board of Governors was established in the late eleventh century after a faction of the newly-formed Wizards’ Council led by Armand Malfoy tried to assert direct control of the school. The plan failed because Merlin and all three of the surviving Founders’ lines of Hogwarts (including the exiled Slytherin Family) had been granted places on the Council in recognition of their great power. However, the entanglement of the Founders’ lines with the Council made it clear that independent governorship of the school was needed. And so, the Governors were appointed, twelve in number to match the Wizards’ Council, to oversee the management of Hogwarts.

It didn’t take long for the Board to become an old boys’ society itself since, while it was nominally answerable to the parents of the students, in practice, it had enough leverage to choose its own members. And when the larger Wizengamot replaced the Wizards’ Council in 1603, there was naturally a lot of overlap with the Board, despite Hogwarts’s official independence. So it was no surprise that Lucius Malfoy had managed to worm his way into the Chairman’s seat, partly with the aid of his allies, Thaddeus Blishwick and Madam Josefina Zabini.

And now, it was time for him to put the next phase of his Master’s plan into action. He wouldn’t be able to shift Dumbledore yet. (And he had to wonder about that; why was the mudblood boy only petrified and not killed?) But he could certainly lay the groundwork to make the old meddler look bad. The House of Malfoy was nothing if not adaptable.

“Thank you all for coming on such short notice,” he said as the Board took their seats at the old-fashioned conference table. He motioned to Dumbledore, who remained standing. “I assume the Headmaster has informed you of the events of last night?”

“It’s bad business, Malfoy,” said one Amos Diggory. “Threats scrawled on the wall, a first-year student petrified, not to mention the caretaker’s cat. I don’t like something like that happening in my son’s school.”

“Nor do I, Diggory,” Malfoy replied, “although the threats would seem to indicate a particular group of students are being targeted.”

“And why shouldn’t that group include pureblood families with certain political views?” Diggory growled. “I don’t appreciate taking on this kind of risk. Dumbledore, do you have any leads?”

“Unfortunately not,” the old wizard said with a sigh. “Mr. Creevey was found alone, having apparently been wandering the castle after hours, taking photographs. The attacker was thorough; the one piece of evidence on him, his camera, was completely destroyed. All we know is that the attack was very powerful, as none of our restoratives in stock had any effect on him.”

“Well, that’s fairly useless,” said Madam Zabini. “Apparently we have nothing to go on.”

“All is not yet lost, Madam Zabini,” Dumbledore replied. “I would like to petition the Board to purchase a dose of Mandrake Restorative Draught for Mr. Creevey. It will be in season in parts of Argentina and South Africa this time of year.”

“Ha!” Blishwick exclaimed. “That seems awfully extravagant, don’t you think. Mandrake is expensive enough here. In the Southern Hemisphere, the price is astronomical. It’s not grown much there, you know. And didn’t we already pay handsomely for a perfectly good crop of mandrakes at Hogwarts this year, Headmaster?”

“The Board did, for which I thank you, Mr. Blishwick,” Dumbledore said, masking his frustration, “but they will not be mature until May. If we revive the Creevey boy at once, he may be able to tell us who attacked him.”

“I should _hope_ as a matter of house honour that the self-styled ‘Heir of Slytherin’ would have enough sense to hide his or her face,” Malfoy drawled sarcastically. “It would be a complete waste of money.” Oh, there would be plenty of time to implicate the Weasley girl, he thought, but Dumbledore had to go first.

“I’m with Dumbledore on this,” Elphias Doge spoke up. As the longest-serving Board member he had an equally long memory: “I seem to remember a very similar set of incidents occurring in the 1942-1943 school year, and those incidents ended with the death of a student. I say we need to take more drastic action before it’s too late.”

“In that incident, the perpetrator was caught and expelled,” Malfoy said. “One Rubeus Hagrid, I believe, although you, Dumbledore, _have_ seen fit to allow him to remain on the grounds ever since—an…interesting choice to say the least.”

“I have always had the utmost trust in Hagrid,” Dumbledore replied. “I still maintain that his arrest was in error.”

“Then who killed that student?” Madam Zabini demanded.

“The more important question, as I told my staff, is not “Who?,’” the Headmaster said. Malfoy didn’t miss the subtle change of subject. “The question is “How?” If we revive Mr. Creevey, he may not be able to tell us _who_ attacked him, but he will almost certainly know _what_ attacked him, and that could be just as valuable in preventing another attack.”

“Oh? Surely, someone as gifted as yourself could take care of this on his own,” Malfoy suggested.

Dumbledore actually glared at him for that one: “I have never pretended to be all-powerful, Lucius.”

“There’s more than just catching the perpetrator to worry about,” Amos Diggory interrupted. “It hardly seems fair to leave the boy petrified like this.”

“As Mr. Blishwick said,” Malfoy retorted, “Hogwarts already has a perfectly good crop of mandrakes.”

“Which won’t be ready till May. Really, now, Malfoy, the boy’s going to miss six or seven months of his life if we wait that long, and he’ll almost certainly have to repeat his first year.”

“Yes, it’s very unfortunate, Diggory, but it’s just business,” Madam Zabini cut in. “We approved the mandrakes because we could recoup the cost from sales in the spring. But to import the material from South Africa—I see no reason to take such a large portion of the school’s budget for the sake of one student, especially when the success of the stated goal is far from certain.”

Malfoy nodded pleasantly in agreement: “Surely you can see, Diggory, that trying to question the boy would be a fool’s errand unless we have something more definite to go on.”

“You’re only saying that because the boy’s muggle-born, Malfoy.”

“Not at all. I assure you I have the utmost concern for the safety of _all_ the students under Hogwarts’s care, whether I personally approve of their enrolment or not. I am merely being practical. The cost is only one concern. If we revive Mr. Creevey, his family will almost certainly withdraw him at once. After all, he could be a repeat target, and parents of muggle-borns are less attached to this school than purebloods and would be more likely to withdraw their children. Moreover, if Mr. Creevey he fails to identify the perpetrator, that would leave the alleged Heir free to increase his or her attacks in retaliation, which could trigger a panic and a mass withdrawal that would be disastrous for the school.”

“Then what could you possibly suggest we do, Malfoy?” another Board member, Llywelyn, asked.

“Keep things quiet—it’ll be a small matter to keep the _Prophet_ away from the story. In the meantime, investigate behind the scenes,” Malfoy smiled as if he were proposing something really clever. “Lead the alleged Heir to believe we are keeping a tight watch, regardless of what cards we are holding. A good deterrence would be the best way to prevent another attack.”

“That hardly seems proper,” Elphias Doge countered. “Wouldn’t it be more appropriate to simply call the Aurors to investigate?”

“I thought that Hogwarts prided itself on its independence from the Ministry,” Malfoy said in mock surprise.

“Not when there are serious crimes taking place!” Llywelyn spat.

“And I don’t see how we can keep this quiet,” Diggory added. “The other students will already be writing home about this, and the boy’s family will have to be informed.”

“I don’t see why that’s necessary,” Malfoy replied.

“Are you serious, Malfoy? We can’t have a student put in a coma for six months and not tell his parents. His family is going to notice if he stops writing home, and what if they learn about it from one of the other families? How will the school look if word gets out we just sat on this?”

 _Yes, that_ _’s precisely the point_ , Malfoy thought smugly, but what he said was, “I see very little risk of _that_. Muggle-born families have hardly any connections in the magical world…I reiterate what I said about causing a panic. Let the public believe that this is a minor incident, and that we are perfectly capable of handling it internally. After all, you _are_ capable of handling it, aren’t you, Dumbledore?” He flashed a wicked smile. “Because I’m sure there are others who can. Why don’t you tell us what steps you will be taking to ensure the safety of the students?”

Dumbledore kept his face calm, but inside, he was starting to sweat. Malfoy was obviously manoeuvring to remove him, and he himself was probably connected to the attacks somehow. It would be a hard sell to suspend the Headmaster, but it was not a risk he could discount. His options were limited. Going along with Malfoy’s suggestion to keep things quiet would be good for him if he could find the perpetrator quickly, but not if Malfoy kept dragging things out, and he was loath to keep the parents out of the loop…although perhaps there were some unconventional options there. “Security will be tightened,” Dumbledore told the board. “Students will be monitored especially carefully to make sure no one is out of bounds or out after hours. The castle will be closely monitored for suspicious activity. The school will be thoroughly searched for the source of whatever is causing these attacks. However, I maintain that questioning Mr. Creevey about what he saw would be a great help to the investigation.”

Madam Zabini shook her head: “I am sorry, Dumbledore, but I cannot justify the cost of this proposal unless you can first show us that you are able to prevent further attacks.”

“Shall we put it to a vote?” Malfoy said. “All those in favour of the Headmaster’s proposal…all those opposed…” He gave Dumbledore a solemn look, but inside, he was smiling. His manoeuvring beforehand had paid off. The vote failed eight to four.

* * *

Ratsbane prowled lightly through the dungeons, keeping his eyes and ears open for any Slytherin students. Padfoot had suggested that plain black ink (with a Drying Charm) might be a better way to cover up his scar and easier to clean than hair dye. He hoped it would work. He would like to be able to sneak around without having to worry about winding up with a big black mark on his forehead.

According to the Marauder’s Map, the entrance to the Slytherin Common Room was somewhere in this corridor, but there was no visible door, only a blank wall. Slytherin was the most secretive of the four houses, so it made sense that their living space would be hidden.

Since it wasn’t too long after dinner, Ratsbane didn’t have long to wait before an older student came by and spoke the password (“Pureblood”), and a doorway opened in the wall, leading into a surprisingly long passageway. The cat silently slunk along behind the Slytherin girl. To his feline nose, this part of the castle smelled more damp and musty than the rest. They must be going out under the Lake. Sure enough, the windows of the Slytherin Common room were a dim, murky green, matching the lamps that hung from the ceiling. It seemed to cast a sickly pallor over everything, but maybe that was his feline eyes missing the reds and oranges of the fire.

Now, he just had to find Malfoy. It shouldn’t be that hard. After all, shouldn’t he be bragging about the Heir’s exploits right about now?

As a matter of fact, he was. Crabbe, Goyle, Nott, Pansy Parkinson, Millicent Bulstrode, and a couple of students from other years were all sitting around him in one corner of the Common Room, hanging on his every word.

“Well, it’ll be good to get rid of _that_ little slime for a while,” Malfoy said as his animagus nemesis crept closer to listen in. And then, if it weren’t clear whom he was talking about, he began taking pictures with an imaginary camera and whined, “Oh, Potter, can I have your picture, Potter? Can you sign it, Potter?” to general laughter.

Harry growled softly and suppressed a sudden urge to sink his claws into Malfoy’s ankle. Colin did not sound like that—well, not since the Welcome Feast, anyway—and he always used Harry’s first name, not that Malfoy ever paid attention.

“But won’t Dumbledore be looking the Heir of Slytherin, now?” asked Theo Nott.

“Ah, but that’s the beauty of it,” Malfoy said smugly. “Father says Dumbledore can look all he wants. He’ll never find out who the Heir is. And then, Father will just say—” He put on an imitation of his father’s voice: “‘This is just one more example of Dumbledore’s incompetence. If he knew how to run a school properly in the first place, this need not have happened.’” The other Slytherins sniggered. “He’ll have the press eating out of his hand.

“Of course, Father’s always said Dumbledore was the worst thing to ever happen to this school—the great mudblood-lover. And now he’s teamed up with Saint Potter to form some kind of dream team. Muggle Protection Act,” he grumbled. “We had that vote in the bag until Saint Potter came along with his little sob story.”

Harry suppressed another growl, but at the same time, he was a little surprised. Malfoy seemed to be a much less reserved person when he was surrounded by allies. That could be useful to know later.

“Yes, so you’ve told us, Malfoy,” Elizabeth Runcorn said from beside the fireplace, sounding rather bored. “I take it this Heir of Slytherin business is Plan B?”

Harry’s ears pricked up. It was a stroke of luck that she was there. Pansy Parkinson and Millicent Bulstrode were brash and bullying, just like Nott, Crabbe, and Goyle, but Elizabeth Runcorn was a quiet manipulator, like Malfoy, and if you believed the rumours, one of the most vicious bigots of the bunch.

“Father’s not talking _that_ much, Liz,” Malfoy said calmly.

 _Liz?!_ Harry thought. This was too good. He thought Parkinson looked vaguely annoyed with her.

“He says it would be suspicious if I knew too much.” Malfoy laughed a little. “And I wouldn’t be fool enough to say it even here if I did, but he knows all about the last time the Chamber of Secrets was opened.”

_Last time?!_

“It’s been opened before?” Runcorn said, sounding much more interested now.

“Yeah, fifty years ago. I guess they caught whoever did it and expelled him before he could finish the job, but there’ll be a new Heir now, right? And get this: the last time the Chamber was opened, a mudblood _died_.”

“Really?” All the Slytherins started gathering around now. Harry slunk in around their legs. Malfoy was basking in the attention. “How did it happen?” Pansy Parkinson asked eagerly.

“Dunno. She was probably petrified extra-hard or something. Anyway, personally, I’m hoping for a two-for-one deal this time: Granger _and_ Saint Potter.”

Harry dug his claws into the carpet. It took all of his self-control not to go at Malfoy hissing and scratching, but he needed information more than he needed revenge for that slight.

“Yeah, that’d be great,” Nott said almost hungrily. “Those two were a pain in the arse all last year.”

“Oh, yes,” Parkinson said, rubbing her hands together. “I can’t wait to see them get what’s coming to them. Do you know who the Heir is? You should tell him to go get ‘em.”

“Of course I don’t,” Malfoy snapped. Then, he looked around to make sure everyone in the circle was an ally and lowered his voice to a whisper: “I’m not sure even Father knows who it is. It’s like the Death Eaters—most of them didn’t know each other’s names. It wouldn’t even have to be a Slytherin. Make fun of Potter all you want for it—please do—but it really would be the perfect cover to be in some other house. Father definitely knows what’s going on, though. He says he’s really gonna get rid of Dumbledore this time—so all of you zip it, keep your heads down, and let the Heir get to work. Got it?”

The rest of the Slytherins nodded quickly and went back to their books—or lack thereof, in some cases—all except Elizabeth Runcorn. She approached Malfoy and sat beside him. Tall and thin, with an indifferent air, she could have made another Daphne Greengrass, except for her dark hair and equally dark personality. “You’re playing a dangerous game; do you know that, Draco?” she said softly.

“Maybe we are,” he replied, “but the House of Malfoy has been playing this game for over nine centuries. I think we know how to handle it by now.”

“I’m just saying. You’ve underestimated Potter before—and you know he’s close with Dumbledore. You don’t want to see this plan fall apart.”

“Eh, what can he do? He doesn’t know anything.”

 _We_ _’ll see about that_ , Harry thought. He crept closer, getting within range of Malfoy’s robes.

“Just be careful. Potter doesn’t seem like the type you want to cross—like by telling people to make fun of him.”

If a cat could smirk, Harry did.

“People will make fun of him anyway, Liz,” Malfoy said casually. “I’m just encouraging them to do something constructive with it. I keep my nose clean, and people like Theo and Pansy do the dirty work.”

Runcorn gave him a small, wry smile: “Spoken like a true Slytherin.” Then, she looked down at Harry. “Hey, Draco, you don’t have a cat, do you?” she said.

“Huh? No—” Malfoy looked down as his feet. “Get lost! Shoo!” Harry took off running and then glared at Malfoy from the corner. He wasn’t a cat person, it seemed. But he’d smelled what he needed to: Dobby was definitely the Malfoys’ elf. He was all set to go—

He stopped as he passed the hallway that led to the girls’ dorms when an uncommon sound came wafting up the corridor. He strained his feline ears to hear it closer. It took him a moment to recognise it, but when he did, he could have laughed. It was a violin. Hogwarts was depressingly light on the performing arts: no theatre, no orchestra—a choir, but that was about it. So who was the violin player around here? (And a fairly good one by the sound of it.)

He couldn’t go down the girls’ hallway (and he didn’t _want_ to know what protections were on it, since it didn’t have stairs), so Harry waited till the song ended, and then he heard a voice coming faintly up the hall, “Are you done practising, Daphne? We need to study up on Transfiguration or McGonagall will kill us.”

Harry gave a high-pitched meow and padded away with his tail held high. Daphne Greengrass was a closet violinist. One more thing that might be good to know, if only to convince people of his superhuman spy skills, if need be. With that, he was ready to go back and debrief with Hermione, Sirius, and Remus. As before with Ravenclaw, meowing a couple of times by the door was enough to get an older student to let him out.

* * *

 _How are you feeling, Ginny?_ Tom wrote.

 _A little better, but it_ _’s still really scary,_ Ginny replied in a shaky hand.

_I can understand. I didn_ _’t want to worry you, but something very similar to this happened while I was in school, and it went very badly._

_It did?_ she wrote hurriedly. _What happened? Did they find out who did it._

_They did. In fact, I was lucky enough to discover the culprit myself before the school was forced to close—although I was unfortunately too late to save that poor Ravenclaw girl._

The words lingered on the page wistfully for so long that Ginny just wrote underneath them: _Who did it?_

_Well, you might not believe me, but it was a third-year Gryffindor named Rubeus Hagrid._

_Hagrid?! But he_ _’s still the groundskeeper now. Everybody likes him. I can’t believe he’d do something like that. Besides, he’s been here practically forever._

_I_ _’m only telling you what I saw, Ginny. I can show you, if you like._

Ginny hesitated with the tip of her quill on the page for a long time. Tom’s memories, or whatever they were, seemed to be getting more and more unsettling with time, and she wasn’t sure sure wanted to see any more. In the end, though, her curiosity got the better of her, and she wrote, _Okay_.

A little while later, she appeared to the world to snap out of a deep trance in a cold sweat. She fumbled with her quill and the diary and started writing feverishly: _Oh Merlin, Tom! I can_ _’t believe it! Hagrid seems so nice. He doesn’t seem like he’d ever kill anyone. Oh, Tom, are you sure? Could it have been someone else? Or an accident?_

 _An accident?_ Tom replied. _I suppose I wouldn_ _’t put it past him. I confess that I was mostly concerned with getting rid of the monster. But it couldn’t be a mistake. It must have been Hagrid, since the attacks stopped immediately after he was expelled._

She didn’t know how to respond to that. She wanted to trust Tom. If she couldn’t trust him, who could she trust? But the things he was saying now sounded so strange. She sat for a long time with the diary lying open and blank on her lap, fighting back tears.

 _Ginny, I don_ _’t mean to pry,_ Tom finally wrote, _but I don_ _’t know anything that’s going on here beyond what you tell me. How are people reacting to what happened to Colin?_

 _They_ _’re not telling us much_ , Ginny replied after a tense pause. _Professor Dumbledore says he_ _’s investigating personally, and they’re watching closer after curfew, but I don’t think they’ve called the Aurors or anything._

 _Interesting. They wanted to deal with it internally last time, too. I hope Dumbledore_ _’s past experience will help him clear things up faster,_ he lied.

_I hope so too, Tom._

_And what are they doing for the boy?_

_They say they_ _’re waiting for the Mandrakes to mature. I thought maybe they could buy the potion, but I guess they can’t._

_This time of year? No, it would have to come from the Southern Hemisphere, and that_ _’s very expensive._

_But it doesn_ _’t seem right to leave him like that._

_I_ _’m afraid that sometimes there is no choice._

_It_ _’s awful, though. I thought Colin was really nice._ Ginny kept her quill on the page for a long time, debating whether to disclose the next thing she wanted to write. Eventually, slowly, she went for it: _Tom, I_ _’m worried. I still can’t remember what happened last night._

 _Just stress, I_ _’m sure, Ginny,_ Tom replied sympathetically. _This must be a very difficult time for everyone in the castle. Try to get some sleep. I_ _’m sure you’ll feel better in the morning._

* * *

Harry’s and Hermione’s conversation with Sirius and Remus bore little fruit except to say they would keep investigating their options regarding Dobby and discuss it over Christmas holidays, along with researching family trees for any clue as to who the Heir of Slytherin was (at least Remus had plenty to do, now), and that the two of them should catch up Dumbledore on everything tomorrow.

While Harry was investigating, rumour and suspicion were spreading through the school like wildfire. Some of the older students started selling bogus protective amulets under the table, and the first years started travelling in groups for safety. Ginny Weasley seemed to be inconsolable about Colin, who was apparently one of her closer friends, and many muggle-borns tried to stick closer to their pure-blood friends. Justin Finch-Fletchley and Sophie Roper formed a tight quartet with Hannah Abbot and Ernie Macmillan, while Terry Boot and Kevin Entwhistle stuck by Anthony Goldstein and Michael Corner. Hermione’s muggle-born roommate, Sally-Anne Perks, mostly hung out with her friend, Lily Moon, but a letter she received at breakfast the next morning left her shaking.

“My parents were uncomfortable from the start with all the prejudice we’ve heard about,” she quietly revealed to her fellow Gryffindors. My Dad got an option to take a job in Canada, and if this goes on, he says he’ll take it. I might have to go to the Athabasca Academy in the spring.”

This was serious. If the Heir was already driving away students, something needed to be done fast, especially from Harry’s and Hermione’s perspective. Their own parents weren’t above pulling them out mid-year, either.

“It’s not all bad,” Sally-Anne said in response to her roommates’ sympathy. “Athabasca sounds really nice. It’s the only magical school in the world with bilingual instruction, and there’s students there from places all over the Americas, like Haiti and Guyana.”

Sally-Anne was trying to put on a brave face, but Harry could tell she was really worried. In his mind, that was just one more reason they had to solve the mystery. After breakfast, he took a moment to pull her aside and said, “Listen, I don’t know if we can do it by Christmas, but we’re gonna work with Dumbledore to try to catch the Heir. We really hope you don’t have to leave.” Sally-Anne’s spirits seemed to be lifted a bit after that, and it was with great determination that Harry and Hermione stood in a corridor on the seventh floor later that day, trying to talk to a stone gargoyle.

“Um, we don’t know the password or anything,” Hermione tried. “Is there any way you can tell Professor Dumbledore that Hermione Granger and Harry Potter need to talk to him?”

The gargoyle showed no sign of life whatsoever for a long minute. The two children were about to give up when it suddenly stepped aside and said, “You may enter.”

They climbed up the spiral staircase and passed through the heavy oaken door to find Dumbledore sitting at his desk, gazing kindly at them. “Ah, good afternoon, Hermione, Harry. Please sit.”

They made their way to two chairs placed across the desk. Hermione and Harry both noticed Fawkes sitting on a perch by the door, looking quite sick and bedraggled.

“Hey, Fawkes, you alright?” Harry said.

Fawkes held out a mournful note for a few seconds that seemed to infuse the air with weariness and a touch of grief.

“Do not worry about Fawkes,” Dumbledore said. “He is merely approaching a burning day. He will be fine in a few weeks. Now, what brings the two of you here today?”

They exchanged a glance, and Harry said, “Professor, we think we have information related to what happened to Colin and Mrs. Norris.”

The old wizard raised his eyebrows curiously. “And what might that be?” he asked.

Hermione and Harry told him about their conversation with Dobby yesterday and then what Harry had learnt from Malfoy in cat form last night. Dumbledore didn’t particularly look like he approved of Harry’s methods, but he wasn’t about to turn down the information. He stroked his beard thoughtfully as he considered their words. “Thank you for bringing this to my attention,” he said seriously. “It does support what I had already suspected, although the depth of Lucius Malfoy’s involvement in this matter is a serious concern.”

“Then you know something about what’s going on, Professor?” Harry said hopefully.

“Not as much as I would like, I’m afraid. Mostly, I know about Lucius Malfoy’s intentions to take advantage of this situation and remove me from my post.”

“But surely you must have _some_ idea who—or what—is causing these attacks, Professor,” Hermione said.

“Only some partial ideas—nothing I can act upon. I sincerely wish I could.”

“Well, can you tell us?” Harry asked. “Maybe we can keep an eye out.”

“I do not want you to take unnecessary risks, Harry,” Dumbledore replied, “especially as we have some evidence that you are a target.”

Harry bit back the urge to mention Dumbledore’s plan to actively try to use him to defeat Quirrellmort last year before realising how dumb an idea that was. Instead, he just said, “I didn’t mean like that, sir. I just mean if you have a name, maybe I can find him on the Marauder’s Map. Or if you have some other clue, we’ll know what to watch out for. Don’t you think we should at least be informed?”

“I really don’t think it’s necessary for the two of you to become involved in this investigation.”

Harry glared at Dumbledore. “Hermione?”

His sister knew her cue: “‘I promise you that you will have my full confidence from now on.” Those were your exact words, Professor.”

The Headmaster frowned. Those _were_ his words. Leave it to Hermione and her excellent memory.

“And besides,” Harry continued, “we _think_ I’m a target, but we _know_ the muggle-borns are, and in case you’ve forgotten, Professor, my sister happens to be one of those muggle-borns who are being threatened.”

Yes, all too true, and if there was one thing to remember about Harry Potter, it was his fierce loyalty to his family. It was no good keeping him out of this. “My apologies. You are correct, Harry,” he said. “I fear I have become too set in my ways. You should indeed be kept abreast of the situation. Even so, I cannot tell you everything, as your Occlumency is not yet up to snuff, and I must ask that what I am about to say not circulate beyond your immediate family.” Harry and Hermione both nodded. “I believe that the legend of the Chamber of Secrets and the Heir of Slytherin is, in large measure, true. Before you ask, I do not know where it is, and no, Harry, you may not look for it. I have my own methods of searching. As for the who, I had previously believed that Salazar Slytherin had only one living heir, and that heir was Lord Voldemort.”

The children both gasped in horror. _Another_ Voldemort plot? This just kept getting better and better.

“You can see the cause for concern. You may rest assured that Voldemort himself is not back in the castle. I have updated the wards to detect his wraith form, and I have certain contacts who suggest he is currently residing in Eastern Europe.”

“Then who’s doing it, sir?” Harry said.

“Unfortunately, I do not know. I see two possibilities. One is that Salazar Slytherin _does_ have another heir—or a Parselmouth disciple who can act the part. Or second, which I think more likely given Lucius Malfoy’s involvement, someone in this school has a dark artifact, received from a Death Eater, that he or she is using to carry out these attacks.”

“What kind of artifact?” Hermione said. “Can you search for it?”

The old wizard shook his head. “I do not know what it would look like,” he said, “I would know the magical signature, but only by holding it in hand. The artifact would be small, easy to hide, and charmed against all but the most careful detection methods, and for better or worse, I cannot search a student’s belongings without probable cause.”

Harry sighed at that, but Hermione nodded that it was accurate. It would take a lot to convince people to go along with a school-wide search, especially considering that Dumbledore apparently didn’t know what he was looking for, given how powerful certain students’ parents were. It also meant there was nothing for them to keep an eye out for besides the usual shady characters.

“Well, just keep us informed, then, Professor…” Harry said reluctantly. “Sir, what are you going to do about Colin?”

Dumbledore shook his head sadly. “Madam Pomfrey will be able to revive him once the mandrakes have matured,” he said.

“In the spring?” Harry gaped.

“Didn’t you say you could get some from the Southern Hemisphere?” Hermione said. “The board might not approve it for a cat, but surely they would for a student.”

“I met with the Board today, Hermione. I am sorry to say that they did not.”

“But they can’t do that!” Harry said.

“Unfortunately, they can—thanks again largely to the machinations of Lucius Malfoy. You can begin to see the pattern.”

“But what about Colin?” Harry pressed. “He’s gonna be out till practically the end of the year. What are you going to tell his parents?”

Dumbledore sighed again: “I’m afraid that the Board has taken upon themselves the duty of contacting the Creeveys.”

Harry’s and Hermione’s mouths dropped open, appalled. “And that means you _can_ _’t_?” Hermione said.

He nodded. “My hands have been thoroughly tied by the Board. They have appointed themselves the right of first contact, and Lucius Malfoy intends not to use it.”

“To make you look bad, right?” Harry said. “Why don’t you just do it anyway?”

“This is not Mr. Malfoy’s only weapon, Harry.”

“That shouldn’t matter. What happened to doing what’s right instead of what’s easy, sir? Can you believe this, Fawkes?” Harry complained. “Back me up, here.”

 _Caw!_ the phoenix squawked, and he glared at Dumbledore with his piercing black eyes.

“I am well aware of Fawkes’s opinion,” he replied, “but there are safer ways of making contact. I cannot do anything _personally_ without risking my position as Headmaster, and I hope you can see that would only make matters worse.”

“Huh?” Harry stared in confusion.

But Hermione hadn’t missed the emphasis in Dumbledore’s last answer. “I understand, Harry. Headmaster,” she said sweetly, “I take it that the Board has prohibited you or any of the staff from contacting Mr. and Mrs. Creevey, right? But if a student were to contact them, they would have no control over that, would they?”

At that, Dumbledore smiled. “Mr. Malfoy is all but openly counting on the Creeveys not to have connections in the magical world. He would be most disappointed to learn that they do.”

“Ohhh…” Harry said in realisation. “So you want us to do your dirty work for you again?”

“I would hardly call informing a family of their son’s injury “dirty work,” Harry,” Dumbledore said with an air of offence. “And I assure you that if I had no other options, I _would_ do the right thing, not the easy one. But in this case, it costs us nothing to find a more productive alternative.”

Harry still wasn’t too happy with that, but Hermione calmed him down, saying, “He’s right, Harry. We need him to stay here. Besides, it’ll make the Malfoys madder if we go behind their backs instead of just breaking the rules.”

“Well, there is that,” Harry admitted.


	51. The Creeveys' Visit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The Great Architect of Harry Potter built it of good stuff.

Most of the time, Hermione and Harry were content to write letters home, like normal people. However, the fastest way to get information from Hogwarts to Crawley was to mirror-call Sirius and Remus and have them apparate there, and that is what they did to inform their parents of their conversation with Dumbledore and his plan, which Hermione expanded, to thwart the Board’s callous actions. (Actually, the fastest way was Dumbledore’s private Floo connection, but the less he was directly involved the better.) It would certainly be nice if they had another pair of mirrors to call their parents directly, but they had to make do for now.

After discussing a few options, Dan and Emma decided to take the Knight Bus to Colchester right after their last dental appointment for the day so that they would be able to catch the Creeveys before dinnertime. On a weekday at this time of day, the trip was mercifully short—only about half an hour. They stepped off the purple monstrosity dizzily and took a moment to straighten their clothing before walking up to the door.

Mrs. Creevey answered and immediately took note of the solemn looks on their faces. “Mr. and Mrs. Granger, hello,” she said. “Is something wrong?”

“I’m afraid so, Mrs. Creevey,” Emma replied. “Are your husband and Dennis home?”

“Oh, of course. Please come in. Joe, Dennis,” she called, “the Grangers are here—they need to talk to us.”

Joe and Margaret Creevey were an unobtrusive, unassuming-looking couple, both on the short side, conservatively-dressed, and with similar mousy brown hair to their children. Joe was a milkman—a real early-to-bed-early-to-rise type—humble and quiet, but with a strength that Dan and Emma Granger were beginning to see in their conversations with the family. Margaret worked as a receptionist and had much the same personality as her husband. Their children, on the other hand, were their complete opposites—excitable and hyperactive, with a constant thirst to learn about anything and everything magical. They had already started an album with all of the pictures Colin had sent them, and then there was Dennis—nine years old, although he could pass for eight—maybe even seven—with a young child’s passion for dinosaurs now carried over to dragons, chimaeras, and anything else that could eat him. When told this, Harry wrote back that he would get on great with Hagrid.

“Good afternoon, Mr. and Mrs. Granger,” Mr. Creevey said once they were all seated in the living room (with Dennis fidgeting a lot, as always). “What’s the matter?”

Emma took a deep breath and said, “Mr. and Mrs. Creevey, we’re sorry we had to be the ones to tell you this—there were unfortunate circumstances that demanded it—but…your son was attacked at school the night before last.”

“Attacked!” Mrs. Creevey breathed. “Is—is he alright?”

“Well, he…he will be,” Emma replied. “I’m sorry—that’s the only quick answer I can give you that would make any sense.”

“I…I think you’d better give us the long version, then,” Mr. Creevey said as he struggled to maintain his composure.

So Dan and Emma told them a brief history of the founding of Hogwarts, the legend of the Chamber of Secrets and the Heir of Slytherin, the Halloween attack on Mrs. Norris, and finally, how Colin was found in the corridors in the equivalent of a coma with his finger still pressing down the shutter of his destroyed camera.

“And you say they can’t help him until spring?” Mrs. Creevey said in horror.

“No, they _won_ _’t_ help him until spring,” Dan clarified angrily. “Apparently the potion he needs is only in season twice a year—May in the Northern Hemisphere and November in the Southern Hemisphere—but the Board of Governors refuses to pay to import it when the school has a crop of its own, even though it won’t be ready for six months.”

“That’s stupid!” Dennis yelled.

“Yes, I’d have to say it is,” Mr. Creevey said angrily. “Doesn’t that conflict with their mandate to take care of their students or some such?”

Dan shook his head. “Stupidity has nothing to do with it,” he said. “The Board is controlled by a faction that is prejudiced against muggles and muggle-borns—the Chairman in particular. The Chairman is the Headmaster’s number one political opponent, and he’s been pushing to sack him for years. If he gets his way, children like ours won’t be able to attend Hogwarts at all.”

Dennis looked at least as horrified by that as what happened to his brother: “What? They can’t do that! They can’t make us not go, can they?”

“Not at present, Dennis, but we have information that these attacks are part of an elaborate scheme to do just that.”

“But that’s awful,” Mrs. Creevey said. She had been near tears for most of the conversation. “Attacking children for some political scheme—”

Emma just shook her head: “Trust us, it can get worse. When we have more time, we’ll have to tell you more about the magical civil war. But right now, the real reason we came is that we thought you deserved a chance to see Colin.”

“You—you can take us to him? I thought the school didn’t normally do visit days.”

“It doesn’t.” _Although maybe it should,_ Dan thought. “But we know our way around the magical world better than most muggles. We can have you there in an hour.”

“An hour?” Dennis said in surprise. The Grangers nodded.

“Well, then…” Mr. Creevey stood up. “What are we waiting for?”

“There is one small complication,” Dan said. “There are two different ways we could take you. One is the way people would normally go. The other is a little faster and safer, and it would definitely less unwanted attention, _but_ we would need to take you to our house, and we would have to ask you to keep our location a secret. It could cause a lot of trouble for us and especially Harry if it got out.”

“You won’t have any trouble from my wife or me,” Mr. Creevey said firmly. “It’s the least we could do for your coming here to help us. Dennis, will you keep Mr. and Mrs. Granger’s secrets for them?”

“Sure thing! Your secret’s safe with me, Mr. Granger, sir,” the little boy said eagerly.

Dan smiled a little at the boy and said, “Alright, then, let’s go. Oh, and you’ll need your Anti-Anti-Muggle necklaces.”

The Creeveys quickly retrieved their charms and followed the Grangers out to the curb. Once there, Emma took off her necklace and held it out to the street. There was an almighty BANG! The Creeveys jumped back as a purple triple-decker bus appeared out of nowhere, and Stan Shunpike jumped out of it in his gaudy purple uniform, saying “Welcome to the Knight Bus, emergency transport for the stranded—oy, ‘choo doin’ back already?”

“We’re going home, Mr. Shunpike,” Emma sniffed as she handed over the appropriate change. “These three are coming with us.”

“Right, then. Hey, Ern, we’re goink back you-know-where.”

“Ar,” the driver said.

The Grangers quickly pulled the Creeveys into the nearest seats as the bus started up again. “Hold on tight,” they warned.

“Um…” they started.

BANG! The Creeveys’ first experience on the Knight Bus was similar to the Grangers’: it took them a while to stop screaming.

“Sorry about this,” Dan said over the noise. “Wizards haven’t really figured out convenient transport.” Not surprisingly, they were all pretty shaken up by the time they got back to Crawley and stepped off the bus.

“Startin’ to brink over more ‘ouse guests are we?” Stan asked as they left.

“That’s our business, Mr. Shunpike. Just remember your agreement with Madam Tonks,” Emma said darkly.

Stan shuddered. He remembered that agreement all too well. It was the summer before last. His very first month on the job, and Harry Potter comes on the Bus. It would have been a big day for him, but then, Andromeda Tonks offered him the same agreement she’d made with Ernie Prang: all of the Knight Bus staff would _agree_ to keep Harry Potter’s location a secret— _or else_. Stan might not have been the brightest bulb in the shop, but he wasn’t about to cross a daughter of the House of Black.

In fact, the Creeveys would have been hard pressed to reveal the Grangers’ address anyway since the bus stopped right outside their house, and their address was never spoken aloud in their presence. They did know, however, that it looked like a nice neighbourhood, which was to be expected for a couple of dentists. “Welcome to our home,” Emma said as they led them inside. “We’ll only be here a minute. We just came here because we have a private connection. We’re not _really_ supposed to have it, but Professor Dumbledore set it up for us in case of emergency. The Creeveys were surprised at that, and also confused, since they didn’t really know what Emma was talking about, but they didn’t have time to ask before the woman grabbed a handful of powder from an urn, threw it into the fireplace, and called, “Hogwarts!”

* * *

Albus Dumbledore was seated at his desk trying to sort out the paperwork he had accrued in the wake of the disastrous Board meeting when a rather loud and distressing alarm sounded—an alarm he had keyed to one very important incoming Floo address. “Mr. and Mrs. Granger, what’s wrong?” he said urgently, rushing over to the fireplace.

“Nothing on our end, Professor,” he heard Emma Granger say, although there was a bit of an edge in her voice. “We have the Creeveys here with us. They’d like to come through the Floo so they can see their son.”

Albus gaped in surprise for a minute. He’d meant for the Creeveys to be informed, not brought straight to Hogwarts the very same day. _Trust that family to take things a step or three further,_ he thought. _Caw!_ Fawkes croaked from his perch and shot him a look that seemed to say, _You asked for it_. It was true. He should have seen it coming from them. Even so, it could be a good thing. Unless the Grangers had taken out their frustrations on his name, it would just serve to vex Lucius Malfoy further without giving him any real leverage. “Why, Mr. and Mrs. Creevey,” he said, “I am terribly sorry about your son, but I am pleasantly surprised that the Board was so prompt in contacting you.” His tone made it clear how fake that story was. “This is quite irregular, but I would certainly not forbid a family visit to see young Colin. You may step through the fireplace when you are ready.”

“Through the fireplace?” a young boy’s voice squeaked.

“Um, thank you, Professor,” the calmer voice of Mr. Creevey sounded, “but you _did_ just say step _through_ the fireplace?”

“It’s not as bad as it looks,” Emma said. “Just try to land on your feet.”

Dumbledore took a moment to send off a quick Patronus message to his Deputy, and just afterwards, Daniel Granger staggered out of the fireplace into the Headmaster’s office, narrowly missing one of the spindly-legged tables for the many twittering devices. He and Dumbledore helped Mr. and Mrs. Creevey stay upright when they tumbled out. Little Dennis fell flat on his face, but he immediately sprang back up, exclaiming, “That was awesome!” while Emma brought up the rear.

“Allow me to welcome you to Hogwarts,” Dumbledore told them. “I wish it had been under better circumstances. I will escort you to the Hospital Wing. Mr. and Mrs. Granger, if you wish to see your children, I believe you will find them in the disused corridor at the other end of this floor at this time of day. Professor McGonagall will be here shortly to escort you.”

“Uh, thank you, Professor, that would be nice,” Emma said, checking her watch and realising this was when the kids were usually exercising. _Of_ course _he knows their daily routine_ , she thought.

* * *

“So Lord Malfoy is working with the Heir and interfering with Dumbledore’s response to make him look bad?” Neville said as he, Harry, and Hermione were doing their stretches. Neville was surprised to find he was starting to enjoy these sessions. In addition to the fact that he was starting to feel the improvement in strength and coordination, it was (usually) a good way to forget about the disasters going on around him for a half hour.

“Yeah,” Harry grunted as he bent to touch his toes. Even at his age, he wished he could keep the flexibility of his feline body in human form. “Near as we can tell, the Heir of Slytherin is gonna try to get rid of all the muggle-borns in the school—he usually petrifies them, but he killed one once.”

“And the Malfoys’ elf basically told us they’re in on the scheme,” Hermione added. They finished their stretches and started jogging in place.

“And Lord Malfoy’s trying to get rid of Dumbledore?” Neville said.

“That’s what our sources say,” Harry said. Those sources being Dumbledore and Draco Malfoy himself, but it would be best not to spread that around. Besides, no one would question Harry Potter having “sources.”

“Lord Malfoy controls the—Board of Governors,” Neville observed. He was starting to pant. He could still only just keep up with the other two at this. “If he gets rid of Dumbledore—he’ll be able to appoint—whoever he wants—to replace him.”

“That makes sense,” Hermione said. “There’s no way they’ll keep the school open if that many muggle-borns are attacked one by one, but then the new Head could finish the Heir’s job if Mr, Malfoy picks him out. It’s lucky for the Creeveys that we could make sure the school’s still acting halfway-responsible.”

“Yeah, lucky—” Neville said. “Lord Malfoy can already make the _Prophet_ —print what he wants them to—try to blame Dumbledore for everything.”

“We really don’t want that,” Harry said. “We’ve had issues with Dumbledore before, but we definitely want him here in the castle.”

“Me too—Are you two scared—? You’ve gotta be pretty big targets.”

“A little,” Harry said with as much confidence as he could muster, “but we’ve got a lot of people backing us up.”

Neville nodded and kept jogging in place. After another minute, they slowed down and transitioned into the kata they had taught him. Hermione and Harry had continued to tell Neville that he should probably focus on duelling, but they taught him enough karate that they were confident he could throw a punch or a kick without hurting himself. “It’s really creepy that people are being attacked and no one can figure out how,” he said after a while. “You’d think they’d have some way to protect us. Maybe I should get one of those amulets, like Lockhart was talking about. I heard Finn McLaggen was selling them.”

“If it was Lockhart saying it, I highly doubt they actually work,” said Hermione dryly.

“Yeah, and if Finn’s anything like Cormac, I don’t know if I’d trust him either,” Harry said. “Smells kinda fishy to me.” _And not in a good way,_ he added mentally. It was getting too close to dinner. “Anyway, you shouldn’t need one, being a pureblood and all.”

“I don’t know…” Neville said fearfully. “The Heir went for Filch’s cat first, and everyone knows I’m almost a squib.”

“You are not, Neville,” Hermione said. “Being a late bloomer doesn’t make you a squib, and all your marks are decent except Potions.”

“People still call me that, though,” Neville said.

“Nobody who matters,” Harry insisted. “Besides, you’re the sole heir of a Most Ancient House, _and_ listed on the Pure-Blood Directory, no less. The Heir wouldn’t dare attack you, even if he doesn’t like you.”

Neville considered this. His parents had been attacked by Death Eaters and tortured until they couldn’t remember their own names. The whole time, he’d been hidden right there in the house, and the Death Eaters knew it, but they never looked for him—threatened to, certainly, but they never did it—never went after the heir of the family line. And that was Bellatrix Lestrange at her most vicious and insane. It was true: a Most Ancient House _and_ still on the Pure-Blood Directory? There were only four of those families left, none of them healthy. _He_ saw no reason to care about such things. To tell the truth, he still harboured a little bit of resentment towards his relatives for pushing him so hard to show magic. But just the same, a lot of people would think his blood was too pure to spill.

“Huh, I never thought about it that way,” he admitted. “It feels weird—it doesn’t really feel right that I’m safe just because of who my family is, and you’re not.”

“Yeah, the magical world is pretty messed up,” Harry said. “But at least you’re safe.”

A few minutes later, a voice came wafting up the corridor: “Yes, they’re up here every day. They drew quite a crowd at first, but now, it’s usually just Mr. Longbottom. You do have to admire their dedication.”

An even more familiar voice replied, “Well, we’re glad we’ve succeeded in teaching them to take their health so seriously.” Hermione and Harry looked up just in time to see their parents and Professor McGonagall coming around the corner.

“Mum! Dad!” the yelled, running over to hug them. “Wow, you got here fast,” Harry commented.

“The Creeveys wanted to come right away,” Dan told them. “Professor Dumbledore took them to the infirmary.”

“We’ve missed you so much,” Emma said. “It’s so hard—It’s terrible that you can’t just have a normal school year here.”

“Well, hopefully Dumbledore will solve it soon,” Hermione said, to general agreement.

“Er, good evening, Mr. and Mrs. Granger,” Neville muttered shyly as he approached.

“Good evening, Neville. You’re looking well,” Emma said.

“Thanks.”

“I see you’re keeping up at the exercising with Harry and Hermione,” Dan said.

“Yes, sir,” Neville replied. “And going to the Duelling Club, too. I’m not that good, but it _is_ pretty interesting.”

“You’re not that bad, either,” Hermione said. “I’d say you’re a fast learner.”

Dan smiled a little. “Well, it’s good to see there’s some kind of self defence training going on here,” he said. “I don’t know if it’ll be any good with this Heir of Slytherin character, but it’s better than nothing.”

“Well…” Neville said hesitantly. “At least we know the Heir’s probably not gonna attack me. So I guess…if you two wanna stick close or something…”

“Thanks, Nev,” Harry said. “You’re a good friend.”

“Yeah,” Hermione added, “plus that’ll be one less thing to worry about.”

* * *

A couple days later, a first-year girl wandered into the disused bathroom on the second floor. She looked around curiously, checking all the stalls. Finding no one in sight, she called out, “Myrtle? You can come out, Myrtle. It’s only me.”

There was a sound of a splash, and then the transparent form of a third-year Ravenclaw poked her head out of one of the stalls.

“Hello, Myrtle,” the visitor squeaked dreamily.

“Oh, hello, Luna,” Moaning Myrtle replied mournfully.

“How have you been?”

“The same,” the ghost sniffed. “No one wants to talk to poor Myrtle.”

Luna Lovegood nodded sadly. “The attacks have caused a castle-wide infestation of aquavirius maggots,” she said. “People are becoming distrustful and talking to each other less. Also, the wrackspurts around the Board of Governors must be getting very bad. Harry Potter told me that they refused to help Colin, so he won’t be awake until spring.” She sighed and sat up on the edge of a sink.

Myrtle stared at her and shook her head in confusion, but Luna didn’t particularly care. She didn’t want to show it, but she found things were growing difficult for her again at Hogwarts. With Colin petrified, Ginny feeling sick all week, and Harry Potter and Hermione Granger withdrawing to their closer friends, the number of people who would actually talk to her had dropped dramatically. Penelope Clearwater would still listen to her concerns, but only reluctantly. Being a muggle-born, she was becoming understandably concerned with looking after herself. That only left Mandy Brocklehurst, who did make an effort, but could only handle Luna in small doses.

“I’m sorry about your friend,” Myrtle said, snapping Luna out of her musings. _Friend?_ she thought. That sounded very nice, but she wasn’t sure it was correct. Not that she and Colin had anything against each other, but she didn’t know him all that well. “I remember when I was alive, people were being attacked like that,” the ghost continued. “No one could figure out who did it or do anything to help them, and everyone was getting really scared. Except the Slytherins. They were even more unbearable that year. They kept teasing me that I would be next because I was a m… _mudblood_.” Her voice rose to a high-pitched whine.

“You should not call yourself that, Myrtle,” Luna said firmly.

“Oh, what does it matter? I don’t have any blood left, anyway.” Then, she gave a loud moan and dove back into her toilet.

Luna sighed sadly. Myrtle wasn’t much for conversation, either, but she couldn’t help but feel some kinship with the ghost. They were both Ravenclaws, and they were both bullied for their oddness. Myrtle did seem a little jealous that Luna had more friends than she’d had, especially Harry Potter, whom she kept asking Luna to introduce to her. But she was actually quite pleasant most of the time and didn’t call her names, so Luna couldn’t say she was all bad.

* * *

The Duelling Club exploded in popularity in the aftermath of the attack on Colin, particularly amongst the younger years and the muggle-borns. Practically all the muggle-borns in the school below O.W.L. year began attending weekly. The older students came less either because they were too busy, or they were more confident in their duelling abilities, and most of purebloods treated it like any other club—only coming if it interested them, or if they were members of Noble Houses, who were expected to be good at it. The pureblood group of course included Malfoy, Crabbe, Goyle, and Nott—all children of suspected Death Eaters, who would have a different reason to be interested in the subject.

By mid-December, the younger students who came regularly had all made significant gains in their practical skills with basic jinxes, and even many of the older students were improving in their aim and reliability of casting. One person who was doing better than most people expected was Luna Lovegood. Luna decided that the duelling club was a good opportunity to try all of those spells that had been used against her earlier in the year—not that she held a grudge—just that it was an excellent learning experience.

“ _Skontapto_ ,” she said after dodging a Slipping Jinx in the first-year exhibition duel that Lockhart and Vector had put her in in front of the crowd. With her voice, it sounded almost half-hearted, but the spell flew true. Unfortunately, her opponent slipped out of the way. “ _Mordeodigiti_ ,” she tried again. The Toe-Biting Jinx struck home, and her opponent began hopping around uncomfortably.

“ _Expelliarmus_!” her opponent yelled back.

Luna dodged and fired back three spells in quick succession: “ _Locomotor Wibbly. Spongenu. Ventus_.”

“ _Contego, Contego, Contego—_ Whoa!” _Thud_.

Luna’s last spell sent a gust of wind at her opponent, making her Block Charm a liability as it pushed against is and knocked her over. Luna immediately stopped laughing and went over to check on her with concern. “Oh, dear, are you okay, Ginny?” she asked.

“Um…fine, Luna,” Ginny mumbled as she staggered to her feet. Ginny hadn’t even been sure about coming back to the Duelling Club. She couldn’t quite place it, but something about it made her feel uncomfortable—something that all of Tom’s coaching could not dispel.

 

 _You really do need to learn to defend yourself properly, Ginny_ , Tom had written to her. _Lockhart is worse than useless in class, but in the Duelling Club, you can make it up somewhat._

 _I don_ _’t know, Tom,_ Ginny replied. _It_ _’s just that…_ She held her quill in place, trying to put her thoughts into words. _I don_ _’t know what’s come over me this year. I haven’t been feeling well, and I always feel funny after the club meetings._

 _You haven_ _’t been sleeping well,_ Tom wrote quickly. He’d been trying to help her discretely in her duels to strengthen his link to her, but he would have to be more careful if she was starting to get suspicious. _I know it can be difficult to sleep in times like these. Probably that combined with tiring yourself at the meetings is what_ _’s doing it. But you have to remember, the only way to get over that is practice. If you pace yourself, you’ll be able to handle it better over time._

Ginny thought about this. It made sense (Tom’s advice usually did), But something still felt off. _I know Mum doesn_ _’t like me going to it_ she wrote, to her own surprise _. Come to think of it, neither do Percy or Ron_ , she wrote.

 _But none of them can stop you, Ginny. You_ _’re old enough make your own decisions on this. This is a vital piece of your education, and your family should recognise that. Besides, Ron’s just being jealous_ , he replied. He was bending the truth a bit, but was true that Ron sounded a bit annoyed to Ginny’s ears whenever she tagged along with him, Potter, and Granger. _Anyway, it sounds like Harry really enjoys duelling. If you work hard at it and let me help you along to move ahead of your yearmates, that_ _’s definitely something that would catch his attention._

_Well, I guess I can keep trying it. And I would like to learn some more hexes I can use against Fred and George._

_That_ _’s the spirit._

_Tom, what_ _’s that spell Harry uses a lot? Hamasu?_

There was a small ink splatter of laughter, and Tom wrote back, _That would be Mahasu, the Sumerian Strike Hex. It_ _’s a very old and very simple spell. It merely strikes one’s opponent like a punch to the nose, but it is still in use because it is particularly fast and easy to cast, and hard to mispronounce…_

 

“Hey, we’re still duelling, aren’t we?” Ginny said as she faced Luna again. “ _Mahasu_!”

Luna dodged and then spun around as the spell hit her in the shoulder. She responded with a Shoe-Sticking Jinx and a Disarming Charm. Ginny blocked the latter, and as for the former, she was hit, she pulled her feet out of her shoes in the blink of an eye.

Luna blocked Ginny’s next volley and then incanted, “ _Keratoglossa_.”

Ginny failed to block that one, and it hit her in the face. (Her Blocking Charms were far from perfect.) Immediately, her tongue felt numb, thick, and…scaly? She wasn’t sure, but there was some kind of hard coating on it or something. What _was_ that spell, and where had Luna found it? And yet, it didn’t seem that debilitating…that is, until she cast her next spell and found she was no longer able to pronounce the letter “L.” “ _Experriarmus_!” she cried, but her wand fizzled.

“ _Expelliarmus_ ,” Luna said, and Ginny’s wand went flying. Professor Vector approached to call the duel.

“Excellent job, Miss Lovegood,” she said. “Creative use of the Tempest Jinx and the Horn-Tongue Hex. That’s a good thing to note. Anything that makes it difficult for your opponent to speak clearly can be useful. In fact, I want everyone to break off into pairs again and try that. Focus on spells that can impair speech.”

Ginny looked around to see the surprised looks that Luna had actually won a duel. Her heart sank when she saw Harry flash Luna a thumbs-up. This wasn’t going very well for her at all.

Meanwhile, the rest of the club paired up. Harry and Hermione stuck to their fellow second-years for this one, so Harry faced off against Daphne Greengrass and Hermione with Mandy Brocklehurst.

“So are you coming to the Christmas play this year?” Mandy asked the others as they took their positions.

“Of course, Mandy,” Hermione said. “It sounds really interesting.”

“Thanks. I know _The Voyages of Odo the Hero_ isn’t exactly a big political statement like last year, but—”

“Miss Brocklehurst, I don’t think this country could _take_ another big political statement like last year,” Daphne interrupted.

“I don’t know, I thought it worked out pretty well, Miss Greengrass,” Harry said with a mischievous grin.

“Well, of course _you_ would, Mr. Potter, but some of us actually have to _live_ in the magical world,” she said. Harry narrowed his eyes at her suspiciously.

“It’s okay, though,” Hermione told Mandy. “I’m looking forward to seeing what it’s like. I haven’t been able to find any translations of early manuscripts about Odo the Hero in the library.”

“Didn’t you say there was an original manuscript in my vault?” Harry asked idly.

Mandy tripped and almost fell flat on her face. “You have an original Odo the Hero manuscript?” she gasped in awe. Harry sighed softly. Mandy was just getting over her hero worship complex around Harry.

Fortunately, Hermione was able to clear it up: “I doubt it’s an original. It looks like it dates to the time of the Founders, but I haven’t had time to try to translate it. Anyway, I’d like to see how much the play resembles _Beowulf_.”

“Who?”

“A muggle poem about a hero who fought monsters. It dates from around the same time. I have to wonder if they’re linked at all.”

“I suppose it wouldn’t be that surprising,” Daphne said offhandedly. “The lines were pretty blurred that far back. Anyway, we should get to the duelling. Are you ready, Mr. Potter?”

“Of course, Miss Greengrass.” They took their stances. “ _Cantis_!”

Harry was fast, but Daphne had the experience that was expected of her as the daughter of a Most Ancient House. She blocked the jinx and retaliated with a Babbling Curse, which Harry dodged. They went back and forth for a while; then, Harry landed a _Cantis_ on her, and the Singing Jinx caused her next spell to come out with completely the wrong inflection. Thus advantaged, Harry pressed on and soon disarmed her.

The upper-year students were quickly silencing each other (although many of them were also good at nonverbal casting, so that didn’t stop them). However, the younger students had to resort to jinxes and hexes like Luna’s. Soon, Hermione cried _“Epoximise_!” and, by a lucky shot, nailed Mandy in the face, causing her mouth to stick closed. Harry thought the difficulty of aiming would make that one impractical in a real fight, but it was fun to watch.

“Very good,” Professor Vector said once all the jinxes had been undone. “Silencing Charm are, of course, a good choice, but you’ll want to pay particular attention to those who used something else to equal effect. The creative use of spells is very important in advanced duelling.”

“Excellent,” Professor Lockhart added. “Let’s have a second year exhibition duel now, shall we? Standard student rules again. Let’s see…Mr. Potter, why don’t you come up here? And…” he looked around the room. Not many second-years wanted to take on Harry. “Mr. Finch-Fletchley, step lively, now.” Justin shrugged his shoulders and climbed up on the platform. “Hey, Harry,” he said politely.

“Hey, Justin,” Harry replied, though he had a bit more of a predatory tone left over from duelling Daphne. Still, it was all in good fun, and there was no trouble between them. He and Hermione hadn’t had a lot of chances to talk to the muggle-borns in the other houses lately, but his understanding with Justin had calmed them down after the attack on Colin, and he could see that Justin himself was looking more relaxed too.

“Wands at the ready,” Lockhart said. “One…two… _three_!”

The spells began flying. Justin was new to the sport, so he was not as fast as Harry and considerably sloppier, but as a muggle-born with a background in football, he _did_ understand dodging, and he made up for his shortcomings with raw enthusiasm. His spells may not have been as controlled, but he put a lot of power into them. It was a risky strategy, since he would tire faster, but it certainly kept Harry on his toes.

It was a very active duel with a lot of movement, rarely matched in the Club except for the case of Harry versus Hermione, and the Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs each began cheering their duellist. Gradually, though, Harry began to win out, pushing Justin back. Growing a little annoyed and quite a bit more desperate, Justin’s control started to slip, with wild sparks starting to emerge from his wand.

One thing Justin Finch-Fletchley was known for was his proficiency with fire-based spells. They came naturally to him, and sometimes by accident. Few people could surpass him in that category besides Seamus Finnigan and the Weasley Twins. However, he wasn’t always as in control as they were, and in this case, his mental focus on power at the expense of control got the better of him.

Without warning, Justin yelled out, “ _Incendio_!” People screamed as a huge fireball flew down the duelling platform and slammed into Harry. With a reflexive, but half-formed wandless Block Charm, he was spared being singed, but he was still thrown flat on his back with a painful blast of heat to his face.

Everyone looked on in shock, Harry and Justin most of all, but Harry hesitated a second too long, an Justin snapped his wand up again and shouted, “ _Expelliarmus_!” He must have put a lot of reckless power into that one, too, because Harry’s wand came clean off his wrist strap.

Then everyone realised what had just happened. A second-year muggle-born—someone with practically no formal instruction in duelling—disarmed the Boy-Who-Lived in a duel after he threw a massive fireball at him. An angry look came across Harry’s face. He was mostly angry at himself for not catching that Disarming Charm, but that was a bad example to show to the crowd.

“Whoa, sorry about that, Harry,” Justin said, moving to help him up. “You okay?”

“I’m fine,” Harry said quickly, climbing to his feet on his own. “Um, nice job, Justin,” he barely thought to say.

“Thanks,” Justin said. “Hey, Harry—” he tried again.

“It’s okay,” Harry said sharply.

Hermione noticed her brother starting to make a scene and intervened. “It’s alright, Harry,” she guessed his problem. “Everyone gets distracted sometimes.”

Harry turned, about to make a cutting remark at her, too, but he stopped and took a deep breath: “Yeah, I know.” He turned back around and said, “It’s cool, Justin, really,” and he quickly shook the Hufflepuff’s hand before rejoining the crowd.


	52. Wizard Genetics

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Interestingly, if you ask three JK Rowling fans what it means to be Harry Potter, you will get three different answers.

Tom’s next move was a tricky one. He had been able to push Ginny enough to lower her guard to him if she was afraid, or even curious, but for this one, he might have to take over by sheer force of will. It was bad enough that she was growing suspicious of him. If he was going to make a move soon, it would have to be today, so she could chalk it up to not feeling well after the Duelling Club meeting. It was even harder that he didn’t have much choice for a target who she was emotionally invested in pursuing. He might have been able to persuade her that the Lovegood girl was a rival for Potter’s affections (even though Potter clearly had little-to-no interest in girls yet), but Lovegood was a pureblood and thus someone he did not want to hurt if he could help it. And anyway, he wanted to try to frame Potter for the attack, which meant the best bet was to try to take “revenge” on the Finch-Fletchley boy who had defeated him last night.

 _But Harry_ _’s not like that_ , Ginny insisted. _He doesn_ _’t do things like that. Ron said he didn’t even want revenge on his horrible relatives._

 _That may be true_ , Tom replied, though he suspected Potter would go for revenge pretty quickly for someone he cared about, _but they_ _’re just muggles. They can’t hurt him anymore. But a defeat like that at the hands of another wizard will be seen by some as a sign of weakness. With his political influence, he should not let it go unanswered._

_I don_ _’t think he cares about that, Tom. Justin’s his friend. I heard they met at the muggle-born orientation. And he doesn’t like causing trouble, either. I don’t think he wants to get him back at all._

_What Harry wants is not the issue. He can_ _’t help being raised by muggles._ _ We _ _both know how politics work in the magical world. Someone like Draco Malfoy could easily seize upon his actions for his own gain. It would help Harry greatly to have someone on his side who is willing to help him like this._

_I don_ _’t think so, Tom. I don’t think Harry would like it._

_I_ _’m sure if you just explain it, he’ll understand._

_I really don_ _’t think so,_ Ginny replied nervously. _Ron told me all about Harry, and I_ _’m pretty sure he doesn’t think that way. Muggles are really—I guess liberal—you know, compared with the rest of the Wizengamot. They don’t do revenge and stuff like that. I just know Harry would get mad if I went after Justin because of him._

Ginny really didn’t seem like she would be persuaded this time. It seemed she was smarter that Tom had thought. But then again, Tom knew the argument was a real stretch compared with what he’d tried before. Still, he had other tricks up his sleeve. Ginny didn’t even notice she was wandering again until she reached the second floor girls’ bathroom.

 _Tom, no, please. I don_ _’t want to go back in there again,_ she thought. She wasn’t even sure why she thought it, but her fear was growing stronger by the minute.

_I_ _’m afraid I really must insist, Ginny._

_No, please! I_ _’m scared, Tom! I don’t understand what’s going on,_ she said in her half-delirious thoughts. _Why do people keep getting hurt? Why are we doing this? What_ _’s happening to me. Please make it stop!_

 _It will stop when the school is cleansed,_ Tom said. Including Potter, he thought to himself. _But for now, we must continue._

 _No_ _…_ Ginny thought timidly, but suddenly pushing back harder. _No, I won_ _’t!_

_You will._

_I won_ _’t!_

_You will! You will obey me_ _…_ Tom pressed upon her hypnotically. _You will obey me_ _…_

* * *

Herbology class was cancelled that morning, and the castle was quiet after the snowstorm, so Harry thought it might be a good time to stretch his legs—all four of them. With his scar thoroughly covered up, he headed out and wandered around with no real destination in mind, just to get a better feel for the lay of the castle from a cat’s point of view, and to see who was out and about. He rounded the corner by the library and passed Hagrid carrying a dead rooster through the corridor. He considered stopping to ask why, but he decided he didn’t want to know. He was a good ways farther down the corridor when he heard it.

_“Come to me…yes, come to me…time to kill…time to kill…”_

Harry froze with indecision. Run towards the voice or run away from the voice? Towards or away?

Well, he _was_ a Gryffindor, after all. Plus, he had stealth on his side. He bolted down the corridor and up the stairs faster than any human in Hogwarts could run, except perhaps Hagrid. Down another corridor, he came to the source of the sound, but it seemed that the action was already over (which was probably for the best for him). He took one look at the scene and bolted back the other direction, towards the Transfiguration Classroom.

Justin Finch-Fletchley was lying on the floor, frozen and stiff as a board with a look of shock on his face. But far more terrifying than that was the person next to him, also lying frozen with a look of shock on his face—because that person was already dead: Nearly-Headless Nick.

Harry looked both ways and untransformed in the nearest alcove to the Transfiguration Classroom. He quickly cleaned the ink off his forehead with his wandless Ink-Cleaning Charm, then rounded the corner and poked his head around the classroom door. “Professor,” he whispered.

Professor McGonagall looked over to him is surprise. “Mr. Potter? What’s wrong?” she asked.

“Professor, I need to talk to you. Now.”

“One moment,” she said to her sixth-year class. “What is it?” McGonagall asked when she approached him.

“I just found Justin—” Harry started.

But then he cringed as the screeching voice of Peeves the poltergeist echoed through the castle: “ _ATTACK! ATTACK! ANOTHER ATTACK! NO MORTAL OR GHOST IS SAFE! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES! ATTAAAACK_!”

“That,” Harry finished with a groan, hanging his head.

“Quickly, Mr. Potter, show me,” she said with alarm, and Harry took off running down the hall with McGonagall following.

“There was someone else, ma’am,” Harry told her. “It was—”

They rounded the last corner, and McGonagall froze in shock with an exclamation of, “Sweet Morgana!”

“Nearly-Headless Nick.”

By now the corridor was rapidly filling with people crowding their way around the two victims, but McGonagall pushed her way to the front, dragging Harry with her, her hand on his shoulder, to inspect the pair. With a loud bang from her wand, she began to disperse the crowd, but it was a difficult prospect, as more students kept arriving from farther away in the castle. Even when most of them began to clear out, Justin’s friends, Ernie, Hannah, and Sophie arrived at a run, clearly alarmed by the absence of their fourth member.

Ernie Macmillan took one look at the scene and pointed dramatically at Harry: “Potter! I knew it! You see, Hannah? Caught in the act!”

“What?” Harry said in confusion.

“Surely not, Mr. Macmillan,” McGonagall snapped. “Mr. Potter was the first to inform me about the attack.”

“Yeah, because he wants you to think he’s so innocent. He’s a bloody Parselmouth, Professor!”

“That will do, Macmillan! And five points from Hufflepuff for that language. If you want to make yourself useful, help us with your friend.”

But even so, Ernie and Hannah stared at Harry, white with fear, and he saw Sophie cringe and hide behind them away from him. That hurt him even more than the ludicrous accusations. Hadn’t he and Hermione been the first ones to befriend her and Justin and the other muggle-borns when they were thrust into the magical world?

In the end, Ernie and Sophie carried Justin up to the Hospital Wing under teacher supervision to rest beside Colin and Mrs. Norris, and, after a few minutes’ discussion, Professor McGonagall conjured a fan for Hannah to waft Nearly-Headless Nick up the stairs after them. Then, she took Harry by the arm and led him in a different direction.

“The Headmaster will want to speak with you, Mr. Potter,” she said.

“Professor,” Harry said worriedly, “you don’t think _I_ did it—?”

“No, I do not, Mr. Potter, but you will need to tell us everything you saw.”

By the time they reached Dumbledore’s office, Professor Snape was there to meet them, presumably as part of the investigation. “Potter,” he said coldly.

“Professor,” Harry replied.

“Sherbet Lemon,” McGonagall said, and the stone gargoyle stepped aside to allow them entry.

Harry once again found himself amongst the many twittering devices in Dumbledore’s office. (Snape looked a bit put off by the noise.) Of course, he’d rather have Hermione there for company than Snape, but he didn’t let it bother him more than he already was. To distract himself, he turned to greet Dumbledore’s familiar and was alarmed to find that the phoenix now looked like a half-plucked turkey and was making a sickly gagging noise that made Harry’s own throat scratch and his muscles ache.

“H-Hey, Fawkes,” he said nervously. “Still feeling out of sorts, then?”

Fawkes made that gagging sound again and then suddenly burst into flames.

Harry jumped back into a defensive stance and hissed as the phoenix gave a loud shriek that seemed to dig into Harry’s skin with a burning pain. Apparently, all types of phoenix calls physically affected people. Harry nearly cried out in pain, but then Fawkes vanished into a pile of ash, and the scream stopped. There was silence for a moment, and then, a tiny peeping sound that filled the air with the calm and innocence of a baby.

In spite of the worrying circumstances, Harry laughed out loud under the bird’s influence: “Merlin’s beard, Fawkes, warn a bloke next time.”

“Don’t mind Fawkes, Harry.” Harry spun around to see Dumbledore descending the stairs with a fleeting smile that died away as the phoenix’s peeping quieted. “It’s about time he got on with it. He seems to be growing sentimental and stubborn in his old age.”

 _Sounds like you two are a perfect match, then_ , Harry thought. The Headmaster sat behind his desk and fixed Harry with his piercing blue stare. Harry didn’t _think_ he was using Legilimency, but just the sight was enough to make him instinctively start practising his Occlumency techniques. Dumbledore motioned for him to sit, which he did, though Snape and McGonagall still loomed over his shoulders.

“Professor,” he said. “I swear I didn’t attack Justin and Nick—”

“I believe you, Harry,” the old wizard interrupted.

“You—you do?”

“Of course. I should think that by now, your opposition to both the Heir of Slytherin’s beliefs and methods would be unimpeachable.”

“Not everyone thinks that, sir,” Harry mumbled.

“Then they are being wilfully blind for the sake of prejudice, or they are lying.” Harry turned in surprise to see Snape defending him. “Surely even you cannot be so dull as to believe that any thinking person would entertain the notion that you would attack your own friends.” _Gee, thanks, I think_ , Harry thought. “ _Although_ ,” Snape continued, “I would be interested to know why you were wandering the corridors in the middle of the morning.”

Harry tensed up for a moment. He couldn’t mention his animagus ability to Snape, but he quickly realised that he didn’t need to, since it wasn’t relevant to the story. “Class was cancelled this morning, and I felt like going for a walk, Professor.”

McGonagall nodded in confirmation: “Pomona did not want to be disturbed while she tended the mandrakes today.” Snape crossed his arms, but grunted an acknowledgement.

“Be that as it may,” Dumbledore said with a warning look at Snape, “I must ask you if there is anything you can tell me about this attack—anything at all.”

Harry shook his head slightly: “I didn’t see it. I just found them, but…I heard a voice.”

All three professors leaned in intently. “A voice?” Dumbledore asked.

“Yeah, it was like a…whispering…like someone talking to himself.”

“ _Him_ self?” Snape observed. “Are you certain of that, Mr. Potter?”

“Yeah, pretty sure. I didn’t recognise it, but it definitely sounded like a boy.”

“What did the voice say, Mr. Potter?” asked McGonagall.

“It said…” He closed his eyes and thought back to make sure he was remembering right. “It said, “Time to kill.’”

McGonagall hissed in worry. “Time to kill?” she breathed.

“That’s what I heard: “Time to kill.” I assumed it was the Heir. I think I must have just missed him.”

A scoffing sound came from Snape: “Typical Potter, charging off into danger. You should count yourself lucky you _did_ miss him.”

Harry jolted at the thought, but he took a calming breath. He still thought he would have had a good chance with his feline stealth, despite what happened to Mrs. Norris, but he couldn’t tell Snape that.

“That will do, Severus,” Dumbledore said. “But Professor Snape is correct, Harry. Under the circumstances, it would be very dangerous especially for you to approach the Heir, particularly if he is now interested in killing, despite his apparent failure to do so this morning. It is of the utmost importance that if you hear this voice again, you will inform the staff at once and not investigate for yourself.”

Harry could live with that. “Yes, Professor,” he said.

* * *

“Time to kill?” Hermione said with concern in the Common Room.

“That’s what I heard,” harry told her.

“But…but he didn’t actually _kill_ Justin, did he?”

Harry shook his head: “No, he’s just petrified, like the others. So’s Nick, as far as anyone can tell.”

“But what could hurt a ghost like that? He’s already dead!”

“I think that’s what everybody wants to know. Anyway, I want to go back there—”

“What?!”

“—to try to sniff out the trail. I didn’t get a chance the first two times.”

“Harry James Potter, have you gone mental? What if you actually _do_ run into the Heir? And besides, don’t you think Professor McGonagall’s already thought of that?”

“Yeah, but everybody knows what her cat form looks like. Me they don’t. The Heir won’t know I’m doing anything.”

Hermione opened her mouth to argue, but she stopped. She knew that look on her brother’s face. “I’m not going to convince you otherwise, am I?” she asked.

“Probably not,” Harry said with a slight smile.

She grumbled for a moment, but said, “Fine, just make it quick.”

Harry didn’t waste any time. He ran up to his dorm where he changed to Ratsbane had Hermione cover up his scar with black ink. A few minutes later they were back on the fourth floor where he had found Justin, and he got to work. Picking up the trail quickly, we followed it down the hall. Hermione followed at a distance as if she were idly wandering the halls. That would be suspicious in itself at a time and place like this, but it was the best she could do.

The scent trail ended not far away at a girls’ lavatory. Ratsbane stopped by the door, looked back at Hermione, and meowed once. She came over to him, drawing her wand, just in case, and peaked inside. “This is probably a bad idea,” she said, but a quick look around revealed there was no one there. Ratsbane slipped between her legs and did a quick once-over of the room, but immediately came back out. He meowed again and jerked his head towards the stairs. Hermione was all too happy to get back to the relative safety of Gryffindor Tower.

“Alright, furball, so what did you find?” she asked once Harry was back to “normal.”

“I’m honestly not sure. I’ve never smelled anything like it.”

“Animal? Mineral? Vegetable?”

Harry rolled his eyes at her. “Animal, but there was too much magic to tell much else. All I could figure out is that it has a really magically tough hide—and I think it’s poisonous. I know I smelled something really nasty in there.”

“And do you know where it went? Did you get the Heir’s scent?”

He shook his head. “No, I lost the monster’s trail in the bathroom, and too many girls had been through there…the funny thing is I didn’t smell any boys.”

“It’s a _girls_ _’_ bathroom, Harry. What’s so funny about that?”

“ _Because_ , Hermione, you remember how I said the Heir’s voice sounded like a boy?”

Hermione frowned in thought. “So you think the Heir is a girl, then?”

“I don’t know. I guess. Maybe she disguised her voice?” he speculated.

“But why?” A fearful look crossed her face. “Do you think there’s more than one of them?”

“I doubt it. Malfoy didn’t seem to this so…although that could be a cover…” He shook himself out of it. That way lay madness. “Okay, better question: why a bathroom? How come I couldn’t follow the monster’s trail any further?”

“Hmm…” Hermione thought, biting her lip. “Maybe the Heir needed a secluded place to summon the monster. Maybe she brought it in through the window or found a way to Portkey it up from the Chamber—no, that would never work. Only Dumbledore can make Portkeys in the school.”

“What about how the elves get around? Mione! What if Mr. Malfoy is forcing Dobby to help the Heir?” Harry said triumphantly.

“Dobby!” she gasped. “Did you smell him in there?”

Harry face fell. “No, I didn’t…I _did_ smell some school elves, though. She could be using another elf—maybe Imperiused or something.”

“Use an elf to apparate the monster close to the victim,” Hermione mused. “That could work…I wonder why a bathroom, though. There would be less risk of someone walking in if she did it in an unused classroom.”

“Yeah, I guess,” Harry said. “I don’t see how else it could have been done, though.”

“Well, hopefully the teachers will have better luck,” Hermione encouraged him.

“Yeah, hopefully.”

* * *

“This is getting out of hand, Malfoy,” said Amos Diggory. “Three attacks, now: two students and one of the castle _ghosts_ , to say nothing of the cat. _Something_ must be done.”

“I quite agree, Diggory,” Lucius Malfoy drawled. “ _Something_ must be done.”

The atmosphere was contentious as the emergency Board meeting began, and most contentious of all for Lucius Malfoy. Outwardly, the Chairman maintained an air of calm, but internally, Lucius’s mind was racing. Why was his Master stringing him along like this? Why didn’t he just kill one of the mudbloods so he would have enough leverage to replace Dumbledore outright? Could he have some other goal—? Of course, Potter! But again, why not go straight for the kill? Potter couldn’t possibly have a defence against the monster of Slytherin…could he? Lucius could drive himself in circles all day with that thought. After all, Potter had already defeated his Master once. And yet, he had shown no truly extraordinary ability since then. All Hallows’ Eve of 1981 was surely just a fluke…wasn’t it?

Perhaps his Master was being cautious and testing Potter’s abilities. Perhaps he was trying to frame Potter for the attacks. That would be a good trick, but Lucius wasn’t sure if it would stick. And dammit, the plan had been to get rid of Dumbledore. That had always been the plan: put the school back under pureblood control. That promised far greater long-term gains than dealing with Potter, valuable as that would be. Yes, Lucius would stick to the plan, but his Master certainly wasn’t making it easy for him.

“Broad daylight this time, Dumbledore,” Malfoy said, playing up his new angle. “It seems things have escalated. Any number of students could have been caught by the Heir. I shudder to think what would have happened if my son had been nearby, or Amos’s, or Josefina’s…”

“I must disagree with you on that, Lucius,” the old wizard replied. “The attack occurred during the middle of a class period. Only a handful of students were wandering the halls on account of Herbology classes being cancelled. The Heir’s attacks have remained carefully targeted. In that respect, we are lucky.”

“But if only a handful of students were wandering the halls, have you then been able to narrow down your suspect list?” Elphias Doge asked hopefully.

Dumbledore shook his head. “Alas, in the excitement caused by our resident Poltergeist, several teachers lost track of their attendance. We cannot be certain which students were out of class at the time of the attacks.”

“And what of Mr. Potter?” Malfoy ventured. “By your report, he _was_ the first person to see the victims, and without witnesses, I might add.”

It was a step to far, he realised. Even Diggory thought it was laughable: “Surely you don’t think Harry Potter would attack muggle-born students after the speech he made last spring, Malfoy?”

“I am merely pointing out that the circumstances are suspicious,” he saved himself. “Dumbledore, what _do_ we know about the attacks? What do they have in common?”

“Very little beyond the obvious. Mr. Filch’s cat was found on the second floor, Mr. Creevey on the sixth, and Mr. Finch-Fletchley and Sir Nicholas on the fourth. All three were found in the West Wing, but otherwise, there were no other connections between the locations. Mr. Potter reported hearing a male voice saying, “Time to kill,” shortly before the most recent attack, but beyond that we have no leads as to who may be involved.”

“And the Chamber? The monster?” Madam Zabini asked. “Do you have any leads on those?”

Dumbledore seemed to sink an inch or so where he stood. “I have been searching the castle for signs of either, but I have as yet found no clues. Nor has my research turned up any clear leads as to what may be responsible.”

“Come now, Dumbledore,” Diggory pressed. “There can’t be that many things that cause petrification.”

“In the world, Amos?” the Headmaster replied, raising an eyebrow. “How many species of magical creature are there, not to mention illegal hybrids? Add the possibility of cursed artifacts and obscure potions and curses. Remember that we have no proof the ‘Horror of the Chamber’ is, in fact, a creature, or even, strictly speaking, that the Chamber is involved at all. Who knows what might lie in lost troves of lore of past dark lords and arcane scholars such as those Lord Voldemort scoured the Continent for in the travelling days of his youth? Or what new methods the Heir himself may have designed? You must see, then, that there is much ground to cover to find the answer.”

Diggory’s face darkened, but he was forced to concede the point. “Then what can we do?” he asked.

“I say we go through with the Headmaster’s original idea of reviving the attacked students,” said Elphias Doge. “According to my contacts, mandrake is still in season in the Falkland Islands and Tierra del Fuego. If we act quickly, we can still acquire a supply, and hopefully, they can tell us something.”

“And the price will be even greater than before,” Blishwick countered. “The late season supply is extremely limited, and there remains little hope of success, as Lucius pointed out last month.”

“We can’t just leave two students to lie there until spring,” Diggory insisted.

“I feel for the children, Mr. Diggory, but the cost-benefit is simply not in the cards,” replied Madam Zabini.

“We need to act now. We won’t have another chance,” Doge roared.

“And if there are more attacks, the victims will be forced to wait until spring regardless,” Malfoy said calmly in a subtle change of subject. “The most important issue is stopping these events from repeating, isn’t it, Dumbledore? Tell us, how do you intend to do that if you have no leads and no suspects?”

“I will continue my search,” he answered stiffly. “Additionally, teachers will be instructed to be more rigorous about keeping attendance, signing out and in all students who leave class. Curfew will be strictly enforced, and staff will patrol the corridors during free periods on a rotation. It will mean more work, but it is a small price to pay for the safety of the students.”

“That may be well and good for now,” Mr. Llywelyn spoke up, “but it’s still not getting rid of the threat. “The smart thing to do would be to close the school entirely for the Christmas Holidays. Send all the students home and have the Aurors scour the castle from top to bottom.”

 _Not just yet_ , Malfoy thought. With his most blatant sarcasm, he said, “Why should we need Aurors when we have the defeater of Grindelwald on the case? Surely, you can handle this yourself, Dumbledore, can’t you?” He smiled knowingly. He’d been waiting for years to put the old meddler in a double bind like that.

And Dumbledore knew it. With the Heir evading him and Malfoy putting the pressure on him, he was being rapidly outmanoeuvred, and he did not like it. If he were anything less than confident, it would give Malfoy ammunition against him. But the truth was that he was pretty sure Tom Riddle had only been scared out of continuing his attacks in 1943, not stopped. Now, with Malfoy on his side on the outside, the Heir might not be scared off so easily. “I am putting in my utmost effort,” he said cagily, but truthfully.

“I should hope so,” Malfoy continued with the same sarcastic tone. “Because if you cannot remove the threat, perhaps we should find someone who can.”

“It is my sincere hope that that will not need to happen.”

“Preposterous!” Doge exclaimed. “Who could do it if not you, Albus?”

“I suggest you start looking, Elphias,” Malfoy interrupted. “Because if the current Headmaster cannot resolve the situation and no replacement is available, the entire castle would have to be declared unsafe, wouldn’t it?” The Board shuddered at he let the ultimatum hang in the air. It was hard to see how the school’s charter, old as it was, could survive a disaster like that.

* * *

“Have you noticed that whenever I get detention, it’s usually because I’m trying to help?” Harry said.

“You know, now that you mention it, I have,” Sirius replied in the mirror. “I’m not sure whether to be proud or disappointed.”

After Dumbledore got back from the Board meeting, Harry and Hermione met with him to learn about the results and to inform him of Harry’s latest findings. The old wizard was distressed to learn that Harry’s description of the Heir was now, “sounds like a boy, but smells like a girl,” but he was far more interested in the fact that Harry was pretty sure the Heir was using an animal for her attacks. (“Thank you, Harry,” he had said, “that will narrow down my research.”)

Professor McGonagall, on the other hand, was more concerned with the fact that Harry took such risks to learn that information. She took ten points from Gryffindor and gave him a detention for reckless behaviour. However, she also gave him ten points for his ingenuity and dedication to his fellow students. Harry had an inkling that she was embarrassed that she hadn’t thought to smell for the trail first.

“Well, it’s no less than you deserved,” Hermione huffed. “I probably deserved one myself for going along with it.”

“Fine, whatever,” Harry said in annoyance. “I still say it’s worth it. I just wish half of Hufflepuff didn’t think I was the Heir of Slytherin, now.”

“Well, like I said, Cub, it was bound to happen,” Sirius told him gently. “I’m afraid that’s just how gossip works. What’s the situation with the victims?”

“The Board still won’t buy any mandrake potion to help them,” Harry grumbled. “It figures.”

“Although, I have to think they have a point, to some extent,” Hermione said, to the others’ surprise. “Look, I don’t like leaving them like that either, but it’s true that if anything else happens later, the potion won’t be available at all.”

“I just wish I could do something for the ones who are there now,” Harry said. “Say, I’ve got a lot of money. Do you think I could buy the potion myself?”

“This late in the season?” Remus said from the mirror. The werewolf still looked bedraggled from the full moon two nights before. “You can probably afford it, but it’s going to be a lot of money—and no discount: your name won’t carry as far overseas. And like Hermione said, there’s nothing to stop the Heir from trying again.”

“It would still help them now.”

“Harry, I don’t think it’s a good idea,” Hermione said reluctantly. “What if the Heir comes after you in retaliation? What if she starts killing people instead of petrifying them in retaliation? If the Heir were stopped, I’d say go for it, as long as Mum and Dad were okay with it, but I don’t think you should try it until we’re sure you’re safe.”

Harry sighed. “Yeah,” he admitted. “And you, Mione.”

“So, then, you think the Heir is a girl, now?” Sirius asked.

“I don’t know what to think,” Harry said. “Nothing really makes sense. Any leads on your end?”

“Sadly, no,” Remus responded. “Just be careful, both of you. That’s the important thing.”

“Yeah, muggle or not, your mum would neuter us if we let anything happen to you,” Sirius added.

The children smiled weakly. “We know,” Harry said. “We will.”

Hermione nodded and added, “Oh, and speaking of that, we’d like you to tell our parents to bring Justin’s parents here as soon as possible. The Board’s trying to stop anyone contacting them again.”

“Sure thing. We’ll do that tonight,” Sirius said.

“I think they might be keeping it out of the papers, too,” Remus added.

“Maybe we should write a letter to the editor?” suggested Harry.

“I doubt they’d print it. From what you’ve said, it sounds like Lucius Malfoy is trying to keep it quiet so he can control the process until he can sack Dumbledore. And of course, he has a lot of influence with the _Prophet_.”

“Why would he do that, though?” asked Hermione. “Why would he need to?”

“Maybe he doesn’t think he has the public opinion to pull it off in the open,” Sirius suggested. “He’d have a better shot if he only has to strong-arm the Board.”

“Well, we can’t have that,” Harry said firmly. “What about the _Quibbler_ , then? It got our campaign against Snape started pretty well, even though not a lot of people read it.”

Remus thought about this: “Hmm…that could work. Of course, I can’t see how this could stay secret through Christmas Holidays anyway with everyone going home. Alright, we might as well try it. We’ll have to think about what to say, but it could be useful.”

“Great. Looks like we’ve got work to do.”

* * *

The next day saw a very dazed-looking, yet well-dressed muggle couple being escorted through the castle to see their son, while Dan and Emma Granger made a brief visit to their own children. In the following days, things did not calm down at the school. After the attack on Justin and Nearly-Headless Nick, the student body was in a near-panic. If they were using the buddy system before, they were practically travelling in packs, now, especially the Hufflepuffs, who were making a point of avoiding Harry as much as possible. And despite the creeping cold, many students were spending their free time outdoors in the Quad, possibly thinking that it would be easier to see a threat coming. However, with so many students in that space, it was a volatile mixture, and when Harry, Hermione, and Neville decided to walk out there to get some air on Sunday, even in human form, Harry could almost smell the trouble brewing.

The first person they ran into was Finn McLaggen. The seventh-year Gryffindor was plying his wares to the muggle-born students around the castle, and he soon made the mistake of coming after Harry and Hermione.

“Say, Granger,” he said smoothly, “you’re a muggle-born. Nasty business going on, isn’t it? If you’re worried about the Heir, I could hook you up with a protective amulet for a good price.” He held up a strange-looking necklace for the trio to see.

“Hey, don’t be showing Potter our protections!” a voice called. They turned to see a familiar group of Hufflepuffs coming over to confront McLaggen. Ernie Macmillan and Hannah Abbot seemed to be acting as bodyguards for Sophie Roper, while Susan Bones stood off to the side uncomfortably. “He _is_ the Heir of Slytherin, don’t you know?” Ernie said. “If you show him the amulets, he can figure out how to beat them.”

“I’m not the Heir of Slytherin, Macmillan,” Harry said.

“You’re not?” Harry, Hermione, and Neville spun around to see Fred and George Weasley had snuck up behind them. They caught a glimpse of Ginny behind them, trying ineffectually to pull them away.

“I guess that explains why you haven’t attacked this idiot yet,” Fred said, pointing at McLaggen.

“We just figured you were waiting for your next tea time in the Chamber of Secrets with Slytherin’s monster,” George added.

“Oh, will you two stop it!” Ginny said hysterically.

“Hey, it’s all in good fun, Gin,” Fred told her.

“ _You_ _’d_ better watch yourself, though, McLaggen,” said George. “I bet the Heir won’t like you helping the muggleborns.”

“ _If_ that’s what you’re really doing,” Fred continued suspiciously.

“I can take care of myself, Weasley,” McLaggen said smugly, “and I’ll have you know these are perfectly good protective amulets.”

“Then you’d better keep them away from Potter!” Ernie lunged forward and tried to grab the amulet, but Hermione’s reflexes were faster. She snatched the necklace out of McLaggen’s hand and stepped back from both of them. Ernie then lunged at her, but Harry stepped in front of her, drawing his wand with a snap of his fingers.

“Just try it, Macmillan,” he said.

“Yeah, you need to cut it out,” Neville said nervously as he also stepped in front of Hermione.

As Ernie considered his options, Hermione carefully inspected the “protective amulet” she’d grabbed. “This is a Spimster wicket,” she concluded. “It won’t protect you from anything stronger than a Tripping Jinx.” Sophie Roper, who was wearing a similar necklace, gasped, and her friends closed ranks around her.

Harry whirled on McLaggen. “Were you trying to scam my sister?” he said threateningly.

“Well, I…” he replied as he started to sweat.

“Honestly, did you not _know_ that half our family and friends come from old pureblood lines, and Hermione’s got a near-photographic memory?”

“Ha! So you admit it!” Ernie cut in.

“I _admit_ that we know our artifacts, and we know how to spot a scam,” Harry shot back. “And aren’t you supposed to be from an old pureblood family, too?”

“That’s right. You can trace my family back through nine generations of witches and warlocks and—”

“And you’re on the Pure-Blood Directory, I know. And I don’t care. I’m just a little concerned that you didn’t recognise that Sophie was wearing a fake amulet—or didn’t tell her.”

“You leave Sophie out of this!” Ernie shouted, drawing his wand on him.

“Sophie’s my friend—I hope,” Harry told him. The tip of his wand started glowing of its own accord. “I’m trying to look out for her, too.”

Ernie started to respond, but at that moment, Susan Bones stepped in and lowered his wand hand. “Ernie, you need to cut it out,” she told him softly. “In case you haven’t noticed, Harry’s been trying to help the muggle-borns ever since he started here.”

“Sue, don’t you get it?” he replied, lowering his voice. “He’s a _Parselmouth._ Everyone knows that’s the mark of a dark wizard. It’s an _act_. He probably just pretended to make friends with all the muggle-borns last year to find out who they were. He already got Justin for beating him in that duel. I’m not gonna let him get Sophie, too.”

“Oh, for the love of—Just because I’m a Parselmouth doesn’t make me the Heir of Slytherin!” Harry yelled loud enough for the entire Quad to hear. His wand started sparking, causing Ernie to back up a step. Hermione could feel his magic flaring. “I’m not attacking muggle-borns. I _like_ muggle-borns. My sister’s a muggle-born, and I know all the others because I went to the orientation with her, remember, Sophie? And I’m not so petty that I’m going to attack someone just for beating me in a duel, Macmillan.” The snow started swirling around him, and Neville took a large step back worriedly.

With Harry in imminent danger of losing control of his wandless magic, Hermione did something she hadn’t done in a long time. She put one hand on the back of his neck and grasped it firmly. His limbs immediately went limp, and he stood unsteadily on his feet. His flaring magic subsided almost instantly, and he took a deep breath and collected himself before she let go. “That’s enough Harry,” she hissed as Neville gave them a confused look.

“Trouble, Mr. Potter?” a new voice called out, and Harry groaned softly when he saw Draco Malfoy leading a group of Slytherins to join the crowd.

“Nothing that concerns you, Mr. Malfoy,” Harry said evenly.

“Oh, I don’t know about that, Mr. Potter. There are an awful lot of strange things going on around here, and you always seem to be in the thick of them.”

“Don’t you think you’re exaggerating a little?”

“Oh, come off it, Potter,” Theodore Nott interrupted. “What do you think you’re doing bringing muggles around the castle?”

“ _We_ were thinking that parents have a right to visit their children when they’ve been seriously injured, Mr. Nott. I’m sure no one would think twice if it had been the parents of any pureblood in this circle, Merlin forbid.”

“Oh, so you’re trying to play both sides, now?” Ernie interrupted.

“Will you cut it out, Macmillan? Can’t you just accept that I’m not the one doing this?”

“Tut-tut, manners, Potter,” Malfoy drawled. “That’s actually a clever idea, playing both sides to keep people guessing. Of course, you know what they say, blood will out in the end.”

“And what’s that supposed to mean?” Harry bristled. “Is my adoptive family somehow not good enough now? And besides, my _blood_ is from an old light-side family and a muggle-born—not exactly Heir of Slytherin material.”

“Obviously, the Slytherin blood is stronger if you’re a Parselmouth.”

“There _are_ other Parselmouths out there, you know, Malfoy,” Hermione jumped in.

“Oh, yeah?” Nott sneered at her. “You’d better hope your alleged ‘brother’ _is_ the Heir, Granger. Otherwise, he’s gonna be coming after you, too.”

“Nott, I’m warning you…” Harry levelled his wand at him.

“What? If you really aren’t the Heir, you already know he will.”

“Or maybe he really is the Heir,” Malfoy prompted.

“Yeah, that’s right. Are you making an exception for your poor, scared, mud—muggle-born sister, Potter?” Nott added.

“I said that’s enough—!” Harry started, but Hermione pushed his wand hand down.

“I can take care of myself, Nott,” she said.

“We’ll see.”

But Malfoy kept going. “Then again, maybe Potter’s not the Heir,” he told the growing crowd offhandedly. “After all, _it_ would make more sense for the Heir to actually be _in_ Slytherin…unless that’s what he _wants_ everyone to think.”

Suddenly, Neville joined the fray: “Hey, how do we know _you_ _’re_ not the Heir, Malfoy?”

Malfoy froze, but he quickly recovered. “Well…what if I am?” he sneered. “And maybe you need to watch your back, too, Longbottom.”

Suddenly, Harry started laughing loudly. The sound was so incongruous that everyone stopped and stared.

“Ha! Looks like Potter’s finally going mental,” Malfoy said.

“Oh, please, Malfoy,” Harry told him, “do you realise that you are the _least_ likely person in this school to be related to Salazar Slytherin?”

“Excuse me? Are you saying my blood isn’t pure enough to be the Heir of Slytherin,” he said with an air of offence.

“No, _too_ pure. You’re Draco Malfoy, Heir to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Malfoy; your mother was a Black; her mother was a Rosier; and so on—all members of the Sacred Twenty-Eight, the purest of the purebloods. Your family is probably the best documented in the country, and if there were even a hint of Slytherin blood in it, the Ravenclaws would be all over it by now.” There were murmurs of agreement from some Ravenclaw bystanders.

“But in the muggle world, things were different. Wizarding families have usually had two kids for practically forever, but muggles were having four, five, and six kids to a family for century after century, and most of them were never documented—not well, anyway. They were all too busy staying alive.”

“So? We all know how pathetic muggles are,” Malfoy said, but he sounded nervous, as if he already had an inkling where the logic was going. His compatriots all looked clueless, however.

“Don’t you see?” Harry continued. “All those unknown generations? All it would take is one squib great-great-grandson, and Salazar Slytherin could be the ancestor of every muggle in Europe. And all it would take is one muggle-born great-great-grandparent today, and he could be the ancestor of every muggle-born, half-blood, or pureblood in Britain—except you, Malfoy. Your blood is too pure to be related to him…unless you _do_ have some muggle-borns on your family tree that you’re not telling us about.”

“ _Oooooh_ …” some of the bystanders said.

Realising that Potter had just run circles around him, Malfoy had little recourse but to back out. “That’s it, you _have_ gone mental, Potter. I kind of hope you’re _not_ the Heir, now,” he said ineffectually. “You’re such a nutter, I’m not sure you could tell the muggle-borns from the rest of us.” He spun on his heel and stalked away.

“Yeah, well, maybe that’s a good thing!” Harry called after him. He turned and glared at Ernie. “So, Macmillan, are you really gonna believe Malfoy on this?” he asked.

Ernie glared back. “Maybe not,” he admitted, “but I’ve still got my eye on you, Potter. Come on, Sophie.”

Sophie was still staring at Harry fearfully, and when Ernie turned to leave, she spun around and hurried after him, sticking close to him and Hannah.

Harry growled softly: “I hate seeing Sophie afraid of me like that.”

“I’m sorry, Harry,” Hermione started. “Ernie’s being—”

“Bigoted?”

“I was going to say paranoid. He couldn’t help Justin, and he’s worried about Sophie. A lot of people are scared.”

“They shouldn’t be scared of me,” he grumbled.

“They don’t have any other idea who the Heir could be. I’m really worried not knowing who it is, and I know you are, too.” She reached up and grasped the back of his neck again, albeit more lightly—the same pressure as a mother cat picking up a kitten by the scruff of its neck. “Are you doing okay, now?”

“I’m not five anymore, Mione,” he murmured in her ear.

“Doesn’t matter. It works on all cats,” she whispered back, but she let him go, and they headed back inside.

“Wow,” Neville said as he went with him, “I can’t believe you outsmarted Malfoy like that. I never thought about blood that way, but it’s right, isn’t it? There’s gotta be a lot of mixing we don’t know about.” Harry and Hermione both nodded.

“That was a very clever point, Harry.” The trio did a double take when they saw that Luna Lovegood had skipped up alongside them. Where had she come from? She did seem to have a tendency to fade into the background. “Do you think you might be interested in writing about it for the Quibbler? I think our readers would like to hear an alternative perspective on the topic of blood purity.”

“Right next to the nargles?” Hermione muttered.

Unfortunately, Luna heard her. She turned to face Hermione with inscrutable silver eyes and said, “You may not believe in nargles, Hermione, but how do you explain where all the missing socks go in the laundry?”

“Most likely?” she replied. “A pair of socks accidentally gets split between two loads, and people interpret it as two missing socks.”

Luna looked unhappy, but Harry stepped in to diffuse the fight: “You can argue about nargles later. Luna, I…might be interested in writing that. Mione, you could help me. But I think I’d like to see what the public reaction to the attacks is first. We should focus on one thing at a time.”

“I understand. I appreciate you being willing to work with us, Harry,” Luna said. She leaned in closer and whispered conspiratorially, “Most people seem to think I’m a bit odd. They say that about Daddy, too.”

“Hey, what are friends for, Luna?” Harry said. “Besides, being normal’s overrated.”

Luna gave him a small smile as she skipped along beside them. Harry thought it meant a lot from her, since her outward expression rarely went beyond the level of dreamy contentment. He couldn’t deny she _was_ an odd one, but in his book, she was at least fun to be around.


	53. Trading Dobby

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: You can’t get any movement larger than five Harry Potters without including JK Rowling.
> 
> Since I got a couple of reviews on this subject, I want to say that yes, I know that Malfoy is a French name. Yes, the Malfoys came to Britain from France. However, that does not preclude them from being a Noble and Most Ancient House, nor does it preclude them from being older than the Potters or the Blacks. According to JK Rowling’s notes on Pottermore, the Malfoys came to Britain with the Norman invasion of 1066. Meanwhile, the first Potter lived in the 1100s, and the Blacks are also only explicitly stated to date back to the 1200s.
> 
> As I alluded to in Chapter 50, my fictional history is that after the Norman invasion, 12 powerful families founded the Wizards’ Council, including the Malfoys, and they became the Most Ancient Houses. You may disagree with this narrative choice, but it does fit my story.
> 
> Thanks to Skald of Freya for correcting my Swedish. Google Translate will only take you so far.

_It_ _’ll be good to get away from the castle for a while, Tom,_ Ginny wrote on the train ride home. _It was getting scary there. I couldn_ _’t concentrate on my work, either._

 _I think you_ _’ll feel better after a break, Ginny,_ Tom replied. _If you take it easy for a couple weeks, you should be more rested to learn more spells._

_I just hope they can find the Chamber of Secrets while we_ _’re gone so they can stop the attacks._

_I_ _’m sure Professor Dumbledore is doing the best he can._

_Do you really think it_ _’s true, what Harry said? How almost everyone in school could be the Heir?_

_I suppose it could be._ The thought unsettled Tom, as much as he didn’t want to admit it. He’d never done the maths himself, but Potter’s words rang far too true. It was too much to expect Salazar Slytherin’s bloodline to stay confined to a single family, or even to only wizards, for a thousand years. Still… _It_ _’s hard to be sure of how the families lined up that far back. Even with good records, bloodlines can be buried for a long time. But even if Slytherin’s blood spread far and wide, I suspect his true_ _magical_ _Heirs, those with the gift of Parseltongue, would be confined to a select few._

 _You don_ _’t think—_ Ginny held her quill to the page indecisively— _my family could be part of them, do you?_

_Of course not. Your family has all been in Gryffindor for generations, and you_ _’re one of the surest Gryffindors among them._

Ginny breathed a sigh of relief. Despite her growing uneasiness about the diary, those words were a real comfort to her. Of course, the Heir would really be a Slytherin. And even though a lot of people suspected Harry, probably more than half the school recognised how silly that was. _Thanks for being so understanding, Tom. I know you were a Slytherin, but you_ _’ve still been really nice to me._

_As I told you, your house is only a label. It tells some of your qualities, but not all of them. The true test is one of character._

“Are you okay, Ginny?”

Ginny flinched and looked up to see who had entered her compartment, hastily covering up the diary. “Oh, hi, Luna. Yeah, I’m fine,” she said breathily.

“Your wrackspurts have got worse,” Luna said matter-of-factly. “And you may have a secondary infestation of something else. Perhaps I should ask Daddy to help you with them.”

“Um…no, thank you, Luna. I think I’ll be okay.” _Is it just me, or is she getting loonier?_ she thought.

 _Quite possible_ , Tom replied.

* * *

In comparison with last year, when the Iron Curtain fell, it was a sombre Christmas in magical Britain. In fact, there was a bit of a pall over the entire magical world, for with only about a million witches and wizards in the world, any serious threat in a magical school garnered international headlines. As soon as the story broke in _The Quibbler_ , a few people both inside and outside of Britain called up the _Daily Prophet_ for confirmation, and at that point, they couldn’t outright deny it. By Christmas Day, magical newspapers as far away as Australia were running stories like, _TERROR IN BRITAIN: MULTIPLE STUDENTS PETRIFIED AT FAMOUS MAGICAL SCHOOL!_ They didn’t always make the front page, but most of the dozens of widely circulating newspapers in the magical world ran articles. France offered investigative assistance, as did a magical private investigator in America. Questions mounted as to whether and why the story had been covered up, but the Board of Governors skillfully manoeuvred out of them by saying they were trying to run their investigation under a media blackout. Harder to justify was the choice not to revive the petrified students when they had the chance, and the resultant war of words left egg on both Dumbledore’s and the Board’s faces.

Meanwhile, after several discussions back and forth between the Grangers, Sirius and Remus, and the Tonkses, it was decided that the situation outside the school was more or less normal, and they should keep their Christmas routine the same as last year, so Grandpa Robert and Grandma Vera were joined by Sirius and Remus visiting the Grangers on Christmas morning. It was more awkward than last year. Although they had been uncomfortable about it, Dan and Emma had agreed to tell Dan’s parents a fairly whitewashed version of what had happened to Harry and Hermione last spring, and they were having to do it again with the Chamber of Secrets mess, but there was only so far you could bend a story about evil wizards in the children’s school.

“Don’t worry, though, I’m sure Dumbledore’s on top of it,” Sirius said, even though it was getting harder to say that with each new attack. “Go on, Cubs, let’s get to the presents.”

The stack of gifts that had come by owl was a little higher this year, with Christmas cards from the Weasleys, the Fawleys, Neville, and Luna, and another one that arrived with Cousin Andi’s owl.

“What’s that one, Harry?” Hermione asked.

“I don’t know. Cousin Andi must have forwarded it.” He opened the envelope. “It’s from…Gabbie Delacour?”

“Oh, that’s right, we were supposed to write her sometime,” Hermione said.

“Yeah,” Harry remembered. “I guess with so much else going on, we forgot.”

“Well, go ahead and read it.”

“Okay, okay,” Harry started reading:

 

_Dear Harry Potter and your family,_

_Fleur is helping me write this because my English is still not good. I heard about what is going on at Hogwarts. I am very sorry that people are getting hurt. It sounds scary. I hope you are okay and that you get lots of presents. Please write back to me so we know you are okay._

_Joyeux No_ _ël,_

_Gabbie Delacour_

 

“Aw, that was nice of her,” Emma said. “You need to be sure to write her back.”

“Yes, Mum,” Harry said.

“Who’s this Gabbie, now?” Grandpa asked.

“Oh, she’s this adorable little witch—probably about six or so. We met her family in France last summer. Her mother’s half-Veela, so we hit it off over the whole mixed family thing.”

“And they were some of the few people we’ve met who were sensible about Harry’s fame,” Dan added.

“Uh huh,” Harry said. “They were kinda stuck up at first, but they were pretty nice after we talked to them for a while.”

They set the cards aside and started opening presents. Besides the usual disproportionate numbers of books, Harry received some top-of-the-line Quidditch gear from Sirius that he was sure would help his game, and then Sirius handed two familiar-looking rectangular presents to Hermione and Emma. “I got something special for you and your parents, Kitten,” he said.

They each unwrapped their present, revealing twin, handheld mirrors. “Communication mirrors?” Hermione asked.

“Yep, go ahead and test them out.”

“Hermione?” Emma said tentatively. Suddenly, her face appeared in Hermione’s mirror and Hermione’s in hers. It was a little disorienting, since each mirror gave an alternate and somewhat jittery point of view of the same room, but they were more than happy with it.

“Sirius, this is wonderful!” Hermione said. “Thank you so much. It’ll be so much better to be able to call home instead of writing a letter.”

“Faster, too,” Harry added, thinking about all the crises they seemed to get into.

“Don’t I know it,” Sirius replied. “Those things are hard to find, but they’re worth it.”

The old house cat, Rowena, slowly padded over to investigate the strange object and sniffed around it in confusion before apparently accepting it and shifting gears to lie down across Hermione’s lap.

“Well, it looks like Rowena likes it,” Hermione said, and she began scratching the cat behind her ears. She let out a sigh and said, “You know, it would be nice to have a cat to take to Hogwarts…one that would actually do what I tell it,” she muttered under her breath, too quietly for Grandma and Grandpa to hear.

Harry glared at her. A cat did as it pleased.

“You’ve never taken Rowena,” Grandpa observed.

“She’s too old,” Hermione said sadly. “She’s gotta be close to fifteen by now…Looks like she’s even going grey on her face.”

“Hey, now,” Sirius said, “there’s nothing wrong with a little grey hair.” He ran his hand self-consciously through his own hair, which had wisps of grey around the edges.

“I know it’s perfectly normal. I’m just saying she’s too old to travel so much.” She let out another wistful sigh.

Harry frowned. It was sad to see his only real feline friend hitting her twilight years. He reclined to get close to her and said encouragingly, “Don’t listen to her, Rowena. You’re not getting older; the mice are just getting faster.”

Hermione rolled her eyes, but giggled in spite of herself.

After a fun day of gifts, laughs, and Grandma’s Christmas dinner, it was time for most of the group to head out to the Diagonal Theatre for the Christmas play. While it would have been nice to take Grandma and Grandpa, along, they didn’t officially know about magic, and truth be told, they didn’t mind having an evening alone after all the excitement.

“We’ll be just fine here,” Grandma said. “Have fun, all of you.”

“What’s the show again?” asked Grandpa.

“ _The Voyages of Odo the Hero_ ,” Hermione replied. “It’s sort of like the wizard version of _Beowulf_.”

“Sounds like a good show. See you later,” Grandpa said.

“Bye Grandma, bye Grandpa,” Harry and Hermione said.

“You know what show I’d _really_ like to see?” Harry mused as they walked out to the car.

“What’s that?” Hermione asked.

“ _Doctor Who_.”

“Oh, I know! It’s been three years now. I can’t believe it never started up again. Is it cancelled, now?”

Dan shook his head. “That’s the funny thing. As far as I know, they never officially cancelled it. Once in a while, I’ll hear a rumour about it starting again. Next year is the thirtieth anniversary, you know. Maybe they’ll do something for that.”

“I hope so,” Hermione said. “They did _The Three Doctors_ and _The Five Doctors_ for the tenth and twentieth anniversaries. It’d be great to have _The Seven Doctors_.”

“Mm-hmm,” Dan agreed. “Oh, but there’s something else that’ll interest _you_ , Harry.”

“What’s that?”

“The _Jurassic Park_ movie is being releasing in June.”

“Awesome!”

* * *

Hundreds of miles away, a very paltry Christmas dinner was being taken in a substandard magical tent. Both the tent and its occupants had been somewhat damaged by their frequent fights. However, one of the two occupants was looking oddly cheerful tonight.

“Happy Christmas, Amycus,” the squat, stubby witch said with a wheezing grin.

“What’s so happy about it, Alecto?” Amycus Carrow grunted to his sister. “We’ve been combing Scandinavia for months with no sign of the Dark Lord, there’s no decent food, and I’m freezing my arse off, here.”

“Can it!” Alecto snapped. “It’ll all be worth it when we do find the Dark Lord. But it’s happy because look what I nicked out of the rubbish…” She held up a newspaper called _Nordiska Nyheter,_ across which the headline blared:

 

_MUGGLARSTUDENTER ATTACKERADE P_ _Å HOGWARTS!_

_RENBLODIG ARVTAGARE RYKTAS MISST_ _ÄNKT_

 

“Hang on a minute,” Amycus grumbled in annoyance as he started searching for his Swedish dictionary.

“Don’t bother, I already translated it. It says, “Muggle-born students attacked at Hogwarts! Rumoured pureblood Heir suspected.” That’ll be the Heir of Slytherin in case you forgot.”

“The Heir of Slytherin? But I thought the Dark Lord…”

“Obviously, another Death Eater’s doing it,” Alecto told him. “Probably Malfoy, the slippery devil.”

“Then how’s that good for us?”

“It ain’t— _except_ this could finally be the last straw that gets rid of Dumbledope—maybe Saint Potter, too. I’ll _let_ Malfoy gloat on that one…for a few minutes. Ha!”

“Peachy. But we still gotta find the Dark Lord before we can do any gloating of our own,” Amycus said. “I’m sick of Scandinavia. I say we try Poland next.”

“Fine, but if this is another wild fwooper chase, it’s on your own head.”

* * *

“ _Legilimens_!”

Harry thought he had built a pretty good mental scene, but it was a lot harder when Maxwell Barnett was trying to break through it and call up his other memories. The truly powerful thing about Legilimency was that when it was done with appropriate subtlety, it didn’t _feel_ like an attack _per se_ ; it felt like one’s own mind was wandering. It was a like a weaker form of being Confunded (which Mr. Barnett had also tried on Harry and his family)—a feeling of losing control of one’s train of thought and being unable to stop one’s mind from straying. It took a lot of willpower to stay on task against the opposing will of the Legilimens. The point of the technique was to amplify that willpower with the familiarity of the image, but even so, Mr. Barnett got through the cracks pretty quickly. Harry could see why prolonged study and a lot of practice were needed to become a good Occlumens.

“Not bad, Lord Potter,” said the Royal Court Magician after the test concluded. “In fact, that was pretty good for only having had a few months of practice with no one to test you.”

The Grangers were all getting a crash course in Occlumency over the Christmas Holidays, in preparation for their main series of lessons next summer. It was difficult with the children not being able to train properly at school (since they didn’t want to let Professor Snape into their minds or their secrets), but Barnett soon found that all four of them were good students—even if it didn’t seem like they had made much progress.

“That’s harder than it sounds,” Harry grumbled, nursing a headache.

Mr. Barnett chuckled a little. “Nonetheless, Lord Potter, you are off to a good start. The detail you have put into your mental image is very good. However, you need to work on improving your focus. Know the image well enough to be able to call it up wholesale at a moment’s notice. If you work on that throughout the spring, I think you will be able to make fast progress this summer and even work on the basics of other techniques.”

Harry nodded in agreement. That _did_ sound good, considering the difficulty of the subject.

“Now, Miss Granger, if you would like to go next?”

Hermione took a deep breath and nodded, albeit uneasily.

“ _Legilimens_!” Mr. Barnett said.

Hermione’s private memories rose up before her, but she pushed them away, focusing on the maze of thoughts she had constructed in her mind. Each time Mr. Barnett tried to call up something she didn’t want him to see, she bounced him to a different memory that was more strongly associated with what she was thinking about, some of them highly incongruous and confusing. This kept up for quite a bit longer than it had with Harry, until she made a misstep in the dance, and Mr. Barnett dropped down into the sea of her memories before withdrawing.

“Very good, Miss Granger. If I weren’t so accustomed to training muggles, I would have got pretty lost for a minute, there.”

“You still got through,” she said unhappily.

“Yes, but you have a remarkable mind to build a mental maze that complex. I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone else who could do it at your age. Focus on exerting better control of the movement through the maze, and I think you’ll progress quickly.”

“Yes, sir.”

Dan and Emma also went through their tests and were a little surprised to find they were behind Hermione’s level. Of course, who could keep up with their daughter’s powers of raw memorisation? But they were still making good progress. Barnett had several longer individual sessions with all four of them over the holidays, which left each of them with a pretty good idea of what they needed to work on, so that aspect of their plans, at least, was going well.

* * *

With the Duelling Club active at school, there wasn’t a pressing need for “tutoring” with Remus, although they did spend some time at Grimmauld Place for a spell review and would be going back for Sirius’s second annual New Year’s Party. However, they spent a bigger part of the holidays visiting at the Tonkses’ House—a choice that was business as much as pleasure, since they had several important issues from school to discuss.

The family meeting took place in the drawing room, where all four of the Potter family portraits from Harry’s vault were hanging. The Tonkses, the Grangers, Sirius, and Remus sat in a semicircle to include them.

“Alright, the first thing is these attacks that are going on at the school,” Emma said.

Harry nodded in agreement and turned to the first portrait in the line: an aged, but elegant, silver-haired witch with an angular face. “Yes, it’s pretty bad,” he said. “Grandma Dorea, you were a Slytherin. Do you know anything about the Chamber of Secrets?”

The portrait of Dorea Potter shook her head. “No more than Andromeda does, I’m sure,” she said kindly. “The Chamber was known as nothing but rumour for centuries, and there was no great revelation of the secret within Slytherin House. Salazar Slytherin would have needed to keep it well hidden even from his own house if he wished it to remain undisturbed. Also, the last time these attacks happened was a few years after we were in school.”

They’d expected as much, but Hermione looked to two of the other portraits, an elaborately-dressed Shakespearean-era pair of Potter ancestors better known as the Fair Youth and the Dark Lady. “Wulfric, Melania,” she asked, “what about you? Did you know anything different in your time?”

“Nay, lass, I am grieved to tell thee we know nought,” Wulfric Henderson Potter replied. “We were not of Slytherin, and the Chamber was far from the minds of the children of the time.”

“And besides all this,” Melania Potter added, “if what thou hast told us be true, then Hogwarts Castle hath been though many changes and remodellings in the passage of time. If the Chamber were not found by the builders nor sealed in the course of the work, it seems that hope paleth to find it now.”

“Well, thank you, anyway,” Dan said disappointedly. “I think the more important question is, do we really want you two to go back to Hogwarts, or somewhere else?”

Hermione and Harry both paled a little at the prospect. “I think we both would rather not have to leave our friends and go somewhere else, especially in the middle of the year…” Hermione said timidly, “but if it’s really too dangerous…”

“That’s what we need to decide,” their father replied. “We know Voldemort isn’t going to leave you alone, Harry, but whatever this Heir of Slytherin person is doing, even if it’s him, it seems to be tied to the castle, so we really would prefer that you go elsewhere. You said one of your classmates already left?”

“Yes, Sally-Anne’s gone,” Harry said glumly. “Her parents took her to Canada. It’s not fair.”

“No, but you have to admit she’ll be safer there.”

“On the other hand,” Cousin Andi cut in, “I think you should know that the Ministry has been leaning on me very hard to make sure you _do_ go back to Hogwarts—or rather you specifically, Harry. The blow to public morale if you were to leave Britain would be pretty bad. I’ve heard rumour that the Board of Governors is worried about the same thing.”

“ _Some_ of them, you mean,” Hermione said shrewdly.

“Maybe all of them,” Andi replied. “Remember, it was Malfoy’s elf that warned Harry he was in danger. I imagine Harry leaving wouldn’t be his first choice.”

“All the more reason to consider it,” Emma suggested.

“There’s still the new security procedures Professor Dumbledore told us about,” Harry reminded them. “They’ll make it a lot harder for the Heir to do anything.”

“We know, son,” Dan answered. “You told us: more patrols, keeping track of everyone better—but we’re concerned that might not be enough to stop the Heir if he—or she—is really determined.”

Sirius spoke up cautiously: “I think I should remind you of Harry’s and Hermione’s friend, Neville’s, offer to stay close to them, since he’s probably a non-target.”

“We don’t want to impose on him,” Emma said.

“He offered it,” Harry cut in. “And it’s really not much trouble to stay close to him most of the time anyway, since we have all our classes together.”

“Professor McGonagall said your house is like your family,” Hermione added.

“And we don’t want to abandon our classmates,” Harry finished. “Especially our fellow muggle-borns.”

“Well, to that point, I’m not so sure you would,” Cousin Andi said. “From the sounds of things, a lot of the other muggle-born families listen to your parents in particular, just because you’re better connected. If you leave, Harry, I wouldn’t be surprised if a lot of them follow, and I wouldn’t be surprised if some half-bloods go, too, especially ones with an actual muggle parent.”

“But that’s just the thing, isn’t it?” Hermione said. “Most of the other muggle-borns are going back right now. I know some of them have a choice, but some don’t—like Terry Boot can’t afford to go anywhere else. Don’t you think it would be good for us to stay at Hogwarts as a show of solidarity?”

Dan and Emma stared at their daughter, feeling a wave of _d_ _éjà vu_ back to seven years ago: _let_ _’s adopt a boy who’s a known target for dark wizards._ They’d been living with this kind of risk calculation for years—living on a side of it that most people would consider mad, especially after what happened last spring. They could deal with this if they had to. But they had demanded a lot from Dumbledore back then—demands that hadn’t been fully honoured.

“What do you think, Dan?” Emma asked slowly. “What else would you want Dumbledore to do if we sent them back there?”

“Hmm…pass attendance lists from class to class like they do in muggle school to make sure no one’s skiving,” Dan said. “If they do that, they should have a pretty tight handle on where everyone is during class hours. I’m more worried about free periods and weekends, though.”

“There’s not much they can do then without confining all the students to certain areas,” Emma replied. “It would be nice if they had something they could do for those times.”

Harry snapped his fingers (on his non-dominant hand to avoid drawing his wand): “What about closing non-essential parts of the dungeons?” Everyone turned and looked at him. “Most of the dungeons aren’t used outside class hours except the entrances to the Hufflepuff and Slytherin dorms.”

“Of course,” Hermione said. “We don’t know for sure if the entrance to the Chamber is in the dungeons, but it would make sense, since it’s supposed to be under the school.”

“That’s good thinking,” their mother said. “Alright, I suppose that if we get Dumbledore to do those things—between that and his other efforts—and if you try to stay close to friends you trust—it wouldn’t be too bad for you to go back there.”

Dan didn’t look thrilled with the arrangement. “ _But_ we reserve the right to call you back by Floo,” he added. Emma nodded.

“We understand,” Hermione said with a look at Harry.

Her brother nodded. “Yeah. Thanks, Mum. Thanks, Dad.”

“Good. Now that’s settled, the next issue is that elf,” Cousin Andi said.

“Dobby,” Hermione clarified.

“Right. Well, I suppose the question is, what do you want with him?”

“We want him to tell us what he knows about the plot against Harry,” Dan replied.

“We want him to stop being abused,” Hermione said immediately after him. They each gave the other an awkward look that said _you need to sort out your priorities_.

Cousin Andi’s face was grim. “For the first one, I’m afraid there’s basically no chance of that,” she said. “And that ties into the second one. You see, an elf can only reveal its master’s secrets if it is freed—formally released from all obligations to its master. Now, you mentioned looking for a law against house elf abuse. I looked into it, and it turns out there _is_ a law on the books that bans abuse of house elves and other creatures, and what Lucius Malfoy has done to his—to Dobby would probably be enough to have Dobby taken away from him in a fair court.”

“But…?” Hermione asked, even though the answer was obvious.

“But in the Wizengamot, even if you managed to get a conviction, they’d only give him a modest fine. They’d never take Dobby away from him because of the precedent it would set. _Maybe_ if you could prove attempted murder, but even then…”

“So that’s out,” Harry grumbled. He hesitated to ask his next question, but after a prodding look from Hermione, he went ahead with it: “Sirius, I know it’s probably a lot of money, but is there any way we could just buy him and free him?”

Sirius shook his head. “Buy him? Yes. Free him? No. You see, Cub, house elf trading is more complicated than you think. The main thing is that if you sell an elf, you don’t want him to be able to tell his new master your secrets. So all sales are really more like permanent leases. Elves are bound to the family they’re born into, and they’re usually only sold once, when they’re old enough to start working. Anyway, the problem is that if you free an elf after buying him, ownership reverts to the previous owner, _and_ his obligation to keep your secrets ends. If you want your secrets kept, you have to sell him back.”

Hermione put the pieces together: “So if we bought Dobby, he still couldn’t reveal the Malfoys’ secrets, and if we freed him, the Malfoys would get him back, and he could tell _our_ secrets?”

“Exactly. So there’s no way to get the secret of the Chamber out of Dobby. Lucius Malfoy would have to willingly give it up. Sorry, no leads there.”

“It’s alright, Sirius. We tried,” Dan told him.

“I’ve just thought of something!” Harry exclaimed.

“What is it?” Sirius asked.

“Hagrid!”

“Huh?”

“When we talked to Professor McGonagall about Hagrid last year, she said he’d been expelled forty-nine years earlier.”

Hermione gasped: “That’s right. And that’s 1943.”

“The same year as the last set of attacks,” Sirius said in awe.

“But then…you don’t think _he_ could be involved in the attacks, do you?” Emma said worriedly.

“No way!” Harry said. “Hagrid would never hurt anyone, and Dumbledore would never keep him on if he suspected him—even he’s not that stupid. But I gotta wonder if maybe Hagrid knows something. Maybe he knows a clue that we missed.”

“It wouldn’t hurt to ask when we get back,” Hermione agreed. “But Sirius, about Dobby—what about just getting him away from them so he’s not abused anymore?”

“In principle, yes. It wouldn’t be cheap, but I could afford it—so could Harry if you get down to it. The price of an elf can run as high as a thousand galleons, and there’s a heavy transfer tax on top of that—it’s a class thing. They don’t want a poor family to be able to get an elf they don’t ‘deserve’ on the cheap. Anyway, the money’s not the problem as long as you’re not planning on opening a…an abused elf shelter or something. The hard part would be convincing Malfoy to sell.”

“Wouldn’t it make him suspicious just asking?” Dan said.

At this, Remus spoke up. “Not necessarily,” he said. “We’ve been putting our Marauder heads together, and we’ve come up with an idea. We’re just not sure if you’ll like it.”

“Well, what is it?”

“We actually have two problems. The first is that we could make Malfoy suspicious if we do this wrong. But before we even worry about that, there’s the problem that if we get him to sell Dobby, he’ll just buy another elf.”

The Grangers’ faces fell. “He would, wouldn’t he?” Hermione said. “I don’t see how we could get around that.”

“Actually, we were thinking we could turn it to our advantage,” Remus said.

“How?”

Sirius grinned mischievously. “We offer them Kreacher.”

“Sirius!” Hermione exclaimed. “You can’t be seri—argh! You know Malfoy will just abuse him instead.”

“Not if I demand he doesn’t as part of the deal.”

The Grangers gaped at him. “You can do that?” Harry said.

“With Lucius? Probably not. But with dear Cousin Cissy? Oh, yes, I can.”

Remus continued the thought: “We think we have an idea of how to make a deal that will make both Dobby and Kreacher happier. We just have to do it in a way that won’t raise their suspicions. And that’s the part you probably won’t like.”

“What is it?” Dan asked.

Sirius looked resigned. He said, “We have to invite the Malfoys to the New Year’s Party.”

* * *

“Good evening, Lord Malfoy, Lady Malfoy, Draco,” Sirius said stiffly as he greeted his guests on New Year’s Eve.

“Good evening, Lord Black,” Lucius Malfoy replied smoothly, looking as at ease as ever, even in his opponent’s house.

Harry’s and Draco’s introduction was even stiffer. “Good evening, Mr. Malfoy,” Harry greeted him.

“Good evening, Mr. Potter…Miss Granger.”

They quickly avoided each other as they went to mingle with the other guests. Shortly afterwards, Harry and Hermione passed Professor Dumbledore speaking with a much fatter old man. “Good evening, Professor,” Hermione said.

“Ah, good evening, Hermione, Harry,” Dumbledore replied happily. “Have you perhaps met Professor Horace Slughorn,” he introduced his companion.

“Why, yes, I believe we exchanged a few words last year,” Slughorn said with a gleam in his eye as he shook their hands. “Of course, your exploits have only grown since then, haven’t they, Mr. Potter. A Parselmouth, too, I hear. It sounds like you’d have made a fine Slytherin.”

Harry made a face like he’d bitten into a lemon.

“Professor Slughorn was an exemplary head of Slytherin House for a great many years,” Dumbledore explained.

“You were?” Hermione said interestedly. She wondered if those years stretched back to 1943.

“Aye, I was. I was. I saw a great many well-known witches and wizards as students in my time. But of course, one does as a teacher. I hear that it hasn’t grown any less exciting since I left, though.”

“Unfortunately,” Harry said.

“Yes, yes. Nasty business with the Chamber. Terrible. I remember the first time it happened—that poor girl. I do wish I could help, of course, but I’m afraid I never learnt any more about the Chamber of Secrets than my students did, as I was just telling Albus, here.”

“Of course,” Dumbledore replied. “Nonetheless, there are some other issues I should like to discuss with you, Horace, if you don’t mind.”

Harry thought Slughorn turned a shade paler at that, but he ignored it and turned to stop Dumbledore for another moment. “Oh, Professor,” he said, “we know you’re busy, especially with the Chamber thing, but we were wondering if there’s anything you can do about Professor Lockhart. I mean he’s a really poor teacher, his books are full of holes, and frankly, sir, he kind of gives me the creeps.”

“I am sorry, Harry, but I am afraid I have no one else to fill the position,” Dumbledore said. “Good Defence teachers—or _any_ Defence teachers—have become very hard to find.”

“We know,” Hermione said. “Actually, we’ve been thinking about that, Professor. Do you think it would help if you asked the Ministry to send an Auror to teach the class each year?”

“Hmm…” Dumbledore stroked his beard. “It’s an intriguing thought. I would very much prefer not to involve the Ministry in the running of the school—even through the Auror Office. However, in the absence of other options, it may be the best we have. I shall consider it for next year when I have the time.”

“Thank you, sir.”

In another part of the house, Sirius reluctantly extricated himself from his conversation to pull Lucius and Narcissa into a more private room: “It’s really good to see you, Vicky,” he said. “I’ll be right back; I just need to speak with my cousin for a few minutes.”

He led the Malfoys into one of the many bedrooms, for lack of anything better, and they both fixed him with a piercing stare. “It’s very gracious of you to invite us to your home, Cousin,” Narcissa said. “Now why are we really here?”

“Well, for one, I was hoping you might have a chance to admire the housework,” Sirius replied. “Kreacher’s been managing it. You remember Kreacher, don’t you, Cousin? Kreacher!”

The elf popped into the room and grumbled, “Yes, Master.” Then, he saw Narcissa and immediately livened up. “Oh, Mistress Cissy,” he said, bowing deeply, “Kreacher is very happy to see _you_ , Mistress.”

“It’s good to see you, too, Kreacher,” she replied before turning back to Sirius. “So, the elf?” she questioned.

“Yes, you see, Kreacher is still loyal to…to the old family ideals. He never liked me. I never liked him. He’s got better over the past year, but I doubt he’ll ever do more than just tolerate me, and I doubt I’ll ever do more than just tolerate him. I was thinking I might just give him clothes and have done with it, but the fact is, I do need an elf around here to take care of the house.” He was embarrassed to think how true that was. Even as a Hitwizard, he wasn’t the wizard he used to be, and he couldn’t keep up with taking care of a big manor house like this one, even with Remus’s help. Merlin’s beard, he was starting to feel _old_. “Then I thought, _you_ must have an elf, Narcissa. And you and Kreacher always seemed to like each other when we were younger. So I thought, if I’m going to shell out the transfer tax for a trade, I might as well ask you first and see if I could put the two of you back together.”

Kreacher gasped in shock and staggered. “Kreacher go to live with Mistress Cissy,” the old elf croaked hopefully.

“That’s enough, Kreacher,” Sirius said. “Of course, I would need to see Lord Malfoy’s elf, first.”

“And what makes you think our elf would be any…more tolerable than yours?” Lucius asked.

“I don’t. But it’s worth a look; I wanted to give Narcissa first refusal, so I’d like to see him or her.”

“You are serious?” Lucius said suspiciously.

“I’m always—”

“Siri!” Narcissa cut him off.

“Sorry, but yes. I would like to see if we can come to an agreement.”

Lucius turned to his wife and raised an eyebrow.

“I do think I would like having Kreacher around better than Dobby,” she told him hesitantly. “It might be worth seeing what he has to offer.”

Lucius nodded slowly. “Very well,” he said. “Dobby!”

Another elf popped into the room, this one younger, but more timid, wringing his hands and almost cowering in fear. “Yes, Master?”

“Lord Black would like to inspect you, Dobby.”

The green-eyed elf turned around to face Sirius as Kreacher eyed him suspiciously. “Dobby is honoured to meet the Lord Black,” he said with a bow.

“Mm-hmm. Good evening, Dobby.” Sirius walked around him, making a show of looking him over. “Hmm…decent physique. Looks healthy enough.” He zeroed in on the scars that he already knew were there from the Grangers’ photographs. “Looks like you’ve really put him through the wringer, though.”

“It’s not our fault if his behaviour and skills are lacking,” Lucius drawled. “I am not certain he can deliver the sort of quality you are accustomed to.”

“Seems to work for _you_ pretty well,” Sirius shot back. “Dobby, Lord Malfoy and I are considering a trade. How would you feel about working for me?”

Dobby gasped, but he didn’t dare say anything about his current masters. Instead, he just lowered his eyes and said, “Dobby would be most honoured to work for the Lord Black, sir.”

“Well, he doesn’t seem too bad,” Sirius concluded. “I believe someone like yourself could find some leeway in when the trade must be filed with the Ministry, Lucius? Perhaps we could arrange a short trial period to ensure the trade is good.”

Lucius seemed a little calmer at that, but he still looked both unhappy and scheming.

“I believe I could find some provisions in the regulations to allow that,” he said, “but there is still the matter of price; Kreacher is twice Dobby’s age—hardly a fair trade.”

Sirius made a show of frowning at that. “Personally, I’ve always thought one elf’s as good as another,” he lied. “However, I suppose I could pay the difference in valuation—for Narcissa’s sake.”

“The difference in valuation?” Lucius said. “Hmm…five hundred galleons, then, I think.”

“Five hundred?” Sirius replied incredulously. He motioned to Dobby: “With the condition this one’s in? Keep him in better shape if you want that. And Kreacher may be old, but he’s still capable of a lot. I’ll be nice and give you three hundred.”

“Three hundred? Is that an offer or a joke. Now, I admit we’ve had to be harsh with Dobby over the years, so I’ll bring the price down to four-fifty because of that.”

“Are you kidding? _You_ _’re_ the one who said his skills were lacking. Doesn’t sound like he’s much good to you in the first place. How about three-fifty.”

“Four hundred, but only because you’re family.”

Sirius crossed his arms and glared at Lucius, but he said, “Fine, four hundred…but only because you’re family. However, as part of the deal, I expect Kreacher to come out a good sight better than this one did.” Dobby gaped as Sirius at an angle the Malfoys couldn’t see.

“We will discipline our elf as we see fit,” Lucius snarled.

But Sirius ignored him and turned to Narcissa: “Cissy, since you two actually seem to like each other, I don’t think that’s an unreasonable demand. Kreacher is bound to the House of Black, and as a matter of Black Family honour, I expect him to be treated fairly.”

Narcissa nodded cautiously. She knew she couldn’t very well back down from that: “I accept those terms, Siri.”

“But,” Lucius cut in, “since this was your idea, you can pay both of the transfer taxes.”

Sirius bristled. That wiped out the amount he’d negotiated down, and Lucius knew it. He could pay it, but it would be harder to make it believable. But Narcissa cut him off, saying, “Come, now, Lucius, he can pay half of ours, and we’ll still come out ahead. I think that’s a fair deal, don’t you, Siri?”

He grumbled just a bit, then offered his hand to Lucius. “It’s a deal.”

Lucius shook his hand and then conspicuously wiped it on his robes.

“Trial period starting now, and I’ll get you the paperwork from the Ministry shortly,” Sirius added. “Kreacher, you will work for the House of Malfoy pending a formal trade.”

“Yes, Master.”

“Agreed,” Lucius said. “Dobby, you will work for the House of Black pending a formal trade.”

“Yes, Master,” Dobby said, clearly trying to hide the tears of joy in his eyes.

“Kreacher, you may go to our manor.”

“Yes, Master Lucius,” Kreacher said far more pleasantly than he ever spoke to Sirius.

“A pleasure doing business with you, Lucius,” Sirius concluded. _This is for you, Cubs_ , he thought.

* * *

“An otter?! My inner animal is an otter?!”

Through all the trouble—the attacks, the mess with Dobby, Harry being a Parselmouth, and the various plans they had in the works, Hermione had been quietly continuing her animagus training, at Sirius’s direction. Now, just before returning to school, she was at the halfway point—the point where she figured out her form. And she was most disappointed.

“What’s wrong with otters?” Harry asked. “They’re intelligent, playful, great swimmers, they have the best fur in the world, _and_ they’re meat eaters.”

“And completely useless as spies,” Hermione complained. “ _You_ can lurk around the castle all you want, but an otter’s going to be a lot more conspicuous.”

“Sorry, Kitten…or maybe it’s Pup, now,” Sirius said with a snigger. “You have to deal with the form you wind up with.”

“Hmph. And Harry, you’re a cat. You’re not even supposed to like the water.”

“Hey, I…tolerate the water,” Harry told her. “And anyway, at least you’re a fellow carnivore. I’d hate to have to deal with us being on different levels of the food chain.”

Hermione shuddered: “Never mention that again, Harry.”

“Come on, sis, who knows? Maybe someday being an otter animagus will come in handy.”

“Yeah, _that_ _’ll_ be the day.”


	54. Lost and Found

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Harry Potter is the miracle of force and matter and JK Rowling making itself over into imagination and will.

By the time Harry and Hermione got back on the Hogwarts Express, Hermione had managed to track down a book—not a chapter or an academic paper, but a whole book—about otters. It still disturbed Harry a little how easily she could work the library.

“Is all that for your you-know-what training?” he asked when she started reading it on the train before their compartment filled up.

Yes, she replied primly. “Sirius says I need to learn about otter anatomy and behaviour so I can more clearly visualise the change. It’s really very interesting.”

“Wow. I’m glad I could just do it naturally.”

Hermione rolled her eyes at him. “Maybe you _should_ read up on cats. A fuller understanding couldn’t hurt.”

“Mione, I lived as one for two months, and—” He cut himself off as the compartment door opened. “Oh, hi, Neville.”

“Hi, Harry. Hi, Hermione.” Neville gave Hermione a strange look at her book, but he shook his head and dismissed it. She read strange things sometimes. “How was your holiday?”

“It was good,” Hermione said. “It was nice to get away for a while. I just hope this term is less exciting than the last one.”

“Don’t we all,” Harry said.

* * *

The term did, indeed, get off to a smooth start. Dumbledore announced the new class attendance policy and the dungeon closure at dinner the first night. No one made any suspicious overt reaction, but after a couple weeks, there were no new attacks, so people started to calm down. It was only the Slytherins who kept trying to stir up trouble.

“So, Mr. Potter, it looks like my father managed to rip off your godfather on an elf trade,” Draco Malfoy said one day when he cornered Harry in the entrance hall.

“I’d hardly call it a rip-off, Mr. Malfoy,” Harry said. “Sirius wanted an elf that got along with him better, and he got that. He’s well aware of how the prices work.”

“Must’ve wanted it pretty bad with what he paid.”

“We’re all fine with how the deal turned out for him,” Harry said. “I don’t see any reason for you to complain about it.”

“I just thought you’d like to know what a bad deal it was, Mr. Potter.”

“Well, obviously you can’t expect this lot to have good business sense, Draco,” Theo Nott said.

“I don’t think that’s fair, Mr. Nott,” Hermione said.

“Nobody asked you, Granger,” Nott snapped.

“Excuse me,” Harry jumped back in. “I’ll thank you not to talk to her like that. And I’ll have you know our business sense is just fine. Sirius just chose to make that deal for his own reasons. And Malfoy, if you and your family are happy with Kreacher, why are you trying to make an issue out of it?”

Malfoy didn’t have a response for that, but Hermione decided to press the issue further. “Incidentally, Mr. Malfoy,” she said sweetly, “I looked Dobby over after he moved into Sirius’s place. He looked pretty beat up, and he really seemed to appreciate the change of scenery.”

“What are you saying, Granger?” Malfoy said threateningly.

She didn’t back down: “I’m saying he doesn’t look like he was treated very well. Do you have anything to say about that?”

He hesitated, then said stiffly, “Only that we have a right to treat our elf any way we want.”

“Even beating him?” Hermione pressed.

“That’s none of your business!” Nott said before Malfoy waved him back.

“It’s common decency,” she snapped back.

“Hermione, is this really the best time?” Harry asked softly, trying to call her off, too, since he saw that a crowd had started to gather around them.

“Why not?” she replied. “It’s gotta be said sometime. It’s common decency, Nott. In the muggle world, we stopped beating our servants over a hundred years ago.”

“And why should we care about the muggle world, Granger?” Theo Nott sneered, ignoring Malfoy. “Just goes to show you how dumb muggles are.”

“Hey! Our parents happen to be two of those “dumb muggles.” You ought to show some more respect.”

“I’ll show respect when it’s deserved. _You_ _’re_ the one who’d better watch what you say, Granger. The Heir of Slytherin’s still around here, you know. It’d be a shame if he decided to come after you next.”

“What’s that supposed to mean, Nott?” Harry demanded, hissing involuntarily and moving in front of Hermione.

“Exactly what I said, Potter. If Granger wants to make an arse of herself, it’s not gonna win her any points with the Heir.”

“Is that a threat?” Harry said.

“It’s a fact, Potter. You remember what the message said: “Enemies of the Heir beware.” Everyone knows the mudbloods are enemies of the Heir.” There were gasps at his language as he zeroed in on Hermione again. “Especially nosey, obnoxious, know-it-all mudbloods like you.”

There was a loud snap and a crackling sound, and suddenly, Harry had his wand in Nott’s face. “Take that back!” he yelled.

Quicker than Harry expected, Nott drew his own wand. “Why should I, Potter? That’s exactly what Granger is.”

“I will _not_ have my sister spoken to in that manner!”

“Ha! ‘Sister.’ I don’t believe I hear a ‘Potter’ in her name,” Nott said with a grin.

“That doesn’t matter, you little troll! She’s still my sister by law.” He started to wave his wand.

Suddenly, Malfoy stepped in. He couldn’t let this continue, as much as he’d like to. Nott’s (successful!) baiting of Potter was entertaining, but his father had given him strict instructions to keep up pressure on the “Heir of Slytherin” line unless it became untenable. With the school being split on the issue, he didn’t need to give more fodder to the image of Potter as the defender of mudbloods. “You _do_ know the Honour Code, don’t you, Mr. Potter?” he said.

Harry froze. The Honour Code wasn’t legally binding, but reputation was everything in the Wizengamot, and it wouldn’t be good for him to break it. His mind raced as he tried to remember the various arcane customs. “What about it?” he said guardedly.

Hermione tugged on his sleeve and lowered his wand arm. “Family honour only applies to blood relatives and spouses, Harry,” she said softly. “It’s all about bloodlines.”

“What? But that’s not fair!” he whispered back.

“She’s right, Harry,” Neville said, coming up on his other side. “You need to back off.”

Harry bared his teeth and hissed menacingly, but he sheathed his wand. “This isn’t over, Nott,” he said.

“We’ll see about that, Potter. I don’t appreciate _you_ drawing your wand on me without cause—but I guess I can’t blame you for being rusty on the Honour Code, what with being raised by muggles and all. Although…I would have expected better from the Heir of Slytherin.” Many of the Slytherins sniggered at that while Harry glared at him and stomped away.

“This is ridiculous,” Harry growled once they were out of earshot. “I ought to be able to defend my own family.”

“I’m sorry, Harry, that’s just the way it is,” Neville replied nervously. “Are you okay? You were acting kind of…funny back there.”

“Yeah I’m fine. Just really annoyed. Say, Neville, shouldn’t there be some way to put Hermione under my family’s protection or something like that.”

Neville froze like a deer in headlamps for a moment, then smacked himself in the forehead. “Of _course_ , I should have thought of that. Harry, you’re the head of your house. You _are_ the law in your family. You can just declare it if you want.”

“I can?” Harry said in surprise.

“Sure you can. I mean, people will call you out if you overuse it or something, but no one will question it for an adopted sister.”

“Well, that’s great. I’ll just go back there and tell them—”

“Harry, wait.” Hermione grabbed him by the arm and stopped him. “It’s probably fine, but I think we should talk to Sirius first to make sure there are no unwanted political implications. Neville, what are the actual effects of this house protection thing?”

“Well, not much, really. It’s like the alliances and all that other stuff. It’s just a public notice that he’ll defend you under the Honour Code. I don’t think it’ll make much difference, but you probably should ask an adult first.”

“Fine, we’ll ask him tonight,” Harry said.

The next night at dinner, Harry made his announcement. Just before the dessert course, he stood up and looked over the Hall, staring particularly at the Slytherin Table. Everyone stopped talking and looked at him pretty quickly. He _was_ Harry Potter, after all. “Excuse me,” he said. “I just wanted to formally announce that my _sister_ , Hermione Granger, is under the protection of the Noble House of Potter. Anyone has a problem with her, they have a problem with me.” He sat back down without another word amid a flurry of whispers wondering how this would change the balance of power at Hogwarts.

* * *

Tom was stuck in a bind. The attacks so far had driven the remaining muggle-borns closer together and closer to Potter, rather than away. Malfoy Junior was still pushing the “Potter is the Heir of Slytherin” line, but Tom could see that tactic was a lost cause. Worse yet, it hadn’t driven Potter himself to do more investigating and so wasn’t getting him any closer to his clutches. Perhaps something that hit a little closer to home would work better.

However, that was also a problem. Ginny was getting harder to convince to go along with him. That surprised him. He was surprised to see an eleven-year-old with this much fight in her, especially after he had been influencing her for months. Going after a specific target in advance was going to be even harder now. He’d probably be better off looking for a target of opportunity. Well, nothing else for it…

 _Ginny, I think it is time,_ he told her.

 _Time for what?_ she replied nervously.

_To continue our work._

_Tom, please, no. I don_ _’t want to do this anymore._ She still couldn’t remember what had happed during those attacks, but she had an almost instinctive feeling that it was very bad—and that she was somehow involved—a deep-seated fear that she had forgotten the reason for.

_You will do as I say, Ginny._

_N-n-no_ _…_

_You will._

_I_ _…I said no, Tom. I won’t do it again._ Just thinking the words made her feel that much stronger. _I don_ _’t understand what’s happening, but I don’t want to do it again. I just want it to end._

_You have no choice, Ginny. You will obey me._

_No._

_You will obey me!_

_No!_ “Not again! That’s it! I’m done with you!” In one wild motion, before she could change her mind, Ginny leapt from her seat in the empty Common Room and hurled the diary into the fireplace.

A flurry of sparks kicked up around it, and she felt satisfied for one fleeting moment. But then she saw, to her horror, that the diary wouldn’t burn.

A cold, high laughter rang out in her mind—a laugh that tripped a memory in the back of her mind—one she remembered best from the chilling description in the opening of _Harry Potter on the Orient Express_. Her heart began racing in terror as Tom’s voice rose up—from the heart of the flames, from inside her head, she wasn’t sure—and said, _Foolish Ginny. Did you think I recorded my memories in something as fragile as paper and ink? You cannot escape me!_

 _N-n-no_ _…Tom, please, stop it,_ Ginny begged, sinking to the floor in tears.

_Pick up the fire tongs._

_Please go away._

_Take the diary._

_Just leave me alone._

But it was no use. Tom had broken through with shock and awe, and she could not resist. He began guiding her back to the entrance to the Chamber. It wasn’t until she reached the door of the out-of-service bathroom that she began to snap out of it.

 _No! I won_ _’t!_ “I won’t do it again!” she screamed, half-hoping and half-fearing someone would hear her. _I won_ _’t let you control me anymore!_ “You can’t make me.”

_I can, and I will._

_Stop!_

She entered the bathroom.

_Let me go!_

She stepped up to the sink, and it was then that she saw her reflection in the mirror. Her eyes were glowing a horrible red, but that was just the start. Her skin was ghostly pale. She was thinner than she had been back in September, even with the holidays, and the dark circles around her eyes looked almost painted on. The expression on her face looked frozen between cruel and fearful. She could see all too plainly what the diary was doing to her, now, and she had never been more terrified in her life.

 _Open the Chamber!_ Tom ordered.

 _NO!_ With everything in her, she took a step back, then another, then another, and she tore eyes away from the sight of that cursed sink. She ran to the stall at the end of the row. In a mad hysteria, she thought, _I_ _’ll just leave you here. No one ever uses this bathroom. No one will ever find you!_ She kicked open the stall door, hurled the diary into the toilet with all her might, and pulled the handle to flush it for good measure. Then, she turned and ran.

She heard a scream of rage and a loud gurgling sound behind her. She must have upset Moaning Myrtle. But she didn’t even slow down. She kept running, somehow not running into any patrols, until she was back safely in her dorm room, and finally, a wave of relief washed over her, and she started laughing with joy. She could already feel the diary’s influence slipping away.

She was free!

* * *

“Hello, Hagrid.”

“Hello, yeh three. What brings yeh out here on a cold day like this?”

Harry, Hermione, and Neville had braved the snow to come see Hagrid once they had settled in for the new term. It would be a bit of a delicate task getting the information they needed out of him. Hagrid could be a bit touchy about his personal life, but they needed to follow all of their leads. They’d try to ease him into it gently.

“We wanted to talk you, Hagrid,” Hermione said. “We don’t get to see you much in the castle this time of year, and it’s hard to get out of the castle ourselves much with…well, you know…”

“Oh, right. “M sorry teh see yeh lot mixed up in that…” Hagrid hesitated, as if he were considering adding something else, but he just said, “Well, come on in. I’ll make yeh a cuppa.”

They went inside and sat down. Harry and Hermione still fit together in one of the jumbo chairs. (Maybe they always would, considering they were built for Hagrid.) Neville cautiously scratched Fang under the chin as he sat in another chair. Even after a year and a half Harry watched the large dog warily, hoping he wasn’t being too conspicuous: he’d noticed Neville looking at him funny sometimes lately.

“So,” Hagrid said as he set the tea set and a plate of rock cakes down on the table. “New term goin’ well for yeh?”

“Yeah,” Harry replied. “Pretty smooth so far.”

“Let’s just hope it stays that way,” Hermione muttered.

They made idle small talk for a while, but the conversation could never stray far from the situation at hand. Eventually, Harry felt that that the moment was right to bring up what he wanted to ask.

“Hagrid,” he said softly, “we understand if you’re not comfortable talking about this, but we think it could really help us. Professor McGonagall mentioned a while back that you were expelled from school in 1943.” Hagrid immediately stiffened in his seat. “And Dumbledore said the last time these attacks happened with the Chamber of Secrets was also in 1943. And we were just wondering…if that was connected…if you know anything about it…?”

“Well…erm…Harry, there’s really no need teh go into that,” Hagrid replied uncomfortably. “Dumbledore already knows everythin’ I do.”

“Yes, we’re sure you’ve told him everything, Hagrid,” Hermione said gently. “But just the same, we’d like to hear it from you if you’re okay with that. Professor Dumbledore is a good man, but we’ve had difficulties with him in the past—and so have you, to be honest.” She remembered how Dumbledore had manipulated the man to leak information last year. “We have other contacts—people like our godfather and Neville’s Gran and Amelia Bones—who we’d like to be able to inform fully.”

“Hmm…when you put it that way…” Hagrid started, but he trailed off, again clamming up.

“I didn’t want to push you, Hagrid. I’m just worried about Hermione, here,” Harry said, wrapping an arm around his sister’s shoulders. “We agreed it was safe enough to come back here, but just the same, I want to make sure.”

“And what about _you_ , Harry?” Hermione countered. “I’m your big sister. I’m supposed to be the one keeping _you_ safe.”

Harry could tell Hagrid’s resolve was weakening. He knew the large man was a sucker for ties of family and friendship—not that that was a bad thing.

“Okay, okay,” Hagrid muttered. He leaned in closer to the table, and the three children automatically did the same. “Alright,” the huge man said quietly, “I’d appreciate it if yeh kept this under yer hats. Just yer families, that’s it. Could cause a lot o’ trouble for me if it got out…Might be a lot o’ trouble, anyway, but I’d still like teh keep it quiet.”

“We understand, Hagrid,” Harry said, speaking for the three of them. “We’ll keep it quiet.”

“Good. Yer a good lad, Harry. Alright, so my third year here, I got in some trouble. I’d got in trouble before, but it weren’t nothin’ big. Third year, though, it happened I got hold of somethin’ bigger…I got hold of an acromantula egg.”

Hermione gasped. “Hagrid!” she scolded. “A giant, man-eating, intelligent spider in the school, really—ouch.” Harry elbowed her to cut her off.

“Hey, now, they’re seriously misunderstood creatures, acromantulas,” Hagrid said. “And Aragog was so cute when he hatched. No bigger than a Pekingese, he was.”

 _Aragog?_ the children all thought. Of _course_ Hagrid would name him. And a Pekingese? Considering this was a _spider_ , that was pretty big. “So what happened?” Harry asked.

“Well, I was takin’ care o’ Aragog in the dungeons. In secret, yeh know? Most people wouldn’t appreciate him too much. Things woulda been fine that year, ‘cept students started gettin’ attacked and petrified.”

“Muggle-born students,” Hermione said.

“That’s right, but everybody was scared. Nobody could figure out who or what was doin’ it, ‘cept they was pretty sure it was the Chamber of Secrets bein’ opened, just like now. They tried more security, but it just kept happening. Then, towards the end o’ the year, a girl was killed instead of just petrified. Poor girl—she was a Ravenclaw in my year. Myrtle, uh…Myrtle Warren, I think it was. Nice girl. Not much of a looker, though and got teased a lot for it. Course, so was I, but they was scared to say it teh my face. And the thing is, they still didn’t know what did it. Funny thing—I think Aragog _did_ know, but he wouldn’t tell me. Must’ve been a spider thing or somethin.”

“Anyway, the Board was gonna close the school after that unless the professors could catch who did it. But there was this Slytherin prefect named Tom Riddle, and he got it into his head that Aragog was the monster that killed her. I _told_ him Aragog’d never hurt anyone, and besides, acromantulas don’t petrify people. They suck out the juices, just like normal spiders.” The three children all turned green. “But he…he wouldn’t listen, and he attacked me—me and Aragog. Aragog barely got out of the castle alive. He had teh hid in the Forbidden Forest after that.”

A look of horror crossed Hermione’s face as Hagrid choked up over a class five-X creature. “Hagrid…is Aragog still out there?” she asked.

“Sure he is. He’s made a pretty good life for himself out there. Even found a mate, somehow—probably from the same bloke what sold me his egg, I figure. But don’t worry. They won’ come out. I tell ‘em if they wanna live in the forest, they gotta stick teh their own territory.”

Hermione and Harry exchanged a nervous look. That didn’t sound very encouraging.

“So after Riddle chased Aragog away, he turned me in to Headmaster Dippet and told him I’d been the one teh open the Chamber. Professor Dumbledore was on my side, said he was wrong, but Dippet only listened teh Riddle, so they…they snapped my wand and expelled me…But I wasn’t the one; they didn’t even have enough evidence teh go teh trial, so there weren’t nothin’ else they could do. But still, I couldn’t do magic anymore—not officially, anyway—and you can’t get far in this world like that, so I was in a real bind.

“Luckily, Dumbledore convinced Dippet to let me be the Apprentice Groundskeeper. See, he told ‘im I never meant teh hurt anyone, and I’d just made a mistake, and I’d learnt my lesson—which was all true, come teh think of it. I sure never tried teh raise an acromantula in the castle again.”

 _No, you just tried to hatch a dragon egg in your hut,_ the children thought.

“Anyway there weren’t any more attacks, so everybody was pretty sure Riddle had got rid of the monster—and I just let ‘em think that, since Aragog never did hurt no one—so they thought there was no more danger.”

“Except they never did catch the real monster,” Harry observed. “It was still in the Chamber all these years, and now someone’s opened it again.”

Hagrid’s face darkened: “I know. Dumbledore warned ‘em, but no one would listen.”

“But why would the attacks stop after you were expelled?” asked Hermione. “Surely, the Heir was after more than just framing you. Why would he even bother—unless the Heir was Riddle himself and wanted to deflect attention?”

“Wait a minute, we already know who the Heir was back then,” Harry cut in.

“We do?” Hermione said in surprise.

“We do? Neville repeated.

“Yes, Hagrid, Dumbledore told us that he _thought_ the only living Heir of Slytherin was Voldemort.”

Hagrid gasped: “Don’ say that name!” Harry and Hermione both sighed heavily. “Er, sorry, but I still don’ like sayin’ it. Look, I guess it don’ matter since yeh figured it out, but Dumbledore hasn’t made this public. Don’ know why, but he must have a good reason. So just remember that. Yer right, Harry. Dumbledore told us back in…back in the war that…that You-Know-Who _is_ Tom Riddle.”

Harry just nodded his head, but Neville gasped. “Y-you knew Y-you-Know-Who in school?” he stammered in mingled awe and horror.

“Yeah. Didn’t know ‘im that well, mind yeh. He was a brilliant student, though. All the teachers loved ‘im ‘cept Dumbledore—even made Head Boy. I thought he was kinda creepy, myself, even before he turned me in. Led a gang of Slytherins around the school kinda like the Malfoy boy, but worse.”

Now, Harry shuddered. Just the thought of Voldemort as a student seemed creepy. He suddenly realised that a lot of people near Hagrid’s age must have known him with there only being only one school in the country. Did Professor McGonagall know him? Or Professor Sprout? Or Flitwick? Or Kettleburn?

But meanwhile, Hermione was taking the practical side. “Hagrid,” she said, “you said you were worried about trouble. Are you having problems now?”

Hagrid shivered a little. “Not yet,” he said sombrely, “but if these attacks keep goin’ on, people’ll start teh think I’m doin’ it again. I don’ wanna think ‘bout what’ll happen if that happens.”

“But that’s ridiculous!” she protested. “You’ve been here for fifty years, and everybody _but_ the Slytherins likes you. Why would you attack again now?”

“I know it’s rubbish, Hermione, but when people get scared, they’ll do some nasty things, and if Dumbledore can’t figure out who the real Heir is, I’ll be the only one they can point teh.”

“We’ll just have to hope there are no more attacks,” Harry concluded. “I wish we could do more, but…Hagrid, Tom Riddle never hinted about where the Chamber was? How he got in? Who else could get in?”

“Or what was in there?” Neville added.

“No, never heard nothin’ ‘bout any o’ that,” Hagrid said. “Riddle was clever. Me and Dumbledore was the only ones even suspected him. So best do the smart thing, all three o’ yeh, and keep yerselves safe.”

All three children agreed.

* * *

A girl’s crying echoed loudly through the second floor. The sound came from a bathroom that had been marked OUT OF ORDER for longer than anyone could remember, and the entire corridor around it was flooded, as it was from time to time, but that didn’t stop one small, blond girl from going in. The inside looked even worse, with water splashed all the way up the walls.

“Myrtle?” Luna said worriedly. “Myrtle, what’s wrong?”

A ghostly, tear-streaked face popped out of the toilet at the end of the row. “Who’s that?” the sobbing voice said. “Have you come to throw something else at me?”

“No, Myrtle, it’s me, Luna. I’m not going to throw anything at you. What happened?”

“Oh, Luna, it’s you,” Myrtle sniffed, calming down a bit. “Oh, it was awful. I was just sitting in the U-bend, minding my own business and thinking about death…when someone threw a book through the top of my head.”

 _A ghost thinking about death?_ Luna thought. _And they call_ me _odd. Oh well, it takes all kinds._ “Well, that wasn’t very nice of them,” she told the ghost. “Did you see who it was?”

“No. I threw their book back at them, but they ran away…it’s over there.”

“Hmm…” Luna saw a small, black book on the floor and approached it cautiously. “It looks like a diary,” she said. She picked it up and inspected it. “1943…T. M. Riddle. Do you know a T. M. Riddle, Myrtle?”

“T. M. Riddle? Why, yes. He was a Slytherin prefect the year I died. If he’s haunting the school now, then I don’t like him. I’ll have to see if Sir Nicholas will chase him out.”

“I don’t think there are any new ghosts in the school,” Luna said. “At least, I think Helena would have mentioned it to me. Perhaps the nargles took this from someone and left it here. That’s been known to happen to me before. I’ll have to see if anyone’s lost it.”


	55. The Sacking of Dumbledore

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The universe now appeared to JK Rowling as a void wherein floated rare flakes of Harry Potter, each flake a universe.

Tom knew he had botched this one. To his amazement, Ginny had fought him off hard enough to throw the diary away. It was sheer dumb luck that another girl happened upon it and picked it up, but that still left him at a disadvantage. He could use Legilimency a little bit from the pages, but it would take a lot of work to be able to possess another girl, or even read her as well as he could Ginny now that he was so closely connected with her. No, it was too late in the proverbial game to try to start working on another girl, and worse, this Luna person didn’t seem inclined to write the diary. At least, that was the sense he thought he was getting. When he tried his Legilimency on her, it gave him a headache. He couldn’t figure what she was doing at Hogwarts when she was obviously stark raving mad. Better to cut his losses and get picked up by someone else, then try to get back to Ginny. He turned his Legilimency to the other girls around her…

“Hey, look at this, Dierdre,” whispered Melanie Maxwell as she inspected her roommate’s bedside table. “Loony’s got a _diary_.”

“Really?” Dierdre replied. “Probably just writes about her silly creatures.”

“One way to find out…Aww, it’s blank.”

“Figures. Lemme check…” Dierdre waved her wave over the book, but no invisible writing appeared.

“Only Loony would keep a blank diary lying around,” Melanie concluded. “You know, it’s a pretty nice one, though. I think I’ll keep it for myself.”

Dierdre’s eyes widened in fear. “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Melanie. Penelope would be mad if we took Loony’s things again. And if Harry Potter found out…”

“But look: it says T. M. Riddle. It’s not even hers. She probably just found it. I’d be doing a favour taking it off her hands.”

* * *

Hermione caught the Quaffle and swerved between the opposing players. With a hairpin turn, she dodged one of the Beaters and then ascended and doubled back at a higher altitude. By then, she was too far ahead for anyone to catch her, and she had a clear run at the scoring area.

Ron braced himself as Hermione flew at him at top speed, vowing that he wouldn’t miss this shot. Unfortunately, his broomstick was his biggest weakness. The old _Nimbus One Thousand_ school broom he was using was a step up from his own _Shooting Star_ , but it was in bad shape and wasn’t really up to competitive play. Meanwhile, Hermione was all but untouchable on her _Cleansweep Seven_ , which had made her the star Chaser of the Hogwarts Flying Club, few of whom had brooms of their own that could match it.

She flew at him, her hair whipping behind her in a loose ponytail and started to move to the left. Hermione wasn’t great at faking, so Ron was pretty sure this was a real move. He started to slide left as she threw the Quaffle. He lunged, but at that moment, his broom bucked, and the ball slipped past his hands and through the hoop.

“Dang it!”

Hermione frowned as she passed him. She knew Ron was better than that. She could tell he had a lot of potential, but it was hard for him to keep it up, and when he was off his game, he was _really_ off his game—She snapped out of her thoughts when she heard a scream and saw him spiralling down to the ground. His broom must have malfunctioned much worse than usual. She dove and managed to catch him by the arm, slowing his descent just enough that he landed on the grass in a heap instead of ploughing into it and breaking something he didn’t want broken.

Madam Hooch blew her whistling, signalling all of the fliers to descend and raced over from where she was supervising the club. “Mr. Weasley, Miss Granger, are you alright?” she said.

“M’fine,” Ron grunted as he pushed himself up. “The ruddy broom wouldn’t stay up anymore!”

Madam Hooch inspected the broomstick: “Tsk. Too many broken twigs I’d wager. I keep telling the Board every year we need new broomsticks, but do they listen? If this had happened in the first year classes, it could have a disaster…I think we’d better call this off for the day. I want to inspect the rest of the brooms before anyone else gets on them.”

She led them back inside, grumbling to herself about insensitivity to student safety, and Hermione’s estimation of the Board of Governors dropped still further. Not only were they playing politics with the muggle-born students’ lives, but they couldn’t even be bothered to update failing and unsafe equipment. If Hogwarts was supposed to be the best magical school in the world, she didn’t want to think what the rest of them were like.

* * *

“Good morning, class,” Professor Flitwick told his first years. “Today we will be continuing our study of the Dancing Spell—particularly focusing on charming an object to dance in a particular pattern. Now all of you form up into pairs…Yes, yes, very good…oh, Miss Weasley would you work with Miss Maxwell, please?”

Ginny sighed and moved to sit by Melanie. She didn’t much like Melanie or Dierdre. She preferred to work with Morgana Dempster if she had to work with one of the Ravenclaw girls, but Morgana was working with Luna, and Dierdre was out sick today, so it seemed Ginny was stuck with Melanie.

“Hi, Ginny,” Melanie said as she sat beside her. She sounded friendly enough, but she was clearly disappointed that her roommate wasn’t there with her.

“Hi, Melanie,” Ginny replied, noticing that the other girl was still fidgeting with her bag looking for her textbook.

“Just a moment,” she said. “I know it’s in here somewhere.” She looked a little bit dazed as she finally emptied all of the books from her bag. She almost looked like she had been Confunded or something. “Ah here it is,” she said happily.

But Ginny didn’t notice. She was frozen in horror the moment she saw the book on the top of the stack.

It was the diary!

How had it got out of the bathroom? She thought frantically. How had one of her classmates got hold of it so fast? And how much did she know? Ginny couldn’t bear to think what would happen if someone found out about her involvement—she still couldn’t remember, but she could guess—in the attacks. She had to get it away from Melanie fast while there was still a chance she hadn’t written in it and found out.

“Uh, _hello?_ Ginny, are you alright?”

Ginny snapped out it and saw Melanie waving her hand in front of her face. “Uh, fine Melanie,” she lied. Well, might as well try the direct approach. “Um, w-w-where did you get that?” she asked nervously, pointing at the diary.

“What? Oh, this?” Melanie said dismissively. “I found it lying around. Why?”

“Er, it’s, uh, mine,” she stammered.

Melanie opened the cover sceptically. “T. M. Riddle?” she asked.

“Yeah, I, uh, got it from my cousin. You know how many cousins I have. C-could I have it back, please?”

“What, seriously.”

“Y-yeah, it’s mine. Give it back!” she snapped, swiping the book from Melanie’s hand.

“Okay, okay. Don’t get your knickers in a twist.”

Ginny stared down at the small, black book in her hands.

_Hello again, Ginny._

Ginny shivered and stuffed it in her bag, promising herself that she’d find a better way to get rid of it later.

And she _did_ try. She wandered around the castle after classes that evening, looking for a place to hide the cursed diary, berating herself all the while. Why had she even talked to Tom in the first place? What had her dad always told her? _Never trust anything that can think for itself if you can_ _’t see where it keeps its brain._ But she had been scared and lonely, and she just so wanted to believe that her mum or dad had been the one who put it in her bag. She should have dumped Tom the minute things started to go wrong, but she’d been a silly little girl and gone and _talked_ to him.

Well, she was going to get rid of him now, once and for all—just as soon as she found someplace to hide the diary—someplace where nobody ever went. She considered every empty classroom she passed, but they weren’t safe enough. She needed to be sure.

Unfortunately, she was so worked up that she didn’t notice the other influence guiding where she went looking. Tom let Ginny wander on her own for the most part, but with subtle nudges, he guided her back towards the second floor girls’ bathroom. He needed to put his Slytherin cunning to good use this time: gentle, subconscious promptings to go where he wanted, leaving the brute force till the end. As she walked, he felt Ginny pass Granger and another mudblood in the hall and took note of their position. Ginny barely even noticed, but this was his chance, and he knew it could be his last. If this didn’t work, he’d probably have to go straight to Plan B and kill her to give himself a body before he was truly ready. It was time to move. He pushed her up to the bathroom door.

“No!” she cried.

Tom didn’t even bother to argue. He just pushed on her mind hard and fast. He forced her into the bathroom and told her to speak the password.

“No! No! No! Not again! Not now!”

_SAY IT!_

“ _Hesha-hassah_!”

Ginny continued crying and pleading and generally being very annoying, but he’d broken her will for the moment, and he was pretty sure he could hold on long enough to finish his task. His pet rose up out of the Chamber, and he began directing it through the castle with whispered commands in Parseltongue. Together, they moved back to the place he had noted, but his prey was gone. However, his pet could smell where she went, and he followed and soon caught sight of his quarry.

 _Tom, please, no! Not her! Anyone but her!_ Ginny cried.

_No one else. It must be her._

_No! I won_ _’t do it! Not to her!_ Ginny tried to cry out and warn the older girl—the one muggle-born she least wanted to go after, but her lips were sealed to anything but Parseltongue. She tried to stop herself—even tried to trip herself and fall down the stairs, but she couldn’t. The best she could hope for was to slow Tom down. Yet even that wasn’t fruitless…

* * *

“Hi, I’d, uh, like to take another look at those protective amulets, Mr. McLaggen,” a nervous, third-year, muggle-born Hufflepuff girl said.

“Of course, Miss…”

“Stewart,” she replied. “Lydia Stewart.”

“Alright, Lydia, I think I can find something for you…” In point of fact, Finn McLaggen had collected quite a selection of “protective amulets” and other questionable wares for resale from his source. It was a good way to get plenty of spending money for Hogsmeade. As for the fact that many of his wares were—what was the professional way to put it? “Mislabelled”—well, so long as nobody else had any better protection—and they didn’t—it wasn’t hurting anybody for him to sell these. He rummaged through his selection, determined to pick one especially suited to the little third year girl. After all, there was no reason not to show his customers the fullest measure of considerateness. It kept them coming back for more.

“Here,” he said, pulling an amulet out of his bag. “This one matches your eyes, and the stones are highly prized for warding off dark creatures of all types. And for you, my dear, I think I could be convinced to part with it for…ten sickles.”

Sophie blanched. Ten sickles was a lot of spending money—about thirty pounds of her more familiar muggle money if she was calculating right. But still, it was for her protection, and she couldn’t afford to skimp on that. “Well, um, alright,” she said uncomfortably. She counted out ten silver coins from her pocket and handed them over.

McLaggen smiled and clasped the amulet around her neck. “It’s a pleasure doing business with you, Lydia, and may I say it also looks very nice on you.”

“Th-th-thanks,” she said, blushing.

“McLaggen!” Both of them spun around to see an irate Gryffindor prefect striding towards them, being led by a pair of second-year girls. “What did I tell you about selling fake protective charms?” Percy Weasley demanded.

McLaggen stood his ground. “I’m running a legitimate business, Weasley. I just sold Miss Stewart this very nice decorative necklace.”

“Decorative? Is that what he told you, Lydia?” said Sophie Roper. “Everybody knows all the protective charms he’s been selling are fake.”

“What?” Lydia said in horror.

“We don’t appreciate you going around scamming our fellow muggle-borns, Mr. McLaggen,” added Hermione Granger. “I suggest you give Lydia a refund before Percy has to write you up for false advertising.”

“Ah ah ah,” McLaggen said smugly, “I believe Miss Stewart can testify that I never actually said the necklace _did_ protect anything.”

“What!” Lydia said even louder.

“And it _does_ look nice on her. I wouldn’t lie about that.”

Percy fumed, but he wasn’t about to give up. “Well I’ll just search that bag anyway, if you don’t mind.” He snatched the bag of merchandise out of Finn McLaggen’s hands. He started to protest, but it was too late. “Aha!” Percy exclaimed. “Just as I suspected. You’ve got quite a few banned items in here. I’ll have to report this to Professor McGongall. We can’t go around not knowing what’s coming into the school, especially these days. And we’ll _discuss_ your sale to Miss Stewart as well.”

McLaggen grumbled at Percy and stomped away, while Percy turned to the three girls before following him. “I’m sorry about that, ladies,” he said. “Honestly, he’s even worse than my brothers. I don’t understand where he even _gets_ all of this stuff.” He turned and walked away to escort McLaggen to McGonagall.

“Thanks for the help, Hermione,” Sophie said. “I really can’t stand that boy.”

“No problem. I don’t like him much either,” Hermione replied. “Honestly, trying to take advantage of a situation like this. Anyway, I’d better go track down Harry before he gets in trouble.”

“Yeah. Let’s go, Lydia. Ernie and Hannah will be worried about me.”

They went their separate ways, while Lydia grumbled, “I can’t believe I just paid ten sickles for this piece of junk.”

Sophie looked at here sympathetically. “Well, it _is_ a pretty necklace,” she said.

“Really?”

“Yes, definitely. Here, take a look.” She pulled out a compact mirror and held it up for Lydia to see…

Hermione barely got away around the corner when she heard a strange hissing sound, almost like running water, and then a scream behind her. Fearing the worst, she turned around, drew her wand and ran towards the source of the sound (dumb Gryffindor move, she knew), and she arrived where she had just left the pair to find Ernie and Hannah standing over Sophie and Lydia in horror. Both girls were lying on the floor, petrified. Sophie had a mirror in her hand, and Lydia’s hand was still raised to her neck, frozen as she was admiring her pretty, but utterly useless necklace.

When Hermione saw the sight, it was finally too much for her. Showers of sparks exploded out of all of the nearby torches as she lost control of her magic. The Heir had missed her by less than a minute, and there was a good chance she was still nearby. With a panicked scream, Hermione ran all the way back to Gryffindor tower with a flurry of sparks trailing after her, leaving a stunned Ernie and Hannah behind.

* * *

_No! Not again! How could I let this happen again? I_ _’ve gotta get rid of this thing! I gotta!_

_It_ _’s no use resisting Ginny. You’re mine, now._ Tom was most displeased that he had missed Granger, even if he did nail those two other mudblood girls. It was no good. He’d just have to take Ginny and have done with it. The trouble was that being trapped in a book without the full power of one’s magic made it more difficult to control someone than otherwise. It was the problem that had plagued him from the start of this plan.

_No! I told you I_ _’m done! I’m not gonna let you hurt anyone else!_

At the moment, Ginny was running up the stairs, away from where Tom wanted her to go. She ran up and up and back and forth so fast that she felt like she might collapse, but she kept going, frantically searching for a place to hide the diary. This time, made sure never to go down—never to go back near the second floor.

 _You are the one who hurt them, Ginny. I just told you what to do,_ Tom whispered to her.

_No!_

_You cannot escape me._

_You will never hurt anyone again!_ When she got to the seventh floor, there was one sight that gave her pause: the entrance to the Astronomy Tower.

_You wouldn_ _’t dare!_

After all the awful things she had done, for a few brief, terrible moments, the open air of the Astronomy Tower with its two hundred foot drop felt incredibly inviting…But no, she couldn’t. She’d never be able to do _that_. She had to find another way. There _had_ to be another way.

She kept running, back and forth around the seventh floor—back and forth, not daring to go either up or down the stairs. _I need a place to hide the diary_ , she thought. _A good place to hide things. A place where it could get lost forever._

Suddenly, a large, ornate door across from an odd tapestry caught her eye. She was sure that it hadn’t been there before. Curious, she went up to it and opened it, and inside, she found the answer to her prayers.

It was a high, vaulted room the size of a cathedral—at least as big as the Great Hall—and it was absolutely filled with lost and hidden things: books and potions and artifacts and furniture, some of which looked centuries old. It was the perfect place to hide something she didn’t ever want to be found. Sure, obviously, people came in here to hide things all the time, but just as obviously, they usually never found them again. It would be like looking for a needle in a haystack. She had no idea where this room had come from, but she wasn’t about to look a gift hippogriff in the beak.

Tom recognised the Room, too. He was pretty sure he was one of very few people to ever discover how it really worked. And he knew how hard the diary would be to find in this mess. He fought with all his might to force Ginny to back away, but it was no use. Her manic elation at finding the place was too strong for him.

_No more, Tom!_

She wound up her arm and hurled the diary like a Fanged Frisbee as far as she could into the mess. It landed with a faint, but satisfying flopping sound about halfway through the room.

 _There,_ she thought. _Now even I won_ _’t be able to find it again._ She turned around and ran from the room. The door vanished behind her. So much the better. Now, she just needed to get back to Gryffindor Tower before anyone suspected, and she could lie down and cry for a while.

* * *

“Shouldn’t we wait for Dumbledore for this meeting, Lucius?” asked Amos Diggory at the emergency Board meeting the next morning.

“It would seem that he has his hands full at the moment,” Lucius Malfoy told the assembled Board members. “And besides, Dumbledore is one of the reasons I’ve called you here.”

“I thought the new attack was why you called us here. Two more students petrified—that makes three from my son’s house, now. And no way to get Mandrake Draught for them this time. It’s out of season unless they’re growing the stuff in Antarctica now. This has got to stop.”

“I quite agree, Amos. But it would appear that Albus Dumbledore is not sufficiently competent to stop it.”

Several Board members gasped. “Malfoy, you can’t be thinking of removing Albus from his position as Headmaster,” said Elphias Doge in horror.

Why was this so hard? Lucius thought. _Why_ didn’t his Master just kill them? That would get rid of the old meddler in five minutes flat. But Lucius Malfoy was not one to give up. He was finally ready to enact his backup plan. “I am suggesting, Elphias,” he said, “that the situation calls for more drastic action than Dumbledore is willing to take. The security measures he has implemented so far proved most inadequate to stop our children from being attacked—”

“And you think anyone else would be better? This is Albus Dumbledore, we’re talking about, here: the defeater of bloody Grindelwald and the only one You-Know-Who ever feared. Who could possibly be better for this job than him?”

And now Lucius made his move. Spreading his hands in a friendly manner, he said, “At risk of sounded pretentious, perhaps the best people for this job are here in this room.”

“What?” they all said in shock and began talking over each other.

“That would be highly irregular.”

“What about McGonagall?”

“And I suppose you want to place yourself in his seat?”

Lucius raised his hands for quiet: “Ladies, gentlemen, surely we can be civilised about this. Of course, Josefina, Professor McGonagall would continue in her position as Deputy Headmistress and handle the day-to-day operations of the school. However, I know that I, for one, as a parent of a child at Hogwarts, would feel better about the situation if we were in control of the response directly. Surely you feel the same way, Josefina? Amos? And then perhaps twelve could succeed where one has failed.”

“Dumbledore is no ordinary “one,” Lucius,” Doge replied icily.

“Dumbledore is also one hundred and eleven years old and has no family of his own aside from an estranged brother—not to mention he has political obligations drawing on his time. None of those are encouraging traits for a protector of children. I have been saying for years that it is past time for him to retire, but he has hung on in response to some perceived threat of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named returning. These latest incidents show clearly that it is time for him to step aside and allow the younger generation to take over.”

“That is perhaps not unreasonable, Malfoy,” said Thaddeus Blishwick.

“Aye, I can see the merit in it,” Madam Zabini agreed.

The more neutral members also started considering it, and it was soon clear that Lucius had swung a majority of the Board to his side and backed his opponents into a corner. However, Diggory was not impressed. “Enough of this!” he snapped. “I want to know what Dumbledore is doing about the attack now.”

“I have it,” said Doge. “This is a transcript of the announcement he made to the students at breakfast: “Last night, Sophie Roper and Lydia Stewart of Hufflepuff House were attacked by the individual styling himself or herself the Heir of Slytherin. They are petrified in the same manner as the other victims. They will be fine once we are able to revive them with the Mandrake Draught this spring. However, in light of this, the following safety measures have now been implemented. Visitors to the Hospital Wing shall be limited to patients and family members only. Quidditch matches and training are postponed until further notice. All evening activities are cancelled until further notice. Curfew will be in force immediately after dinner each night. All weekend activities will be supervised by a teacher; weekend activities will be limited as needed to accommodate this. Finally, all non-essential areas of the castle will be closed until further notice.

“‘I will not lie to you. Hogwarts School cannot withstand many more attacks like this. If _anyone_ believes they have any information about them, however trivial, I urge you to come forward to any of the teachers, and we will hear it, no questions asked.’”

“Quidditch cancelled—shame,” Diggory muttered. “Even so, it sounds like Dumbledore is on top of things. I don’t see how we could do much better.”

“Of course we could. Isn’t it obvious?” said Llywelyn. “Close the school at once and have the Aurors scour the place from top to bottom, like I said last time.”

 _Typical Llywelyn_ , Malfoy thought. _Works a desk job in the DMLE, and he suddenly thinks Aurors are the answer to everything._ “You know that we have been very reticent to close the school, Culhwch,” he answered, “and you also know why—there are just so few alternatives available. That’s why the school was not closed the last time this happened.”

“Yes, and we know how _that_ turned out,” grumbled Doge.

“Yes, most tragic, but we’ve learnt from that incident. We are tightening the security further, taking a more active role, and—I should hope—removing the ineffective staff members. In any case, there are better uses for the Aurors.”

“Such as?” Llywelyn asked.

“Such as contacting Minister Fudge to take Mr. Hagrid into custody. I understand he’s very anxious to take some sort of action in light of the public outcry.”

“Hagrid?” Amos said in confusion. “But we have no evidence that he’s involved.”

“None besides his initial expulsion record, you mean.”

“Which is not sufficient for a criminal matter.”

“Merely a precautionary measure, I assure you,” Malfoy lied. He’d already leaned on Fudge to have Hagrid sent straight to Azkaban “pending charges’ instead of a Ministry holding cell. “If Hagrid proves to be uninvolved, then that will be the end of it, but given his record, you have to agree it’s a fair precaution.”

“The fact remains that having Aurors on the grounds is starting to sound pretty good right about now,” Llywelyn insisted.

“I’m afraid the consequences to that would be far more wide ranging than you think,” Malfoy replied smoothly. “What confidence would the people have in the educational system if we couldn’t secure the school on our own?” Of course, this was mostly spin. Aurors had been involved with the school during the war, though that was to protect against an external threat. “As to how we could do better, Amos, all of the measures so far have focused on _stopping_ the Heir, not on _catching_ him. “I propose that we gradually loosen these new restrictions—carefully—point by point and section by section, and that we keep a particularly close eye on each new opportunity for the Heir as it opens up.”

This got strange looks from most of the board, but Diggory started to catch on. It was risky—and ruthless—but the payoff would be big if it succeeded. “You mean to set a trap,” he said shrewdly.

“A simplistic summary, but yes, you might say that.” Of course, he had no worries about the trap succeeding. His Master was cleverer than that, and anyway, the diary would be almost impossible to find.

“It’s hardly a physical trap, or a reliable one,” Doge observed. “It’s a purely logistical trap to narrow down the suspect list—one in which we don’t know where the enemy will go, and more importantly, using the children as _bait_!”

“And what else would you have us do,” Malfoy countered before any of the other parents could respond. “We _were_ agreed, were we not, that we would like the school to remain open? What other kind of “bait,” as you so crudely put it, do we have at our disposal? More to the point, given what’s happened already, with appropriate monitoring, the risk need not be greater than it is now.”

“You’re suggesting a very dangerous ruse—”

“Actually, I think the idea might be sound, Elphias,” Diggory interrupted.

“ _Et tu_ , Amos?” he said in disbelief.

“Certainly, we would need to be very careful. It would take a lot of planning to hand the Heir enough rope to hang himself without letting him get at anybody else, but in the absence of any other ideas to actually _catch_ him—remember, last time, he seemed to have just disappeared and lain in wait.”

“Dumbledore would never agree to that plan,” Doge said.

“Which is precisely why I suggested we take over his duties until the crisis is resolved,” Malfoy said. “If Dumbledore is not willing to do what is necessary, then he is not suited to the job. You and he are concerned about putting children at risk, but they are already at risk. If we are not to abandon our ability to educate them entirely, we must strike out on a different path from the one we are on.”

“Well, I don’t know that I’d go that far, Malfoy,” Diggory positioned himself, “but be honest, Elphias, how much progress has Dumbledore had with finding the Chamber or the Heir, either in 1943 or today? Or has he made any progress on intimidating the Heir into submission?”

“Amos, your son is at Hogwarts. Do you honestly agree with Malfoy, now?”

“Not as such, Elphias, but I am concerned that we have nothing left to go on. I have no quarrel with Dumbledore, but this idea, with some modifications, could work whereas all of the usual methods have produced nary a single lead. And while I am greatly concerned for my son, as a Board member I also have to be concerned with the safety of all the other students, present and future. This needs to end _permanently_. If that means pushing Dumbledore into the background for a while to carry out this plan, then maybe that’s what we need to do.”

Diggory had played right into Malfoy’s hands with that little speech. He was always the go-to man for passion and determination. And once he set his mind on a particular course, it was not easy to take it off again. Upon seeing his enthusiasm, most of the rest of the board murmured to each other in agreement and swung over to his side—all except Elphias Doge.

“Need I remind you, Lucius, that an Order of Suspension must be signed unanimously,” Doge said.

“I am, but I had hoped I could convince you that an alternative was available—that Dumbledore, while an excellent wizard, is not the only man for the job—or even the best man.”

“Well, forgive me if I don’t agree.”

“And why shouldn’t you?” said Madam Zabini. “Lucius is a perfectly capable wizard, and so is Amos. If there’s one thing I’ve learnt in my time, it’s that no man is indispensable.” Several board members laughed nervously at her joke—now six times widowed, she had learnt that well.

Elphias was livid. He could feel the eyes of all of the eleven other board members on him now. They were asking him to go against his oldest friend. Malfoy the Death Eater (as much as he denied it) had even sucked Amos into his scheme. And the worst part was that many of the points they were making made sense. He was left with a terrible choice to make. Sitting at eleven to one like this, they could kick him off the board and replace him with someone who would go along with them—and he had no doubt that would be Malfoy’s next move. But if he stayed on, he could as least exert some control for the good of the students. Well, that was hardly a choice at all. _I_ _’m sorry, Albus_ , he thought; then he growled out, “Very well, I will sign your Order, Malfoy, but for Amos’s sake, not for yours. And I want _him_ in charge of this plan of yours, not you. And I swear that if I get a _hint_ of another attack, it’ll be _you_ I call for a vote of no confidence in next.”

“Fair enough,” Malfoy replied with a hint of a sneer in his voice. He could deal with that later. “Thank you for seeing reason, Elphias.”

* * *

And so, Albus Dumbledore was suspended as Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. It was a dark day for the school; there was no doubt about that, but he had little recourse. True, he might be able to put enough pressure on to Fudge to persuade him to help reverse it, but with Amos Diggory taking Lucius Malfoy’s side _and_ claiming to have a workable plan (albeit one Albus strongly disapproved of), it would be a hard sell. And as much as he hated to admit it, Hogwarts could get by without him for a few months with the rest of its excellent staff, even with the Heir of Slytherin on the loose.

No, it would profit little to resist the suspension, not with the Heir already slipping by under his nose. Instead, there was something else he could do for his school. He would begin looking into Tom Riddle’s history, and Salazar Slytherin’s, to try to find new clues about the Heir and the Chamber. And while he was at it, it would also give him more time to search for the horcruxes.

And in any case, help would always be given at Hogwarts to those who deserved it.


	56. Valentine's Day

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Harry Potter grows by accretion. Tales accumulate around JK Rowling like dust.
> 
> Part of this chapter has been quoted from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.

“Dumbledore’s gone? Are they mad?!”

“The muggle-borns won’t stand a chance with him gone.”

“Someone’s gonna die at this rate; mark my words.”

“How’s anyone gonna find the Chamber _now_?”

“They arrested _Hagrid?_ What does he have to do with anything?”

“I heard that’s why he was expelled.”

“They should’ve got rid of Potter.”

“They should’ve got rid of the Slytherins.”

The mood in the Great Hall was more anxious than ever when Dumbledore failed to show up at dinner, and Professor McGonagall reluctantly announced that he had been suspended by the Board of Governors. Not even twenty-four hours after the last attack, and things seemed even worse than before.

Cedric Diggory was the only voice of reassurance in the Great Hall. With three of the victims being Hufflepuffs, many of the half-bloods and even purebloods who were friends of the victims were starting to worry that they might be next. “Listen, guys,” he said, “you don’t need to panic. My dad’s on the Board of Governors. He just owled me a note saying they’re still supporting Dumbledore’s safety measures, and he’s leading a new committee to try to catch the Heir. They _do_ have a plan.”

The mood at the Gryffindor table was little better. As Dumbledore’s house, they had particularly believed in him to save the day, and with him gone, everyone was looking around nervously, wondering who would be next. Hermione and Harry were both very concerned that Hermione had probably been the real target last night. They sat huddled together beside Neville and picked at their food. Hermione’s hands were still shaking from time to time, and her magic was shaking with them. Finally, with one particularly bad tremor, her knife and fork flew out of her hands, flipped through the air, and embedded themselves points-first in the table.

“Whoa!” Neville said.

“Hey, hey!” Harry said, awkwardly grabbing his sister’s trembling hands. “Centre yourself, remember? Take a deep breath…”

Hermione remembered her years of mental discipline with karate and later with Occlumency and animagus training and calmed herself down. “Sorry,” she muttered.

“What was that?” asked Parvati Patil.

“Just, uh, lost control there for a minute,” she said. “Harry, I’m really not hungry tonight.” She leaned against him and started scratching him behind the ears, mostly for her own comfort, which indicated she was _really_ shaken up this time.

“Me either,” Harry replied. He nudged her to stop when the people around them gave them a funny look. “But McGonagall says we’ve gotta stick with our House. Just wait. We’ll call home when we get back to the Tower.” Harry was angry—angry _and_ scared—a dangerous combination. It had been a long time since he’d seen his sister this scared. He felt like he had last year when Quirrellmort kidnapped her, but this time, there was no evil wizard for him to fight to save her. The thought made his own magical control slip. He heard his plate rattling on the table, but soon got it back under control. This couldn’t go on much longer. People were already starting to point and whisper at them.

Both children went back to the Common Room having eaten very little, and after some discussion, Hermione retrieved her own communication mirror from her room, and the pair proceeded up to Harry’s room. Ron and Neville graciously herded Dean and Seamus out of the dorm for them so that they could speak with their family in private. This was a little bit awkward, since there was really no way to set up the mirrors so that they could see them _and_ each other, but they got by.

“Hey, Cubs, what’s new?” Sirius asked once they were all in on the conversation.

“It’s not pretty,” Harry said at once. “The Board suspended Dumbledore.”

Dan, Emma, Sirius, and Remus all gasped. “Are they mad?” Remus said. “How is that supposed to help? Dumbledore’s the only person keeping Hogwarts together.”

“I guess they think he hasn’t done a good job of that,” Harry said. “And they’re kinda right, aren’t they? Four attacks in four months and zero leads! We have nothing to work with and no way to protect ourselves!” The sheets and bed curtains started flapping around them.

“Harry, calm down, please,” Emma said. “You know all of us are doing everything we can.”

“Sorry,” he muttered.

Now that she could do it openly, Hermione scratched Harry behind the ears and ran her fingers through his hair until he settled down. “We know, Mum,” she said. “We’re scared, though—both of us. And we’ve both been losing control of our magic, too. I know I keep wanting to throw a wandless _Flipendo_ at every little sound. Honestly, I don’t know how much longer we can keep this up.”

“Just do your best,” Emma assured her. “It’s not the end of the world if that bit gets out, and it’s more important to keep yourselves safe.”

“You said Dumbledore was out,” Dan chimed in. “I hope they’re still beefing up security.”

“Oh, yeah,” Harry remembered unhappily. “Quidditch is cancelled, all the clubs are cut way back, and curfew is right after dinner now.”

“No Quidditch?!” Sirius said in horror.

“Well, at least they’re closing off the most dangerous hours,” Remus said, rolling his eyes.

“There’s something else,” Hermione said. “Apparently, Amos Diggory is working on a new plan to try to catch the Heir. What do we know about him?”

“Amos Diggory?” Remus said. “I know him. He’s high up in the Magical Creatures Department at the Ministry. Decent enough bloke—honourable, anyway, but tough, short-tempered, not a big fan of werewolves, either. But he’s always going on about how great his son is, so I’m sure he’ll fight as hard as any parent.”

Dan and Emma nodded. “That’s good to hear, at least,” Dan said. “The most pressing thing for us, though, is can we still use the Floo in Dumbledore’s office?”

“Yes, we asked Professor McGonagall after dinner,” Hermione confirmed. “She has it covered.”

“Good,” Emma replied. “Do the two of you want to come home? We know it’s gotta be hard staying there.”

Harry and Hermione looked at each other questioningly.

“I don’t think so,” Harry said. “Not yet. It’s getting to be a close thing, though.”

“That’s fine. We understand. We tracked down Malcolm Roper today. We can bring him in tomorrow if it’s okay. What do you know about the other girl’s family?”

“Not much,” Harry grumbled. “Most of the Hufflepuffs are scared of us again.”

Hermione sighed as she tried to keep her brother calm. “We’ll let you know know as soon as we can.”

They talked for a while longer. Sirius started growling when they mentioned that Hagrid had been arrested and why. (“Fudge,” he said. “One of these days…”) Finally, with promises from Hermione and Harry to stay safe and stick close to Neville if they could, they signed off.

“I’m going to bed, Harry,” Hermione said. “Are you going to be okay?”

“Yes,” he said, putting on a brave face. “Are _you_ going to be okay, sis?”

She nodded shakily: “I’ll get by.”

Harry flopped down on his bed again after she left and wandlessly closed the curtains. They may have been getting by, but he felt like they were seven and eight years old again, hiding under the sofa and terrified the house would blow down on top of them.

Hermione didn’t want to admit it, but she felt the same way. She got ready for bed quickly and wandlessly closed her own curtains around her when her roommates weren’t looking. She tossed and turned for a long time before falling asleep, and what sleep she did get was troubled by bad dreams.

She was walking down an empty corridor. It was late at night—or maybe not late, but certainly past the new curfew. She shouldn’t be out alone. She needed to find a teacher—or even another student. Where _was_ everybody? Probably safe in the dorms, she thought.

She could hear footsteps behind her—the kind that always stop the moment you stop, so you’re never quite sure if they’re real or just an echo. When she looked, she always saw an empty corridor, except that it ended in a thick darkness that seemed to creep a bit closer each time she looked. She must have made a wrong turn somewhere because the layout of the castle didn’t look right at all—not like anything she recognised. Her heart started racing. She was lost, and she was being followed. _Help. I need somebody to help me_ _…_

Hermione hit a dead end, and then, the worst happened. The darkness came creeping around the corner like a mist, threatening to envelop her. That fleeting hissing sound she had heard the night before returned, growing louder and louder until it was like the rushing torrent of a waterfall. She could sense, more than see, a dark shape rushing toward her through the darkness, and she knew it was the Monster of Slytherin.

_No! Stop! Make it go away!_

It was nearly on her.

_Stop! Stop!_

_Hermione, wake up!_ “Hermione, wake up!”

“NOOO!”

“AHHH!”

Two girlish screams accompanied by a loud crash woke Hermione up fully. She was in her dorm room, and amid moans of pain and confusion, Lavender and Parvati were picking themselves up from where she had thrown them against the wall with a wandless _Flipendo_ from each hand. She remembered Harry saying he’d done this to Ron and Neville once last year. This probably wasn’t a good sign.

“He-He-Hermione?” Lavender said in a daze. “What happened?”

“Sweet Merlin, what _was_ that?” Parvati asked, rubbing her head.

“Um, nightmare—accidental magic—sorry,” Hermione said sheepishly.

“ _That_ was accidental magic?” Lavender said. “What happens when it’s on purpose?”

“I’m scared, okay?” Hermione snapped. “The Heir almost got me last night.”

“Hey, it’s okay, Hermione,” Parvati said gently. “We understand. We’re purebloods, and _we_ _’re_ scared.”

“Hey, girls? Are you alright?” Lily Moon said blearily, poking her head out from behind her bed curtains. Lily had been particularly sad since the new term started. Sally-Anne had been her best friend, and she’d seemed kind of lost without her.

“Yeah, we’re fine, Lily. Hermione just had a nightmare,” Parvati said.

“Oh, I’m sorry, Hermione. Did you…did you want to talk about it?”

“Well, there’s not much to tell…” she started, but she told them anyway. With their support, she was feeling better by the end and to her surprise was able to get back to sleep.

* * *

The full story of Dumbledore’s sacking (or at least what people were meant to see) hit the _Daily Prophet_ the next day, along with the news that the Board of Governors had taken the unusual step of taking over the security of the school directly. Minister Fudge made a milquetoast statement of disapproval, but Amos Diggory seemed to have a strong enough personality to reassure people.

“But who’s the Chairman of the Board of Governors?” the Gryffindors reminded each other. Most of them were firmly in the camp that Draco Malfoy was in contact with the Heir of Slytherin, and they didn’t trust anything the Board did with Lucius Malfoy running it.

Draco himself was strutting around the school like he owned the place. Most of the rest of the school was afraid of him, since they knew full well that he could get them in much more trouble than usual, Heir of Slytherin or not, not to mention that his father had just achieved his life’s dream of sacking Dumbledore from Hogwarts. To be sure, he was careful not to say too much in front of the teachers or any of the Gryffindors, but word got around faster than ever with all the tension in the air. “Father always said Dumbledore was the worst headmaster this school’s ever had,” he was reported as saying. “Maybe now we’ll get someone decent. Of course, Father’s been saying for years that Hogwarts needs to be more _selective_ in who it accepts. I mean, look at Durmstrang. They don’t accept muggle-borns, and they get on just fine. We’d be better off with a tougher admission policy here.” Few people had the courage to point out to his face that Beauxbatons took most of the muggle-borns that Durmstrang rejected and _also_ got on just fine.

In all of this, the news that Hagrid had been taken into custody for “questioning” was a mere footnote. (Professor McGonagall hired a woman named Wilhelmina Grubbly-Plank to serve as the interim Groundskeeper.) Harry and Hermione sincerely hoped that the rumour that he had been carted straight to Azkaban was false, but they both had a bad feeling it wasn’t. When this was over, Fudge would really get it for that, especially since he was trying to use it as _his_ main talking point.

“Hagrid admitted the creature he was raising was an acromantula,” Hermione told anyone who would listen. “It’s public record by now that there’s a colony of them in the Forbidden Forest. But acromantulas _can_ _’t_ petrify people.”

“Yeah, it’s not fair,” Neville answered as the three of them studied in the library with a reluctant Ron. “I just wish we knew what _was_ doing it.”

“Mm-hmm,” Harry agreed. “Say, Mione, everyone knows Slytherin was the snake guy. Maybe he’s got a Gorgon down there.”

“A Gorgon?” Hermione said with interest. “I…don’t think so. The muggle legend of the Gorgons is pretty far off. The Gorgons were really just powerful witches with a thing for human transfiguration…although…if Slytherin came up with someone or some _thing_ that could mimic their spells…”

“Yeah, that would be bad,” Harry agreed.

“Yeah—although I doubt he could have. I’ve read _Our Magical Brethren_ cover to cover, and I haven’t seen anything about any type of sentient creature that can live for a thousand years _and_ cast spells.”

“Well…maybe not,” Harry admitted. “But still…”

“No I’m with Dumbledore on this,” she said. “I say dark artifact, or _maybe_ a really obscure creature.”

“Yeah, but that’s bad enough,” he replied darkly.

“True…Well, you know, it could be worse.”

“Worse?” Neville and Ron said nervously.

“How?” Harry asked.

“It could be Daleks,” she said with a smile.

Harry shuddered so hard that his magic slipped, and all the parchment on the table fluttered. “Ugh. Don’t even _joke_ about that. I’m gonna have nightmares now.”

“Um, what’re Daleks?” Ron asked fearfully, wondering what would be scary enough to give Harry Potter nightmares.

“Muggle horror story,” he said curtly. “You _don_ _’t_ want to know.”

But jokes aside, the whole school was no closer to solving the mystery than they were to start with, and a certain core of the Slytherins were loving it. Theo Nott, predictably, wasn’t as discreet at Draco Malfoy and spoke openly: “What would be _really_ nice is if the new Headmaster didn’t _want_ the Chamber of Secrets closed, eh, Draco? Then we could solve the problem all in one go.”

“Come on, Theo, you know my father wouldn’t tolerate that,” Malfoy (truthfully) replied. “It’d be nice if he could reach out to the Heir and work together to change the attendance policy, but the Chamber’s not the kind of thing you want to just leave open. If this school got its act together, the Heir wouldn’t _need_ to work in the shadows like this.”

Needless to say, the mood at Hogwarts was darker than ever. Most of the muggle-born students, especially, didn’t _want_ to leave their dorms except for meals and class, and even the library was emptier than usual. That Lydia Stewart had been petrified whilst wearing her new amulet proved once and for all that the various protective charms floating around were useless (although Finn McLaggen still seemed to be making money off other contraband), leading to paranoia as people had no discernible way to protect themselves.

The tension nearly blew up into a major incident on the way to dinner that day. With all the fear in the air and the students pretty much all sticking together and never really getting a moment’s privacy, everyone was under a lot more pressure than usual, and when the Gryffindors met the Slytherins in the Entrance Hall, it threatened to break loose.

“Hey, Granger,” Theo Nott called, “I hear the Heir nearly got you, too. Or did you ask your brother to go after someone else instead?”

“That’s enough, Nott!” Harry yelled. He drew his wand and lunged toward the boy, but Hermione grabbed him by the arm and pulled him back.

“Harry, don’t,” she hissed.

“Is that it, Potter?” Nott said, remembering Harry’s declaration of house protection and speaking more carefully than usual. “You have a soft spot for muggle-borns if they’re family?”

“I said shut it! You wanna go?” Harry tried to break free of Hermione’s grasped, but she held firm.

“Harry, you can’t,” she pleaded.

“You heard what he said.”

“Yes, but remember the Honour Code? It’s not technically a threat, and it’s not technically an insult.”

“I don’t care. That’s how he means it.”

“You have to be careful with things being this volatile here. Besides, you _know_ what Mum and Dad would say if you got into an honour duel. Just let it go.”

Harry clenched his fists tight, but he stopped straining to make a move at Nott. But still, he shot back, “You’d better not having anything to do with the _real_ Heir, Nott. I won’t let anyone go for taking a shot at Hermione.”

“Harry!” Hermione hissed.

“Is that a threat, Potter?” Nott asked.

“Not if you have nothing to hide.”

Nott glared at him. “Better watch what you say, Potter. You don’t wanna get in trouble, do you?”

“What I want is for my sister to be left alone—from you, from the Heir, from _you_ , Malfoy. I am tired of people coming after her—”

“After both of us,” Hermione interrupted.

“—after both of us, just because of who our parents are. You don’t see me making fun of you for how close your parents are related. So just back off, will you.”

“Harry—” Hermione chided.

Nott bristled: “My parents are fourth cousins once removed.”

“See, the fact that you even know that—”

“Just because I’m a respectable wizard—”

“Boys, boys, is there trouble here?” The argument was interrupted by a smooth voice belonging to a wizard with perfectly coiffed blond hair and an impeccable smile.

Harry and Nott immediately broke off from where they had stood getting closer and closer in each other’s faces. “Just making sure we know where each other stands, Professor,” Nott said with a smirk. “Although if we need formal moderation, I’m sure you’ll be the first person Mr. Potter asks.”

Harry glared at Nott, but forced himself to take a calm position: “We have no quarrel here, Professor. We were just trading some opinions.”

“Glad to hear it,” Lockhart said with a grin. “Wouldn’t want trouble among the students, especially in times like these. Now, why don’t you run along to dinner? It’s not good to be loitering around the castle these days.”

Malfoy and Nott dashed into the Great Hall, but Lockhart held Harry and Hermione back for a moment.

“Harry, Harry, Harry,” Lockhart said in that condescending tone of his. “You need to be careful working with these political types. I’m sure it’s hard; you have to play two roles, the hero and the legislator. That must be quite a burden. I can only imagine what it’s like. But you need to be careful about your image. It’s one thing to be a hero, but if you start pushing back too easily, you’re going to come off as a hothead, and you don’t want that. Now, if you’d like some advice—”

“Professor,” Harry interrupted through gritted teeth, “I already have several people in my family to help me work in politics. I don’t need your help. My concern here is keeping my sister safe from the Heir of Slytherin—and probably me, too—so unless you have some advice on that from your many years of experience, I think we’re done here…sir.”

“Don’t worry, Harry,” Lockhart said confidently “I really don’t think the Heir will get past the new security measures, and if he does, I’ll be ready for him.”

“Like you were ready the last four times, Professor?” Harry snapped.

“Well, that was a…terrible bit of luck, yes—no one regrets more than I…” the Defence Professor said uncomfortably.

“Say, Professor, in _Gadding with Ghouls_ , even if I accept that it’s possible to trap a ghoul with a tea strainer, I really don’t see how you could have fought infestations in three different countries in three days.”

“Well, er, um…you know what? What this school needs is a morale-booster,” Lockhart changed the subject. “I’ll have to think of some ideas. Maybe something for next month. Now, you two run along, and don’t worry. There’s nothing to fear when I’m on the case.” He turned around and high-tailed it out of there.

“Git,” Harry said.

“Harry, you shouldn’t talk about a teacher like that,” Hermione said.

“Why not? It’s true.”

“Yes, but you shouldn’t say it. You should write it in a courteous, but hard-hitting letter to the editor.”

“Ah, _that_ old trick.”

They went into the Great Hall, not noticing a little red-haired girl following shakily at a distance behind them.

* * *

_Dear Gabbie,_

_Thank you for your newest letter. We are safe here right now, but you_ _’re right. It is getting very scary. We think the Heir tried to attack Hermione a few nights ago, but she missed. Two other muggle-borns were petrified instead. The teachers cancelled Quidditch and most of the clubs and won’t let us go out much to try to keep us safe, and the Board of Governors kicked out Dumbledore because they say they can do it better, but a lot of people are worried they can’t._

_We_ _’re doing everything we can to stay safe, but it’s hard since we still don’t know who is doing this or how. We really hope someone can figure it out soon, but none of the teachers have had any luck. We don’t think Hagrid is the one who did it. We talked to him right before he was arrested, and we think he was framed. We’re not even sure where he is now._

_We have thought about coming to Beauxbatons before, and if they can_ _’t solve the problem with the Heir by the end of the year, we probably will. We don’t think we can take another year of this. That’s if the school is even still open. No one knows what will happen if they have to close the castle. There aren’t many other places in Britain that are as safe as a magic school is_ _ supposed _ _to be._

_We hope you_ _’re having fun in France. We’re sure it’s better than here right now._

_Your friends,_

_Harry and Hermione_

 

Gabrielle Delacour whimpered as her mother translated the letter from her pen pals. The latest news out of Britain was very bad. The attacks on muggle-born students continued, and the move to suspend Dumbledore from Hogwarts was seen by many as a form of desperation. The international reaction varied, but was generally negative. The Americans in particular sent an official missive to the British Ministry suggesting they close the school. However, other countries, particularly Russia, said that it was vital that education remain open. The very conservative Scandinavia, as the home of Durmstrang, made a statement that changing Hogwarts’s admission policy was something they ought to do anyway, even if they (officially) disagreed with the Heir’s actions. Also, numerous experts and authorities had sent in theories about what was causing the petrifications, but they were as varied as the ones the British experts had come up with and no more helpful.

But Gabbie wasn’t interested in all of that. She was just hoping her friends would make it till summer. With Hermione being muggle-born and Harry being Harry Potter, it was clearly very dangerous for them, and she wanted to be able to see them again.

* * *

The weeks came and went with no more attacks, but no one was letting their guard down just yet. No one knew whether they had not repeated again because of the new security measures, because of Hagrid’s arrest, or just because it was normal for the Heir to wait a month between attacks. By mid-February, some people were starting to relax, while others were becoming more paranoid, saying they were due for another one. Harry Potter leaned toward the second camp.

“I don’t know if it’s gonna be now,” he said. “The Heir might decide to lay low again, but I know Hagrid didn’t do it, and that means it’s not over yet.”

The mood in the castle was positively depressed. Dumbledore begin gone was just the start. With no Quidditch, few other clubs, and no one allowed out after dinner, the school was much more bleak and boring than usual. Even Peeves was getting depressed with fewer opportunities to prank students, and he consoled himself by spending more time heckling the ghosts (except the Bloody Baron, of course).

Duelling Club was one of those clubs that was cancelled entirely. A lot of students wanted to keep it up to learn to defend themselves, but Professor McGonagall would have it: “With all those spells flying around, it would be far too easy to slip in a dark curse without being noticed.”

At the same time, the O.W.L. and N.E.W.T. students were getting restless. Their library time had been severely cut by the new restrictions. Eventually, McGonagall announced that the dinner-time curfew would be lifted, but with only limited access to the castle to get to and from the library, and the corridors would be closely monitored. The school would still functioning, if barely.

Then came Valentine’s Day.

No one was sure how Professor Lockhart had got McGonagall to sign off on his “morale booster” with the security in its current state. The most popular theory was that he didn’t, but later managed to convince her he had. As it was a Sunday (and because it _was_ Valentine’s Day—he remembered the notes he got last year), Harry had been considering just having a lie-in, but Hermione dragged him down the stairs, telling him he couldn’t go around moping all the time. When they got to the Great Hall, Harry took one look and said, “Nope, not doing it. I’m going back to bed.” He turned around to leave, but Hermione pulled him into the Hall by the wrist.

“Come on, oh brave Gryffindor,” she said, and then she actually _giggled_.

Lockhart certainly didn’t come across as a great dark creature hunter in person, but he _did_ seem to have a flair for decorating. Pink climbing roses climbed up the walls of the Great Hall until they met the projected blue of the sky on the ceiling, from which heart-shaped confetti fluttered down—all over everyone’s breakfast. A _flair_ for decorating—not common sense about it. Lockhart himself was standing up in front of the High Table in painfully pink robes, beaming, as usual, and he looked like he was the only teacher who was happy about the whole mess.

“Happy Valentine’s Day!” he addressed the Hall. “And thank you to the forty-five people who already sent me cards.” Harry stared at Hermione questioningly, and she frantically shook her head no. “I hope you all like the first half of my little surprise, but the best is yet to come. Now, with the current security situation, I wasn’t able to bring in outside help, like I’d originally planned, so I had to improvise a little…”

Lockhart clapped his hands twice, and the doors of the Great Hall opened, revealing twelve house elves from the kitchens, but they didn’t look like ordinary house elves. Their tea towels had been charmed a very pale pink, and each was wearing a pair of golden wings and carrying a harp and a stack of letters.

“My friendly card-carrying cupids, who will be delivering all of your valentines in person throughout the day,” Lockhart grinned.

It was a good thing it was Sunday because the cupid-elves popping in and out of the classrooms all day would have been very disruptive. As it was, the elves were following people around all day, so no one could escape, even in their dorms. Hermione thought it was cute, but she wasn’t the one with an admiring elf following her, saying, “Harry Potter, sir! Nellie has a message for you!”

Harry wanted to get away, but by bad luck, Nellie managed to corner him in the courtyard, where a lot of students were milling around and hemmed him in—including Draco Malfoy and his minions, and also most of the Weasleys. He made a couple of weak attempts to escape, but it was no good. “Alright, Nellie, give me my letter,” he said.

“Oh no, Harry Potter, sir. It is being a _singing_ valentine.”

Harry turned white. Half the crowd started sniggering at him.

Nellie began to sing:

 

_“His eyes are as green as a fresh pickled toad,_

_His hair is as dark as a blackboard._

_I wish he was mine, he_ _’s really divine,_

_The hero who conquered the Dark Lord._ _”_

 

The crowd laughed uproariously, and Harry turned pinker than Lockhart’s robes. He just barely restrained himself from questioning the toad-blackboard rhyme. However, at the sound of the laughter, he _did_ notice one face in the crowd also turning red: Ginny Weasley. Their eyes met, and she vanished into the crowd in a flash.

 _Great,_ Harry thought. _She_ _’s being more fangirlish than last year._

“Miss Hermione Granger, Nellie is having a valentine for you, too,” the elf squeaked.

“Eep! Y-you do?” Hermione squeaked nervously.

“Yes, miss, but it is being a letter, miss.” She handed over the envelope.

“Um, thank you, Nellie.” She breathed a sigh of relief and quickly pocketed it. “I’ll read it over very carefully—in private.”

The crowd began to disperse, but then, someone else came up to Hermione—a boy with curly brown hair. “Hello, cousin,” said Sullivan Fawley softly.

She jumped briefly. “Oh, hello, Sullivan.” Harry and Hermione didn’t have much interaction with Hermione’s second cousin on her mother’s side, but they always made sure to exchange notes every holiday.

“I wanted to give you this directly,” Sullivan said, handing her a letter. “Since it’s a family note, it didn’t seem quite right to send it by cupid.”

“Oh, right. I was thinking the same thing,” Hermione said, even as her mind was racing: _If he didn_ _’t send the note with Nellie, who did?_ “Here, I have one for you, too.” She fished in her bag and handed another note to her cousin. “Say hello to your parents for us.”

“Sure thing—”

“Well, isn’t this touching?” The three of them whirled around to see the wiry, dark-haired form of Theodore Nott grinning at them. “Trying to trade up from that half-blood ‘brother’ of yours to a proper pureblood, are you Granger?”

Harry started to make a move on Nott, but by now, Hermione held out her hand to stop him without even thinking. “He happens to be family,” she informed the Slytherin.

“If I were him, I wouldn’t be advertising that I was related to a mud—muggle-born,” he stopped himself. “Especially considering the Heir’s made a point of going after his house. Oh, wait, Potter’s the Heir, isn’t he?”

Harry broke free and actually drew his wand at the half-slur, but to his and Hermione’s surprise, Sullivan stepped in front of him and said, “Nott, you really need to can it. You’re just annoying everybody, and if you lot are really so sure Harry’s the Heir of Slytherin, then why do you keep trying to piss him off?”

“Language!” Hermione said automatically.

A look of uncertainty flitted across Nott’s face for a fraction of a second. Could he really not be sure himself?

“I’m not scared of Harry, even if he _is_ a Parselmouth,” Sullivan continued, “but maybe _you_ should be.”

Harry grinned at Nott and said, “ _Haashee seeheth_!”

Nott’s eyes grew saucer-sized, and he started backing away. He didn’t care what Draco had said. He didn’t want to stick around to see what happened next. He bolted from the courtyard, passing Ginny Weasley, who had been peeking at the show from behind a pillar. She yelped and scampered off herself as he passed.

“Harry!” Hermione chided. “What if the Heir goes for him next to frame you?”

“After she already tried to get you?” Harry said dismissively. “I think she’s past that. Anyway, where did _that_ come from, Sullivan? I know Hufflepuff’s been nicer to me the past couple weeks, but wow, standing up to Theo Nott?”

“Hey, in Hufflepuff, we stick up for friends and family alike. Oh, and what happened was a couple weeks ago, Cedric Diggory made a big speech and told everyone there’s no way you could be the Heir because you would’ve gone after Nott and Malfoy ages ago. Everybody’s been listening to him because his dad’s in charge of our security, now.”

“Wow, well, thanks. That git’s been trying to bait me for months. One of these days, I might have to just kick his arse to shut him up.”

“You will do no such thing, Harry James Potter,” Hermione said. “We’ve got enough trouble already.”

“Fine,” Harry said as they walked back into the castle. “Say, why don’t you look and see who that valentine is from?”

Hermione blushed and pulled out the envelope. “You’re not going to hex _him_ , either.”

“Fine, but I reserve the right to have a _talk_ with him.”

“Honestly, Harry, you’re twelve, and I’m thirteen. Since when are you the protective brother.”

“Since always. And _especially_ since the Heir of Slytherin came after you.”

“We don’t know that for sure—Oh, it’s from Neville,” she exclaimed when she saw the signature.

“Neville?” Harry said incredulously. “What did _he_ say?”

“Just a note as a _friend_ , Harry. Nothing special. You don’t need to have a _talk_ with him; he needs more self-confidence as it is. And besides, how many valentines did _you_ get today? And from older girls, too?”

“Okay, okay. I was just joking about that,” Harry said quickly. They walked on in silence for a little while, but then Hermione stopped dead in her tracks.

“Harry!”

Harry tensed and spun around, drawing his wand. “What?”

“You just spoke Parseltongue! On _cue_!”

Harry holstered his wand again and grinned at his sister: “So you finally noticed.”

“But I thought you couldn’t do that.”

“I’ve been practising.”

“I thought you didn’t _want_ to do that.”

“Well, it was your idea—and I quote, “Voldemort was a Parselmouth. What if he attacks you with a giant snake?’”

Hermione was speechless, but when she finally snapped out of it, she said, “So you do listen after all.”

“Don’t I always? You know what, let’s see if we can track down Luna. She’s probably lonely on Valentine’s Day. Plus, we can do that linguistic study you two were talking about. If people are gonna call me the Heir of Slytherin anyway, I may as well get _some_ use out of it.”

“Really? Who are you and what have you done with my brother?” Hermione said. Harry just laughed.


	57. I Demand Satisfaction!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Harry Potter is a beautiful and terrible thing, and should therefore be treated with great deference to JK Rowling.
> 
> I’ve been waiting to this chapter for a long time, and I suspect some of you have been wanting to read it for a while too. I hope you like how it worked out.

“Uh, no, _lukchath_ means to slither in a concertina motion. _Luksash_ means to slither in a serpentine motion.”

“ _Sanahh_ ,” Luna acknowledge as she scratched out the note she had made and wrote in the correction.

It had been an…interesting two months at Hogwarts since Harry, Hermione, and Luna had started studying Parseltongue.

“Are there any other words for “slither,” Harry?”

“Yeah, “s far as I can tell there’s two more,” Harry told Luna. “ _Luknod_ means to slither with a caterpillar motion, and _lukthalee_ means to slither with a sidewinder motion.”

He might not have expected it (actually, he never knew quite _what_ to expect with Luna), but the little Ravenclaw girl _was_ good at keeping a secret and respected Harry’s wish for her not to use Parseltongue in public, especially around him. That was some attention that neither of them needed.

Parseltongue, Harry decided, coincidentally like a lot of things having to do with Luna, was confusing. In one sense, it was simple. The vocabulary for normal things was very limited, much like the vocabulary of cats’ speech was, even for animagi. However, much like the cats’ speech, there were a lot of additional snake-related words that you would rarely need to use in practice. The grammar was also very simple, but it was also confusing in that it omitted a lot of words that then had to be inferred from the context, although it was a very literal language, which helped. The really hard part was that it was a devil to wrap the human tongue around.

“ _Noasee hashesh st_ _’kah inyee sanahh_?” Luna asked.

“ _Sanahh. Theeth st_ _’kah inyee_ ,” Harry replied.

But since Harry was so accustomed to how animals thought, he found he was a natural at understanding how the language worked, and Luna proved to be a quick study—quicker than Hermione, even, to the older girl’s chagrin, and the two of them could now hold a simple conversation in Parseltongue—for all the good it would do them. It would scare the daylights out of the rest of the school.

Luna closed the notebook, deciding that was enough Parseltongue for now. Switching back to English, she said, “Are you excited for the Quidditch match this weekend, Harry?”

“Oh, definitely, it’ll be good to get on a broom again, and I’m ready to beat those Hufflepuffs.”

At Amos Diggory’s direction, the security restrictions had gradually been eased. It was a questionable move, but it seemed to be working for the moment. In March, after two full months had gone by with no attacks, Quidditch was allowed to resume, although all the practices had to be supervised. But even this left the schedule cramped for the end of the season, and Gryffindor’s second match, which was normally held around the first of March, had been pushed back to the eighth of May, this coming Saturday.

The easing of the restrictions, the lack of new attacks, and the improving weather had boosted morale in Hogwarts far more than Lockhart’s Valentine’s Day debacle ever could. Granted, not all was well. After three and a half months with no attacks, Dumbledore was looking more and more incompetent, and Hagrid was looking more and more guilty, with both of them being gone. Plus, Harry knew that the Heir of Slytherin had to still be around somewhere, and they still had no clues as to who she was or how she was attacking people.

“Oh, and thank you for that last article, Harry,” Luna said. “Daddy says it was very popular.”

“No problem, Luna. I’m glad we can get our message out.”

With things quieting down for the moment, the Grangers were resuming their media campaign from last year. There were still periodic complaints about Snape, and McGonagall was leaning on him hard to curb the worst of his excesses, but this year the letters focused on the appalling state of Defence Against the Dark Arts instruction in the school, which left Hogwarts graduates vulnerable. They now publicly advocated their idea of sending an Auror each year on rotation, something that was gaining traction.

However, the most recent article, the one that came out over Easter Holidays, was the one Luna had suggested about blood purity and blood lines—how even—especially—the oldest and purest bloodlines had probably filtered far and wide throughout the muggle population and back again by now. Apparently, it was the talk of magical Britain for a few days, with some purebloods outright denying it, smarter ones dismissing it as unimportant, and many non-purebloods embracing it as proof that blood purity didn’t matter. Granted, politically, it didn’t make much difference, except for the long-term benefit of Harry getting his voice heard.

Harry and Hermione had also caused a stir more locally for a few weeks when their control of their magic was slipping, but they were calmer now, so they had no more outbursts than usual. However, they had recently received a pair of letters that really called into question their perspective on the wandless magic bit:

 

_Dear Harry Potter and Hermione Granger,_

_I don_ _’t know if you remember me, but we met in Diagon Alley two years ago. My brother Kevin is in your year, but in Ravenclaw. I wanted to thank you about the advice you gave me about how to do wandless magic. I’ve been practising ever since, and I can really do it! I can only do little things like levitate coins and flip light switches, and if I really work at it, I can write with a pen without touching it, but I’m going to keep working on it this summer. I’m starting at Hogwarts next fall, and I can’t wait to show you. I’ve been writing to Nathan Boot—his brother Terry is Kevin’s roommate—and he’s been learning wandless magic, too. Is it different learning magic with a wand?_

_I_ _’m really glad there haven’t been any more attacks, and so are Kevin and our mum and dad. I hope they really stopped the Heir of Slytherin for good this time. (Kevin says he doesn’t think you’re the Heir, Harry.) I hope there’s no trouble when I come next year._

_Sincerely,_

_Annabel Entwhistle_

 

“Well, _that_ _’s_ something we never thought about,” Harry had said.

Nathan Boot’s letter had been similar to Annabel Entwhistle’s in substance. Both of them were progressing just as well with wandless magic as Harry and Hermione had.

“We really can’t ask them to keep it a secret,” Hermione said. “After all, there’s no reason for _them_ to.”

“We haven’t really _had_ to keep ours a secret either,” Harry suggested. “We just didn’t want the attention. My birth mum never kept her wandless magic a secret, and it won’t be so bad if we’re not the only people in the school who can do it.”

“It could still be a useful advantage for the rest of this year,” Hermione countered. “The Heir of Slytherin doesn’t know about it.”

“If they even catch the Heir this year,” Harry grumbled. “And besides, if the Heir is powerful enough to petrify people like that, I don’t think wandless magic will throw her off for very long. And it’s not like we can do more with it than we can do with wands—not anymore. Have you noticed that we can only do this year’s spell equally well wandless versus wanded?”

“Of course I have. It makes sense. We always knew it took longer to learn them wandlessly, and it’s not as efficient. Anyway, I think it would be best to wait for the end of term to show what we can do…but if there’s something else that’s you think calls for it, I guess it’s not a big deal.”

“Thanks, Mione.”

* * *

Finn McLaggen was once again very grateful that a certain seventh-floor corridor had been reopened. It was almost impossible to sneak up here when this part of the school was closed off. He paced back and forth in front of a blank stretch of wall and thought, _I need the room of hidden things. I need the room of hidden things. I need the room of hidden things._

It had taken him a long time to figure out how this door worked, but it had been worth it, for inside was perhaps the greatest treasure in all the British Isles. Granted, most of it was junk, but there was just _so much_ of it. And most importantly, a lot of it was contraband that students had hidden in here over the years—contraband that he could collect at his leisure and resell.

He’d been doing it since early in his sixth year, and it had allowed him to live the high life, by student standards. His spending money was up there with what the rich kids got from their parents, and only the Weasley Twins could possibly touch him in the selling of illicit items (and their brother was keeping them in line, unlike his).

Percy Weasley. He grumbled at the thought. Mr. Perfect Prefect had become his arch-nemesis, confiscating a big chunk of his merchandise before he could sell it. But Finn could always get more from a place no one else knew about. Even Cormac didn’t know where he was getting it.

He strolled around through the massive piles of junk, collecting banned items and interesting or valuable-looking trinkets as he went. There was enough stuff here that he could have been doing this since first year and still had plenty to spare. And there were other things, too. He’d have to do a big last run to amass a stash of things like jewels that were valuable in the real world before he left the school for good. In fact, he’d already pocketed a few small items that weren’t likely to be found, even by Weasley.

As he was scanning the room, he noticed something: a small, black book lying on top of a pile of rubble slumped across an aisle, almost as if someone had thrown it into the room. Finn wasn’t sure why the book caught his eye, but he picked it up. Someone named Riddle had owned it in 1943, but never used it. It was in good condition, so Finn pocketed it to use as a ledger.

That night, he got the shock of his life: _A ledger? How boring. Now, if you want some practical business advice_ _…_

* * *

The Flying Club was restarted shortly after Quidditch, which was a great relief for people who were going mad not being able to get out of the castle or who were trying to hone their skills for tryouts next year. Hermione was a little of both. She may have still been a dyed-in-the-wool bookworm, but after living with Harry for so many years—climbing the jungle gym, learning karate, and now flying on broomsticks—she started to lose it if she couldn’t get any outdoor activity for an extended period. And playing a weekly pick-up Quidditch game in the club really increased her interest in the sport.

Unfortunately, Theo Nott showed up today. Honestly she wasn’t sure why it had taken him over a month to make the connection that Harry wouldn’t be here, but he was doing his best to sabotage her every chance he got. She was wary of him before they even got off the ground, and sure enough, as soon as they were in the air, he bolted straight at her. She screamed and barely managed to roll out of the way.

“Watch where you’re going!” she yelled after him.

Nott just laughed. “Your brother’s not here to save you _now_ , is he, Granger?”

“Come on, Hermione, kick his arse!” Ron Weasley (who was on her team today) called encouragingly from the scoring area. She gritted her teeth and took off after him.

Unlike a lot of people, Theo Nott was both a decent player and had a good broom—another _Cleansweep Seven_ , in fact, which would have made him a real challenge to play against, even if he were playing fair, which he most definitely was not.

It should have been easy, since the opposing keeper was on a school broom that could barely stand up to the stresses of Quidditch. But today, she might be taking a run at him, when she would feel a sudden jerk and nearly topple off the front of her broom, not to mention dropping the Quaffle, only to turn around and see that Nott had grabbed her broom’s tail. Or she might be moving to catch a pass when he would come up alongside her and give her a sharp jab in the ribs with his elbow to block her. But the worst offence came when they were making a close run at the goalposts, with him trying to block her from throwing the Quaffle, when he suddenly locked the handle of his broom around hers and pushed her off course—hard.

“Stop it!” Hermione yelled.

But Nott didn’t stop. He kept going off course until it was clear that he was going to try to run her into one of the towers. “No one to save you now, mudblood!” Nott yelled with glee.

“Let go!” She snapped her fingers and drew her wand from her wrist holster, but Nott grabbed her wand arm to try to stop her from pointing it at him. However, before he could react, she turned it around in her hand and hit him with a Stinging Jinx to the face, forcing him to break off and spiral down to the ground.

“Ow! Foul for wand use, mudblood!” he yelled.

“Foul for blurting!” Hermione yelled back. “And for trying to shove me into the tower. I’m sure there’s a name for that, too.”

A fight might have started then and there—Ron was already trying to take a swing at him—when Madam Hooch caught up with them and stopped them.

“That’s enough from both of you,” their teacher snapped. “Nott, ten points from Slytherin, and all of you get back to the castle before you cause any more trouble.”

Hermione was fuming when she came back inside, and she must have cut quite a figure by the time she met up with her brother—stalking through the castle with a grimace of anger, her robes askew, her hair sticking out everywhere, and carrying her broomstick more than a little like a club. She thought she actually scared a couple of first years who crossed her path.

“Whoa, Mione, what happened to you?” Harry asked nervously when he saw her.

“Theo Nott happened, that’s what,” she grumbled.

“Oh no, are you okay? What’d he do?”

“That prat fouled me about six times.”

“He did?”

“Yeah, he got me with blagging, blatching, blurting, _and_ cobbing. _And_ he tried to crash my broom. And he called me mudblood.”

Harry’s face darkened. “That’s it, I’m gonna get him,” he hissed, and he stalked off toward the Great Hall with an angry, cat-like gait.

Hermione paled suddenly when she realised what she’d just done, and she ran after him. “Harry, please don’t do anything,” she pleaded.

“Sorry, Mione. I’m not gonna let him do that to you.”

“I can take care of myself. Really. You _know_ I can.”

“But you’re under my protection. It’s a matter of house honour.”

“Oh, come on, Harry, house honour for name calling and Quidditch fouls?”

“Yes, in a muggle school, he’d’ve been cited for harassment by now, and you know it…Look, I know house honour isn’t that big a deal to us, but it matters to _them_. If they’re going to respect me _and_ you, I need to be able to stand up to them.”

“But Harry, picking a fight isn’t the answer. It never has been in our family.”

“There’s times when it’s gotta be done. I can’t let Nott get away with this. Not this time.”

“Okay.” She threw up her hands. “Okay, go do what you think you have to do, but _you_ get to explain the whole thing to Mum and Dad.”

“Deal,” Harry said resolutely, which surprised Hermione. She thought that would’ve got to him a little, but he looked really mad this time.

This wasn’t going to end well.

They reached the Great Hall, and Harry made a beeline for the Slytherin Table. That immediately turned some heads, especially since Harry Potter was looking almost murderous.

Draco Malfoy rose to his feet. “Do you have business here, Mr. Potter?”

“I want a word with Mr. Nott.”

Nott also rose to face him with a hint of a smirk. “What is it, Mr. Potter?”

“I want you to apologise to Hermione for singling her out for attack in the Flying club, and for calling her a vile slur.”

Nott’s smirk grew. “And what alleged vile slur was that?”

Harry glared at him with his trademark feline stare. “You _don_ _’t_ want to make me say it, Nott. You’ve been harassing my sister for months, insulting her, and now trying to hurt her. That’s no way for a proper pureblood to act, and I want an apology.”

Nott lowered his voice and took a step closer to Harry so that the teachers wouldn’t overhear. “A proper pureblood doesn’t apologise to a mudblood,” he said.

“Then a proper pureblood is a bloody arrogant prat,” Harry said. Nott must surely feel the ripples of magic around him, right? Or did Nott just think he really was stronger than Harry. “And I demand you take that back.”

“Why should I? You think you’re so great because you’re the Boy-Who-Lived, and then you come in here with your mudblood sister and still expect respect.”

 _No, I never expected respect from the son of a Death Eater_ , Harry thought, but what he said was, “Stopping calling her that.”

“Why deny the truth, Potter?” He dropped his voice to a whisper. “It doesn’t matter if she earns top marks or wins prizes or even spreads her legs for a rich pureblood. You can’t change the contamination on the inside.”

And with that jab, Theodore Nott found Harry Potter’s breaking point. Harry took a step back, pointed at the Slytherin boy, and shouted, “That’s it! Theodore Nott, I DEMAND SATISFACTION!”

The Great Hall fell to a deadly silence as everyone stopped and stared at the duo. Fights happened at Hogwarts, but honour duels were very rare—maybe one a year or so, and never this high-profile. Students and staff alike waited with baited breath to see how Nott would react. Hermione was taken aback, but she was too stunned to interfere.

But Nott looked like he’d been waiting for this for a while. He stood his ground, grinned, and looked Harry in the eye. “Then you shall have it, sir!” he shouted. “Magic only. None of your muggle fighting.”

“Agreed,” Harry said. “Here in the Great Hall after dinner, if that’s acceptable.”

“Agreed,” Nott answered, and the duel was set. Whispers immediately began to circle around the Hall, with people speculating on the outcome, the political ramifications, what effect, if any, the Heir of Slytherin would have on things, and no doubt placing bets. This was the most exciting thing to happen at Hogwarts since at least the Valentine’s Day mess.

Harry looked up to the High Table to see Professor McGonagall rising from her seat with a disapproving expression. “Mr. Potter, is this really necessary?” she asked.

“I’m afraid it is, Professor,” Harry replied. “The Heir to the _Noble_ House of Nott has been harassing and insulting my sister, who is under the Protection of the Noble House of Potter, for months, now, and as the head of that house I will no longer tolerate it. Under the school bylaws, you are required to accommodate a properly invoked duel of honour. If Mr. Nott does not object, I request Professor Flitwick to be our moderator. If the field of honour is not available, then we will accept a different location.”

McGonagall drew herself up in a formal pose. It had been a long time since a student had spoken to her in such a manner—perhaps never as the _head_ of their house, in fact. She knew that Harry didn’t even _like_ to pull rank, but it was pretty clear he wasn’t going to back down. “Very well, Lord Potter,” she replied. “The duel of honour is recognised. The Great Hall will be available immediately following dinner. And Professor Flitwick, if you would moderate…” The tiny Charms Master nodded. “I do hope to see both of you in one piece when this is over.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Harry said. He led Hermione back to the Gryffindor Table, keeping one eye on Nott the whole time.

When they sat down, Hermione looked steadfastly at her own plate and gave Harry a taste of his own I’m-ignoring-you medicine. “Are you going to use you-know-what?” was the only thing she asked of him.

“Haven’t ruled it out,” he replied.

“Well, just remember what I said.”

“Yes, yes, I get to explain it to Mum and Dad.” _I_ _’ll probably be grounded for this,_ he thought, _but it_ _’ll be worth it._

All the other Gryffindors crowded around him, talking over each other: “Way to go, Harry!” “Yeah, get that wanker.” “Wow, an honour duel. This is awesome!” “That was irresponsible, Mr. Potter.” (Percy.) “Kick his arse for the rest of us.”

The Gryffindors barely finished dinner, what with so many of them alternately asking Harry how he was going to beat Nott and trying to offer him tips. The excitement bled over to the other tables, as everyone was eager to see what would happen. Harry and Nott could be seen conspicuously glaring at each other all through dinner. However, Harry was dismayed to see several teachers continuing to shoot disappointed looks his way.

By the time dinner ended, Madam Pomfrey had been summoned and was looking very stern, but ready to deal with any injuries. Professor Trelawney, the batty Divination teacher, showed up half through dinner, even though it wasn’t clear who had summoned her, and there were far more ghosts floating up near the ceiling than usual. _No one_ wanted to miss an honour duel involving Harry Potter. Harry remembered what Professor Lockhart had said back at the first Duelling Club meeting: _Honour duels are far more serious business than anything we_ _’ll be doing here._ It looked like he’d got that bit right.

Finally, the time came when McGonagall would normally dismiss everyone, but this time, she stood and said, “A duel has been arranged to occur at this time. Any students wishing to leave may do so now.”

No one did.

“Please stand.”

Everyone stood, and several teachers stacked the house tables against the walls.

“Professor Flitwick, if you would.”

Flitwick stepped into the middle of the Great Hall, and all the students backed up against the tables as he began erecting duelling wards down the middle of the Hall. When they were ready, he said in a deeper and more formal voice than they had ever heard from him before, “Will the combatants and their seconds please step forward.”

“Hermione, will you at least be my second for this?” Harry asked quietly.

Hermione rolled her eyes and said, “Well, I guess _someone_ has to stop you from getting killed out there.” She followed him out to the middle of the Hall, while Nott strode out the other end flanked by Draco Malfoy, who looked noticeably less enthusiastic than Nott did. Malfoy clearly suspected Harry had a trick up his sleeve.

“Lord Potter, are you willing to settle your dispute with Mr. Nott peacefully?” Flitwick asked.

Harry considered how to reply for a moment, but he decided there was no good way out of saying the word (and besides, Hermione had said it without flinching). “Not unless Mr. Nott, at minimum, apologises for calling my sister a mudblood,” he said.

Many students and even Professors Sprout and Trelawney gasped, not having heard how serious the insult was. Few would dispute that calling out Nott was acceptable for that alone.

“Not this time, Potter,” Nott sneered. “It’s time we settled this properly.”

“Fine by me. We will duel, Professor.”

“Very well. Take your positions.”

Harry and Nott entered the duelling wards from opposite ends and approached each other. In accordance with the Honour Code, they brandished their wands, bowed, and then turned around and paced back the ends of the wards, where they took their stances to cast. Harry’s senses were on high alert the whole time—mundane and magical—but Nott didn’t try anything.

“No lethal spells, maiming, or Unforgivable Curses,” Flitwick reminded them. “Cast on three. One…two…three!”

“ _Expelliarmus_!” Harry cried, while Nott led with, “ _Incendio_!”

 _Well, he_ _’s certainly bowling fast,_ Harry thought. “ _Everte Statum! Glacius! Immobulus_!”

“ _Contego! Diffindo_!” Nott yelled. Things like Severing Charms weren’t technically against the rules because they were relatively easy to block and could be cast weak enough not to do much damage (which was all Nott was likely to be able to do anyway). This was as opposed to many dark spells that were specifically designed to maim and would not be allowed here.

Just the same, Harry wasn’t keen to make contact with that spell. “ _Contego_!” he cast. “ _Flipendo! Skontapto! Glistrima_!” He followed the strategy that had generally served him well in the Duelling Club: firing several spells at a time in short bursts and dodging as much as he could. However, Nott was one of the best duellists in his year and was fast showing himself to be more familiar with the destructive end of the sport.

“ _Fumos_!”

And good with smokescreens, apparently. Harry quickly cast “ _Evanesco_!” and dispelled the smoke, but it cost him precious seconds, and he lost track of where Nott was standing.

“ _Spongenu! Digiti Wibbly! Expelliarmus_!” Nott cast.

Harry ducked and rolled, but the Disarming Charm actually connected. However his wand caught on his wrist strap and bounced back into his hand. He immediately shot back with “ _Locomotor Mortis! Petrificus Totalis! Keratoglossa_!”

“ _Contego! Contego! Bombarda! Diffindo! Percutio_!”

Nott really wasn’t pulling any punches. His curses might not be strong, but he was still forcing Harry back. The school watched in awe as spell after spell splashed off the duelling wards. Hermione winced as her brother was backed down the row, and Harry focused on trying to get Nott’s wand away from him: “ _Expelliarmus! Relashio! Ventus! Flipendo_!”

It was a battle fiercer than any second years or even third years had engaged in at the Duelling Club, and lightning fast. Harry was extremely agile, but Nott was holding his own with Blocking Charms. It was almost like a dance, except that one misstep could land one in a fair bit of pain. Then, the unthinkable happened. Harry zigged when he should have zagged, and Nott managed to connect with not one, but two Disarming Charms, knocking his wand out of his holster. The crowd gasped as Harry Potter went sprawling on his back, groaning in pain and wandless.

Nott swaggered forward and stood over Harry. “Well, Potter, it looks like the legend is just a story after all,” he said. “Do you think you can defend your mudblood sister _now_?”

“Mr. Nott!” Flitwick squeaked.

“Oh dear,” Hermione said, for she knew exactly what was about to happen.

Harry was livid. When Nott came over to rub it in, that was bad enough, but he’d dragged Hermione into this for the last time. As the Slytherin stood grinning over him, Harry pooled his energy, threw both his hands up, and without speaking a word, cast a powerful wandless _Flipendo_. There was a loud crack in the air, and the unprepared boy sailed back down the floor and landed in a heap. And everyone gasped even louder as they realised just why Harry had that odd tick of always verbally yielding whenever he lost a duel in the club.

Harry leapt to his feet and marched over to Nott without bothering to retrieve his wand.

“Y-you can’t do that!” Nott yelled from where he lay. Malfoy just looked speechless.

“I just did.”

Nott raised his wand: “ _Incen_ —”

But Harry was faster than him without a wand. In a move worthy of Dumbledore himself, he disarmed Nott with a casual wave of his hand before he could complete the spell. “Do you yield, Mr. Nott?”

“But—but—that’s against the rules!”

“Is not. You said magic only. You didn’t say anything about having to use a wand. Now, Mr. Nott…” He tried to intimidate him; he whispered “ _Lacarnum Inflamari_ ,” and conjured Bluebell Flames in each hand, then quickly applied a Colour-Change Charm to make it look like he was handling real fire. “ _Do you yield_?”

“Ahh! Yes! Yes! I yield! I yield!” Nott cried, seeing as he probably couldn’t cast wandlessly to save his life.

Harry closed his hands, extinguishing the cold flames. Then he smiled. “My honour is satisfied,” he said. He turned around and walked away. As he went, he levitated his and Nott’s wands to him and tossed Nott’s back over his shoulder without looking back. He kept his magic sense tuned to any spells flying at his back, but a little to his surprise, there weren’t any.

“The dispute has been resolved,” Flitwick confirmed, and he took down the duelling wards.

It was then that Harry was hit with a tidal wave of sound. Three-quarters of the school was applauding him, at least for his incredible demonstration of magic, if not directly for trouncing Nott. Even some of the teachers joined in, though McGonagall still looked disapproving. Snape seemed shocked, and Trelawney looked like she might faint. McGonagall and Flitwick had told their colleagues of Harry’s and Hermione’s proficiency without a wand, but it was hard to believe it until they saw it. Like so much around Harry Potter, than duel was sure to become a part of the legend. Severus Snape in particular felt like he needed to go to his quarters and pour himself a stiff double. It was a pity Potter looked so much like his father, he thought, since he had undeniably inherited his mother’s protective streak, her talent with charms, and—Snape remembered with a shudder—her temper.

“Harry, that was incredible!” his fellow Gryffindors said. “You told me you could do wandless magic, but bloody hell!” “No one beats Harry Potter!” “He’ll think twice before he tries that again.” “I’ve never seen anyone but Dumbledore do that.” “Is that how you beat You-Know-Who?”

The adulation was almost out of control by the time Harry his housemates reached the Gryffindor Common Room. Harry was barely able to calm them down. “Okay, guys, guys. We get it. I’m Harry Potter,” he told the crowd pressing around him. “It’s not that big a deal. Come on, Hermione, tell them—help me out, here.”

“Oh, _really_ , you want my help _now_?” she said. She got a wicked smile on her face, then she made a particular hand gesture, and Harry suddenly found himself hanging in midair by his ankle. “Not like that!” he yelled. He was gonna get Sirius for teaching her that one.

Most of Gryffindor gasped again and took a couple of steps back as they saw Hermione Granger make just an impressive show of wandless magic as her brother. “No, it’s not a super Boy-Who-Lived power,” she explained. “It’s actually not that hard to learn if you start young and have a lot of patience. We’ve just had a lot of time to work on it.”

She floated Harry over a sofa, and he cancelled the charm on himself, falling onto the cushions. She nearly fell over herself from exhaustion—that was a hard spell, but she kept it together for appearances’ sake. “Good,” Harry said, brushing himself off. “Now that’s sorted…” He turned and started up the stairs to his dorm. He was plenty tired, too. That duel had taken a lot out of him.

Ginny Weasley was speechless as she watched Harry disappear up the stairs. Ron had mentioned that both Harry and Hermione could do wandless magic, but that was beyond anything she’d ever dreamed. The way Harry had wiped the floor with Nott was incredible. Even the books didn’t have him doing things like _that_. She didn’t know how she could ever measure up to that level, but one thing was for sure. She did not want to get on Harry Potter’s bad side.

Harry heard a ruckus from the seventh-year dorms as he climbed the stairs. One could hear a lot going up and down the stairs of the towers, and tonight, he could make out the dulcet tones of Percy Weasley: “Really, McLaggen, where do you even _find_ all of this stuff. And I think I’ll take that ledger, too.” _Finn McLaggen getting in trouble again_ , he thought. _Well, at least one thing is normal around here_.


	58. You Will Obey Me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: It is JK Rowling, Harry, that shows what we truly are, far more than our abilities.
> 
> Part of this chapter has been quoted from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.
> 
> Several reviewers have complained that I’ve been making Hermione more powerful or generally better than Harry. First off, Hermione is better at magic. JK Rowling herself has said that Hermione would have beaten Harry in a duel at first, but he passed her up sometime in third year. Also, Hermione is smarter and is more often the voice of reason, especially in the early books. I don’t think any of that is controversial. However, if any of you thinks that Harry is a deficient character, just read this chapter and especially the next one.

Most of the school woke on Saturday morning thinking it was a beautiful day for a Quidditch game and were excitedly talking about Harry Potter taking to the skies again. Some of them were still gossipping about Harry’s astounding wandless trouncing of Theodore Nott. Ginny Weasley, however, had something different from either of those things on her mind.

She had seen Percy with the diary!

How _anyone_ could have got the diary out of that massive room was beyond her, although after listening to her brother, she had an inkling that Finn McLaggen had something to do with it. But now Percy had it! Worse yet, _he hadn_ _’t turned it in yet!_ It must be doing something to him already for that to happen. Was he writing in it? Did he know something now? The thought made her physically ill. How was it that she couldn’t get rid of the damn thing?

She’d had to wait two days for Percy to slip up around her. She couldn’t do anything to make him suspicious. It wasn’t until after breakfast that Saturday, when he was corralling the excited students who were getting ready for the match, that she saw that he let his guard down. She snuck up behind her brother, reached out where the diary was poking out of his pocket, and snatched it away. Percy spun around to see who had brushed his robes, but Ginny had already vanished into the crowd.

She ran.

Up one flight, two flights, three flights, down a corridor…She had to get rid of it again, before something else bad happened. She needed a new place to hide it, but from the lowest dungeon to the highest tower, she couldn’t think of any place that would be better than that room.

 _It_ _’s too late, Ginny_ , Tom whispered in her mind. _Far too late. You will be mine._

 _No! You_ _’re going back in the room,_ she thought, _and this time, I_ _’ll find a way to knock down one of those big piles on top of you. McLaggen’s graduating soon. There’s no way he’ll find you again that fast._

_You cannot resist me._

But she was trying, still. In fact, she might have succeeded, except that a certain girl caught her eye. Tom’s powers of control were also fuelled by emotion, the same as her resistance, and seeing that girl again was giving him a very strong drive to act. This time, she would not escape. _Turn around,_ he thought. _You will obey me._

_No! Not again!_

_I am your Master, and you will obey me!_

Ginny’s body betrayed her once again, and she was dragged from her chosen course back to the second floor girls’ bathroom. She cried and pleaded the whole way not to do it again, or even just to let somebody else do it, but Tom had built up his strength with all that time waiting. She spoke the terrible words that did terrible things and set out in search of her prey.

She spotted her target on her way back from a trip to the library with another girl, but something had changed. They looked very solemn and nervous. They were constantly looking down at the ground and listening intently for any activity. Most tellingly, they were looking around every corner with a mirror. She knew full well what that meant.

 _How convenient_ , Tom thought, although by this point it really mattered little whether Granger lived or died. The important thing was to make sure Potter would do anything to get to the bottom of it.

 _No, Tom, please, don_ _’t!_ Ginny thought desperately. _Not Hermione! Not Hermione! Please not Hermione!_

_There can be no other, Ginny, and I will not miss this time. Get her._

_You don_ _’t understand. Harry_ crushed _Nott just for insulting her. There_ _’s no telling what he’ll do if she’s attacked._

_Oh, I_ _’m counting on it. Do it. Order the creature._

_No, I won_ _’t!_

_Do it, you silly girl! Do it now!_

_Not Hermione, please no, take me instead! Let me do it! Please, Tom. Harry will hate me forever if I attack his sister!_

_No, I have another purpose for you. I will not back down this time. I let you get away with a few things, Ginny, but no more. You have no other choice. Petrify Hermione Granger!_

Ginny tried to fight it, tried to cry out, but once more, her body would not obey. She spoke the horrible words that she never wanted to speak again and sent the monster around the next corner. There was a hissing sound, a brief yelp, and then two thuds.

“NOOOO!” she screamed. She held out the diary and tried to rip the pages out by hand, but no matter how hard she tried, they wouldn’t tear, and she only succeeded in giving herself several very nasty paper cuts. Her blood dripped onto the pages and was absorbed into the paper.

She ran again, breaking down in tears as she went. She couldn’t destroy it, and she couldn’t get rid of it. She couldn’t show it to somebody else. There was no telling what would happen to her, or them, for that matter. She was doomed. Eventually, she ran back to her dorm room, praying nobody else was in there. They weren’t, and she locked herself in and collapsed on the bed in tears.

What was happening to her?

* * *

Harry Potter was very nervous, and it wasn’t because of Quidditch. He wasn’t even sure there _would_ be a Quidditch match today at this rate. As he was walking back from breakfast to get his broomstick, he heard something—something like someone whispering. Something that sounded an awful lot like that voice he’d heard last Christmas: _Time to kill._ Except that now he knew what the odd inflection really was.

“Parseltongue?” Hermione gasped.

“I’m sure of it,” he said. “We should’ve thought of that before. It’s Slytherin, after all. We have to warn Professor McGonagall. Do you have any idea what kind of snake it could be?”

“No, not off the top of my head—but I can find out.” She hurried off in the other direction.

“Hermione, Dumbledore said—” Harry called.

“I’m not going after the Heir. I’m going to the library. I want to get a book on magical snakes. I’ll meet you in McGonagall’s office.”

“Hermione—” He started to run up the stairs after her. “Hermione, wait!”

“There’s no time!”

“Well, at least find a prefect to go with you.”

“Fine, I’m on it,” she called behind her as she passed out of sight.

Harry stared after her for a few seconds, shaking his head, before heading off to Professor McGonagall’s office. Once there, he needed a couple of minutes to adequately explain what was going on and what Hermione was up to. McGonagall didn’t approve of what Hermione was doing any more than Harry, but she agreed to wait for her to arrive, assuming it didn’t take very long. If she could identify the monster in the Chamber, it would be invaluable.

“There are many species of magical snakes in the world, Mr. Potter,” McGonagall explained, “some of them very rare and obscure, and yet Salazar Slytherin would have had easy access to them. There are still more ways to enchant a mundane snake. I could make a few good guesses as to what we might be facing, but nothing I can think of at the moment petrifies like we see in the victims. If your sister can positively identify it, it would save a lot of effort.”

Harry could see the logic was sound, but he couldn’t shake the lingering nervousness. He and Hermione were both targets, and it wasn’t good for either of them to be wandering the castle right now—or any of the other students, for that matter. “But most of them are on their way to the Quidditch Pitch right now—out of the castle,” McGonagall said. “It will be more dangerous if I tell them to come back inside now.” However, she did alert the portraits to pass the word along.

Harry was still getting a very bad feeling, and with good reason, because a couple of minutes later, a tiny, silver mouse came through the wall and spoke in Professor Flitwick’s voice: “Minerva, please find Harry Potter and bring him to the Hospital Wing at once.”

Harry shot to his feet: “Oh, Merlin’s Beard, no!” He ran from the office.

“Mr. Potter, wait!” McGonagall said, but Harry wasn’t listening. She could understand he was a distraught, protective brother, but was he ever going to get a talking to when this was over. She ran after him, but she quickly realised that she wasn’t as young as she once was, and Harry was an uncommonly fit twelve-year-old. There was only way she could keep up with him.

Harry barely even noticed the grey tabby cat running up alongside him and meowing at him as he sprinted to the Hospital Wing, hoping—praying that he’d misunderstood. That it wasn’t what he thought it was. But of course, he knew. When he entered the infirmary, she was there in the first bed, glassy-eyed and still as stone, one arm held out in front of her at an odd angle, and a look of fear frozen on her face.

“Hermione!”

Several torches blew out, a number of loose objects clattered to the ground, and the nearest window shattered outward. Harry ran over to her bedside and all but threw himself on top of her, sobbing onto her shoulder. A moment later, he threw his head back and let out a long cry that sounded like a cat in pain.

McGonagall transformed back to human and approached her student. “Mr. Potter—ouch!” She yelped and flinched back when she tried to lay a hand on his shoulder. His magic was so uncontained that it was like an electric shock. “Mr. Potter, please try to calm yourself,” she said. “It will do you no good to magically exhaust yourself. Your sister will be fine once the mandrakes are matured.”

 _Yeah, which won_ _’t be for another three weeks, he thought ruefully. What’s Hermione gonna say when she finds out she missed her prime study time?_ He took a couple of deep breaths and tamped down the magic that was swirling around him before he could pass out. “Hermione, why’d you have to go and do that?” he sobbed. “I should have stopped you! I knew the Heir was after you—I should have stopped you!”

“Mr. Potter, I’m very sorry.” McGonagall successfully placed her hand on his shoulder this time.

“She had it figured out. I know she did. She was going to tell us. Maybe the Heir got her because of that. Professor, you have to _do something_!”

“There has never yet been more than one attack at a time,” she reasoned. “I will order the students back to their dorms and reinstate the strict security measures. We will begin searching again based on the most recent security changes.”

“That’s not good enough!” Harry shouted. The chairs started rattling again, and he took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down.

“I will do what I can, Harry, but even with a clue as to what the monster is, we still have no idea where to find the Chamber.” She sighed. “And I’m afraid the school may not be able to stay open at this point.”

“Mr. Potter?” a squeaky voice said.

Harry’s head snapped up to see Professor Flitwick standing beside a second bed. There, the muggle-born Ravenclaw prefect, Penelope Clearwater, also lay petrified. _Of course,_ he thought, _Mione was in such a hurry that she grabbed the first prefect she could find and didn_ _’t think about whether she was a target, too._

“I found them near the library,” Flitwick said. “Your sister was holding this.” He held up a small hand mirror. “Do you have any explanation…?”

Harry shook his head: “No, no idea.”

“Very well,” McGonagall said. “I’ll escort you back to Gryffindor Tower.”

“I’ll stay here, ma’am.”

“Harry, I’m afraid I must insist.”

“The Hospital Wing’s still open to family, isn’t it?” Harry snapped. “I don’t have anything else to do today. I’m gonna stay here.”

“Really, under the circumstances, you can’t—ouch! Mr. Potter!” He’d struck her with that electric shock again, except it was more controlled this time—a wandless Stinging Jinx, she suspected.

“Please, Professor,” he said as he broke down in tears again. “I need some time with her. Please just let me stay with her…”

McGonagall’s heart broke as she saw the boy so distressed. How deeply he cared for his sister—she couldn’t tear him away like that. If it continued until it became unhealthy…but for today, she could leave him be. “Poppy, will you keep an eye on Mr. Potter, please? Harry, do not leave this room without an escort.” He nodded, and McGonagall and Flitwick hurried out to deal with the rest of the students.

* * *

Harry stayed by Hermione’s beside for what felt like hours—certainly long enough to get the students corralled and informed of what happened. He refused Madam Pomfrey’s offer of lunch, and when she repeated her request, he told her off so vehemently that he was sure the Mediwitch had come close to confining him to a bed of his own, but he didn’t care right now. All he could do was sit by Hermione’s side and stroke her hair—the one part of her than wasn’t rock-solid.

“Hermione, I’m so sorry. I should have been there for you,” he said for probably the tenth time.

“It’s not your fault.”

It wasn’t Madam Pomfrey’s voice. Harry spun around with a loud hiss and a nameless hex glowing in his outstretched hand, but there was no one there. “Who’s there?” he demanded.

There was a shimmer in the air, and an invisibility cloak fell away…revealing Neville Longbottom.

“Neville?” Harry gasped in disbelief. Neville wasn’t the type to defy a teacher, or to steal Harry’s invisibility cloak, as he must have done, or to go sneaking around the school like this. “What’re you doing here?”

“I came to see you,” the round-faced boy said. “You and Hermione. McGonagall told me you were still down here, and I couldn’t just leave you. Both of you have been really good friends and all…”

“And…and you took my invisibility cloak and sneaked down here?” Harry kept one eye on Madam Pomfrey’s office in case she came back out.

“Sorry.” Neville looked down at his feet and held out the cloak. “I hope you don’t mind—”

“It’s fine. I’m…I’m glad you came.”

“Thanks. Anyway, it’s not your fault. It’s the Heir did this.”

“I knew the Heir was after her. I should have stayed with her.”

“Then he—she, you said—might’ve got you, too. Besides, I should’ve stayed with her, too. I was really worried after the Heir almost got her before, and I told you you could stick close to me.”

Harry remembered and kicked himself for forgetting, but it was no use now. “I know. It’s just it’d been so long…”

“I know. I wonder why the Heir started up again now,” Neville replied.

“Maybe she thought we were on to her,” Harry said. He explained Hermione’s idea about a snake.

“Hmm, could be, the other boy agreed. Do you know if she figured anything out?”

“No, she didn’t bring a book. Just that mirror.” He pointed at the bedside table. “It’s weird. She doesn’t normally carry a mirror—I don’t think. It must have been Penelope’s.”

“D’you think she was looking at something behind her?” Neville suggested.

“I don’t know—why would she?” Suddenly intrigued, Harry scrambled to his feet, picked up the mirror, and slipped it into Hermione’s frozen, outstretched hand. Something didn’t look right about the angle. “I don’t think she was looking behind her.” He bent over her and tried to get a good look from her perspective, but he couldn’t get close enough. “Hang on, help me shift her,” he said.

He and Neville slid Hermione over to the edge of the bed, and Harry lay down beside her and put his head next to hers. Correcting for the position of her eyes, he thought the view in the mirror looked an awful lot like a ninety-degree angle. “She was looking…around a _corner_ ,” he concluded.

“A corner?” Neville said. “Why?”

“I don’t know. It—” Harry stopped as his hand brushed something. In Hermione’s left hand, pressed tight to her side, there was a crumpled-up piece of parchment. Looking closer, he worked carefully to slide it out of her clenched fingers and uncrumpled it. He gasped when he saw that it was a page from a book. This _must_ be important. Had Hermione Granger actually defaced a library book?

“What is it?” Neville asked.

Harry read over the parchment with growing anticipation. “…It’s the answer!” He read the page aloud:

 

_Of the many fearsome beasts and monsters that roam our land, there is none more curious or more deadly than the Basilisk, known also as the King of Serpents. This snake, which may reach gigantic size and live many hundreds of years, is born from a chicken_ _’s egg, hatched beneath a toad. Its methods of killing are most wondrous, for aside from its deadly and venomous fangs, the Basilisk has a murderous stare, and all who are fixed with the beam of its eye shall suffer instant death. Spiders flee before the Basilisk, for it is their mortal enemy, and the Basilisk flees only from the crowing of the rooster, which is fatal to it._

“The monster’s a basilisk?” Neville squeaked in horror. “But—but if its gaze kills, why didn’t anybody die?”

“Because of the mirrors! Hermione and Penelope saw it in this mirror. Sophie and Lydia were found with a mirror, too. Colin had his camera. Justin…Justin must have seen it _through_ Nearly-Headless Nick, and Mrs. Norris…the bathroom was flooded, remember? There was water on the floor, and she saw its reflection there. Everyone saw it either reflected or obscured. No one looked it straight in the eye. _That_ _’s_ why no one’s died yet.”

“That can’t be a coincidence, though,” Neville said astutely. “Not that many times. Why would the Heir deliberately petrify everybody?”

“I don’t know—but at least we know what we’re up against, now.”

“But…but Harry, it says basilisks are gigantic. One that old has to be _really_ huge. How’s it getting around the castle?”

“Hermione answered that, too.” He pointed to the bottom of the page, where a single word was scrawled in: _Pipes_.

“ _Pipes_?” Neville said. “It’s getting around through the _plumbing_?”

“If the pipes are big enough, it would make sense.”

“So, what, then, the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets is in a bathroom or something?” Neville said sceptically. “I woulda thought Salazar Slytherin would be more dignified than that.”

Harry deflated. “Yeah, you’re right,” he said. “It _doesn_ _’t_ make sense.” He sat down and rested his hand on his chin, his eyes periodically flicking back to the parchment. “Everything else makes sense, though,” he muttered. “Why would the Chamber open onto pipes and not a secret passage somewhere?” He kept thinking until he was sure he had hit a dead end, and then a thought came to him. “Wait a minute,” he said in a low voice. “Wait a _minute_.” He stood up and started pacing. “In _Hogwarts, A History_ , it says that Hogwarts’s modern plumbing system wasn’t installed until the eighteenth century. So what _looks_ like a bathroom now…”

“Might not have been when the school was built.” Neville concluded. “Brilliant. How do you _remember_ this stuff, Harry? I can never remember anything.”

“Hey, growing up with Hermione, you have to learn to keep up.”

“Wicked,” said Neville. “But it couldn’t be a bathroom that’s used much, could it? Otherwise, all the victims would be right there, wouldn’t they?”

 _You know, Neville_ _’s a lot smarter than he gets credit for_ , Harry thought. “Good point, it’d have to be one that’s out of the way and not used much. Neville, do you know what this means? We could narrow down the search for the Chamber!”

“But Harry, there’s loads of bathrooms in the school. I don’t even know where all of them are.”

A grin crossed Harry’s face for the first time in hours. “I know some blokes who do—Quick, get under the cloak. We have to back to the Tower.” He gave his sister one last look and kissed her on the forehead. “We’ll get you out of here soon, Mione,” he whispered. Thinking fast, he grabbed the mirror, too. Couldn’t be too careful right now.

The two boys ducked under the invisibility cloak and slipped past Madam Pomfrey’s office. (McGonagall had never said Harry needed a _teacher_ as an escort, right?) Harry listened for any hint of Parseltongue the whole way, and they also used the mirror to look around all the corners. Harry came out from under the cloak (no one knew Neville had left) just outside Gryffindor Tower and gave the password to a very flustered Fat Lady.

Everyone stared at Harry for a moment when he stepped into the crowded Common Room, before all the Gryffindors mobbed around him, offering their sympathy. He let out a crackle of magic that made them all step back nervously while his eyes scanned the room. Spotting the two people he needed, still in their Quidditch robes, he called out, “Fred! George! Marauders emergency!”

Fred and George Weasley jumped to attention and, at a gesture, followed Harry up the stairs.

“Harry? What’s going on?” Ron said and followed after them.

By the time the Twins got to the dorm, Harry had already taken the invisibility cloak back from Neville and pulled the Marauder’s Map and his communication mirror from his trunk. (Hermione’s own communication mirror was in her room, where he couldn’t get it.)

“What d’you need, Mr. Ratsbane?” Fred and George said in unison.

“Ratsbane?” Neville asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Family nickname,” Harry dismissed it. “I have an idea where the Chamber of Secrets is, but I need your help.” He tapped the map: “I solemnly swear that I am up to no good.” And he touched the mirror: “Sirius Black.”

Within seconds, Sirius and Remus appeared in the mirror. “Harry, we just heard from McGonagall. We’re so sorry,” Sirius said frantically.

“Yeah, Hermione left me a clue, though,” Harry replied.

“She did?” Remus said.

Harry held up the page from the book and explained how they had put all the clues together.

“Bloody hell, a basilisk?” Remus gasped. “Why didn’t I think of that? It’s so obvious when you know the secret.”

“But the _plumbing_?” said Sirius incredulously.

“The plumbing system in Hogwarts is only two hundred and fifty years old,” Remus said. “It says so in—”

“ _Hogwarts, A History_ ,” he and Harry finished in unison. “Exactly. But the only way that makes sense is if the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets is in a bathroom that hardly anybody ever uses. You two and Fred and George know the castle better than anybody. We need to figure out which bathroom it is.”

“Does it have to be a bathroom?” George suggested. “What if it’s the kitchens or laundry?”

“No, too well populated,” Remus replied. “The basilisk would have killed half the elves by now. Harry’s right. It’s got to be a bathroom. Now, we can eliminate the parts of the school that were still closed off before today. Then, let’s start from the dungeons and work our way up.”

“Tilt the mirror a little farther, Harry…” Sirius said. “That’s good.”

“There’s this one in the dungeons,” Fred pointed. “Can’t imagine many people would want to go down there.”

“No, too close to the Potions classrooms,” countered Sirius. “I refuse to believe even Snivellus is that blind.”

Ron snorted loudly. Fred and George stared at each other in surprise at that nickname, but they silently agreed that there continued health would be better served by forgetting they’d heard it.

The group of seven worked their way through the rest of the map, figuring out which bathrooms were little-used and could serve as access points for the basilisk based on where the attacks happened. They found several candidates, but one of them clearly stood out.

“The second floor girls’ loo in the East Wing,” Remus said. “It’s been haunted by a ghost named Moaning Myrtle since before we were in school. It’s always out of order.”

“And that’s right by where the first attack and the message were,” Harry added.

“Wow, that’s _gotta_ be it, then,” Ron said. “It all makes sense, now.”

“Yeah, it does,” Harry agreed. “Okay, I’ve got an idea—just hear me out. I wanna go check out that bathroom.”

“What?!” Sirius and Remus yelled, and they started talking over each other. “Harry, you can’t go down there with a basilisk!” Sirius finished.

“No—I said hear me out—I don’t wanna go in. I just wanna try and find the entrance. We think it only opens for Parseltongue, right? So it has to be me, anyway. Neville and I can go under the cloak, but we’ll get McGonagall first. We’ll use the mirror for all the corners, and I’ll listen for any Parseltongue. And if we do find the entrance, we’ll call the Aurors right away.”

“I’m worried that won’t be enough, Cub…” Sirius said. “But I guess that’s as good a plan as we’re gonna get, and Merlin knows we got up to more dangerous stuff than that. So I guess we can’t physically stop you—but you’d _better_ be safe if you do that.”

“We will; I promise,” Harry said firmly. “Neville are you up to this? We could use someone from a Most Ancient House.”

Neville looked nervous, but he set his jaw and said, “Yeah, I’ll do it.”

“I’ll come with you, too, Harry,” Ron said.

Harry shook his head: “No, Ron. It’ll go faster with just two of us, and no offence, but if anyone’s gonna make the Heir think twice about attacking, it’ll be the Last Son of Longbottom, okay? I need you here, anyway. I need you three—” He pointed to Ron, Fred, and George. “—to watch the Map. If anything goes wrong, tell the nearest teacher right away. Sirius, Remus, if I don’t call back in half an hour, call the Aurors.”

“You can count on it,” Sirius said.

“You can count on us too, Mr. Ratsbane,” Fred and George said together.

“Good. Thanks, all of you. Let’s do this.”

* * *

In an unusual house in a small village in Devon, a very unusual clock chimed. The sole current occupant of that house rushed to see which name was indicated and then raced to the fireplace to make a frantic Floo call—a call that would go unanswered for several hours.

* * *

Impelled by a will not her own Ginny Weasley scrambled down the stairs when she heard the boys emerging from the room. Tom was happy. Harry had figured out where the Chamber was, just like he wanted. And when Tom was happy, it was not good for her. He seemed more in control. She kept trying to fight him, but she was still tired from trying to fight all morning. He forced her to wait in silence until the invisible duo snuck out the portrait hole. He then forced her to cast a weak Notice-Me-Not Charm—just enough so that no one would notice her slip out if they weren’t actually looking for it, and she went after them.

She was made to follow Harry and Neville to McGonagall’s office, where they frantically explained their idea, and she reluctantly lead them to the bathroom where the Chamber was. Tom was listening to their footsteps and hanging back just far enough to go undetected. Ginny wanted to run up and tell McGonagall everything, but she couldn’t stop Tom anymore. All she could hope for was that maybe Harry and Neville would succeed in their mission, then, the Aurors would soon come and get rid of the basilisk. If she could slow Tom down enough—but she felt so tired right now—drained, almost. And it was like he was getting stronger. Her mind was going fuzzy while his will was getting sharper. She could barely fight anymore.

 _Tom, please, Harry_ _’s a half-blood. You don’t have to go after him,_ she pleaded wearily.

 _Oh, I have very different reasons for wanting a chat with Harry Potter_ , Tom said with a wicked laugh. _It_ _’s time to really test his dark wizard fighting skills._

Ginny felt like her blood had turned to ice water. _Please don_ _’t make me do it! I’ll do anything! Please! He’s already freaking out about Hermione. He could kill me if I attack him!_

_I assure you I will be able to keep you quite safe, Ginny._

She was outside the bathroom, now. She could hear Harry and Neville inside, talking to Moaning Myrtle about how she died or some such. Then she heard a whispered word that sent shivers down her spine, and there was a grinding sound. Harry had opened the Chamber.

 _Clever boy,_ Tom said. _Now is our chance. Open the door. Quietly._

_Please don_ _’t!_

_You cannot resist me._

_No! I_ _’ve hurt so many people already!_

She creaked open the door. Harry and Neville had their backs to the door and were using a mirror to look down into the pipe. McGonagall was behind

_Very clever. But they_ _’ve let their guard down. You can strike them both before they have time to react._

_No! No! No!_

“ _Lumos_ ,” Neville said. Harry cast small fireballs down into the pipe.

_Cast the spell!_

“Well, there’s nothing there now, but this has to be it. It responded to Parseltongue.”

Ginny raised her arm.

_Not Harry! Not Harry! Please not Harry!_

“Sirius Black.”

_NOW!_

“What is it, Cub?”

McGonagall started to turn around.

“ _Stupefy! Stupefy! Stupefy_!”

“Harry? Harry!”

Sirius Black and Remus Lupin watched in horror as the view in their mirror started spinning uncontrollably and then shattered into a blackened kaleidoscope.


	59. The Chamber of Secrets

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Harry Potter, thinking over this event afterwards, realised that by his own lifelong standards he had a crew composed entirely of lunatics, with himself well to the front in degree of aberration; but he was fairly sure that this particular form of JK Rowling was going to be useful. 
> 
> Kudos to theartofsafecracking for spotting the Doctor Who reference in the last chapter. I was wondering if anyone would catch that.

“Hello, Mr. Potter.”

Harry woke feeling like he’d been whacked by a Bludger and blinked his eyes open. He was in darkness—only a few torches lined the walls, which were a surprising distance away. He heard a groan next to him and turned to look. Neville was lying beside him, also waking up. He didn’t see McGonagall. The fog lifted from Harry’s mind, and he quickly took stock of the situation. They were in a large, damp chamber, probably underground. He saw pillars elaborately carved with stone serpents. They were in the Chamber of Secrets.

They were in big trouble.

He remembered dropping the mirror, so that was out. His wand was…not in its holster.

“How kind of you to join us,” the voice continued. No, _voices_ , one male and one female. They were speaking English, not Parseltongue, but it was disconcerting just the same. Harry winced in pain as he rolled over and looked at the source of the voices.

“ _Ginny?_!”

Sure enough, there was Ginny Weasley standing over the two boys, but it wasn’t the Ginny Weasley Harry knew. She looked cruel and ruthless, and her eyes were glowing red. She held a wand in one hand, pointing at them, and some kind of small book in the other, and Harry spotted his and Neville’s wands poking out of a pocket of her robes. Behind her stood a fuzzy, transparent shape that looked vaguely like the form of a man, and behind that was an enormous statue of Salazar Slytherin. It was an imposing sight, especially looking up at it from the floor.

“Oh, yes, little Ginny has been a great help to me, although it took some hard work.” A shiver went up Harry’s spine at the sound of those voices. Ginny was speaking in a monotone and stood there like a puppet. She spoke in unison with the ghostly form behind her.

“Professor—?” Harry looked around.

“Still in the bathroom,” the two of them answered. “I would have left you, too, Longbottom, but you _had_ to fall in.”

“Who are you?” Harry demanded as he and Neville staggered to their feet.

“Wh-what are you?” Neville finally found his voice.

“A memory,” the spectre and Ginny said. “Preserved for fifty years in my diary.” That explained the book in Ginny’s hand. “But that won’t mean much to you. In life, I was Tom Marvolo Riddle.”

Harry and Neville both gasped. Neville fell on his bum and started to scramble away. “Y-y-y-you-Kn-n-now—” he stammered.

“ _Voldemort_!” Harry hissed.

“You’ve done your homework,” the two voices said. “Good. That will make this easier, now that I’ve finally got your attention.”

 _Got my attention?_ Harry thought. _Hermione! He attacked Hermione to catch_ me _!_

“I’ve been waiting to speak to you, Harry Potter.” Riddle confirmed. As they spoke, the ghostly form seemed to grow more solid, it’s human features more apparent. And, though it was hard to tell, it looked like Ginny was tiring. That was a bad sign.

“You’re possessing her!” Harry said. “Let her go!”

Riddle just laughed—a high, cold laugh.

Enraged, Harry shot off a wandless, wordless Disarming Charm in Ginny’s direction.

“ _Protego_!” Ginny screamed— _just_ Ginny—and the spell was deflected.

“Now, now, Mr. Potter, you don’t _really_ think you could catch me off guard with a bit of wandless magic, do you?” The voices spoke together again. “Even if you hadn’t made your big revelation to the school, I was quite the adept myself at your age. If you are truly the defeater of Lord Voldemort, you must be able to do better than that.”

 _You_ _’ve got to be kidding me_ , Harry thought. _Even Voldemort himself is buying into the Harry Potter legend?_ As if that were the important thing, but it annoyed him to no end, and he was ready to set him straight. “My _mother_ defeated Lord Voldemort,” he shot back. “My common, _muggle-born_ mother defeated _you_ when she died to save me. And she got you good, too.”

“Harry, what’re you doing?” Neville squeaked behind him.

Harry ignored him. “I saw the real you last year. You were a wreck. You were in even worse shape than this ghost…thing.” But this ghost-thing that was looking more and more human by the minute. He noticed Ginny’s eyelids drooping a little lower as she kept her wand trained on them.”

“Ah, a sacrificial protection, of course,” Riddle and Ginny said. “A pity. I had hoped there was something special that would be useful to me. But no matter. I’ll be rid of you and your mudblood friends soon enough. The Heir of the House of Longbottom is an interesting one, though.” Neville shook with horror. “I shall have to think about what to do with him, but for now…” Ginny waved her wand and conjured a blindfold over his eyes and tied his hands behind his back.

“Ahh! Harry!”

This was about to get very bad very fast. Harry needed to stall Riddle so he could try to think of a plan. Riddle and Ginny started to hiss something, but he quickly said, “How?”

Riddle stopped. “What?”

“How did you control Ginny? How did you possess her with a diary?”

Riddle, who had a well-defined face, now, smiled a cruel smile. “By being her _friend_ , of course—imagine a diary that _wrote back_ —a diary that would always listen to her silly little problems and would offer comforting words, no matter what. Oh, Salazar, it was boring, but she poured out her soul to me until I knew her well enough to take control.”

Harry thought he could see Ginny trembling. “Just like that?” he said. “There’s gotta be more to it. Her brothers said she’s been acting weird all year.”

“Oh, she’s a feisty one, I’ll give you that. She actually fought me off twice—right before my attack in January and again right after. But I’ve always been good at persuading the people I need.”

Harry was at a loss as to what to do. When he had touched Quirrell while he was possessed, he was burnt and then died. He didn’t know if that would happen with Ginny, but he didn’t want to try it. But Quirrell had actually _let_ Voldemort possess him, according to Dumbledore. If Ginny had been fighting it the whole way…

“Ginny!” He said, standing as close as he dared in front of her. “You have to fight him!”

“It’s no use, Potter,” she and Riddle said. “She’s been fighting me all day, but I remain in control.”

“Ginny, I know you’re tired, but you have to fight him. I can’t risk touching you while you’re possessed. It could hurt you. You have to do this on your own. You have to fight him off.” For a moment, he thought he saw the red light in Ginny’s eyes waver.

“No,” Riddle and Ginny said. “You are mine now, Ginny. You cannot resist me.”

“Yes you can!” Harry said. “You fought him off twice before; you can do it again. You’re stronger than he is. You have to get rid of the diary.” He could only hope that she had to actually be _touching_ the diary for him to control her. Ginny’s arm started to extend. “Yes! Come on! That’s it, Ginny, just let it go.”

“Do not do it. You will obey me, Ginny.” Her hand started to pull back.

“Please, Ginny,” Harry pleaded. “Your brothers know you’re down here. They’ll all be worried about you. But none of us are getting out of here unless you can fight him off. Please, you have to let go of the diary. Please!”

The red light in Ginny’s eyes wavered again, and her arm outstretched. She was shaking so badly now that she seemed on the verge of collapse. She held the diary out in her trembling hand for so long that Harry began to contemplate whether he could rush her and grab her wands and the diary before she could get a spell off without touching her. But then, her grip loosened. The diary slipped through her fingers and fell to the floor with a clatter, and the red light vanished from her eyes, leaving them their normal brown.

“Harry, I—” she said breathlessly, but then Riddle lunged and grabbed for the wands. He still looked fuzzy around the edges, but he was solid, now. And at that moment, Ginny fainted.

“Ginny!” Harry lunged forward and caught her.

“You seemed to have a way with witches, Mr. Potter,” Riddle said, “but it doesn’t matter. She doesn’t have much life left in her, now. Possessed or not, I’m taking that for myself.” Harry’s eyes grew wide. He was killing her to gain enough life force to get a new body? He didn’t even _want_ to know what horrible ritual that entailed. “As for you,” Riddle continued, “let’s match the famous Harry Potter against the monster of Salazar Slytherin.” He turned to the giant statue.

 _No!_ “You can’t win!” Harry said desperately.

“Can’t I?”

“Dumbledore knows I’m here by now. He’ll stop you.”

“Dumbledore was driven from this castle months ago,” Riddle sneered.

“He’ll come back. And he has allies. You won’t beat him until you’ve beaten all of us!”

Before Riddle could respond, a musical cry filled the Chamber—a cry that emboldened Harry’s heart and made Riddle turn pale—and a beautiful red and gold bird descended into the Chamber.

“Fawkes!” Harry cried.

Fawkes flew overhead and dropped something at Harry’s feet. It was the Sorting Hat. Then, he circled back to Neville and tore away the ropes that bound him with his beak.

“Harry?” Neville said fearfully as he pulled his blindfold off.

But just then, Riddle called out, “ _See-aachs ungatas Seleetheyin_!”

“Neville, run!” Harry yelled as the mouth of the statue started to open. “ _Sai-achass haashee_!”

He could hear something very big and very deadly slithering out behind him. And he heard that voice again: _“Time to kill.”_

“ _Sai-achass haashee_!” he repeated. “ _Sai-achass haashee! Haashee seeheth_!”

“Parseltongue won’t save you now, Potter!” Riddle mocked him. “It only obeys me.”

Harry and Neville tried to run for the exit in the cathedral-like structure, but the monstrous basilisk was faster. It was going to outflank them and cut off the exit, catching them with its deadly gaze.

Fawkes dived with a screech of righteous anger that almost made Harry want to turn around and go after Riddle barehanded. Then, the basilisk roared in pain, and Riddle shouted. “No! Blasted over-sized pigeon! _Get the boys_!” he hissed in Parseltongue. “ _You can still smell them! KILL THEM_!”

“Smell them?” Harry gasped. “It’s blind! We can fight it!”

“With what?” Neville said.

“We have to get to Riddle!” They turned and ran back the other direction. Harry shook the Sorting Hat. “Come on, come on, there’s got to be something useful about this.” He saw a glint of metal inside the hat and reached inside. It disgorged a beautiful longsword with a jewel-encrusted hilt. “Well, that’s useful.” The basilisk turned toward them, and he held the sword in front of him as Neville gaped at him. The snake was huge—easily three times the length of anything he’d ever seen at the zoo and big enough around to swallow him whole without unhinging its jaw—a sickly, poisonous green monster with thick, knobby scales.

It lunged, and Harry swung the sword and at the same time cast a wandless _Incendio_ —the most powerful attack he could think of. The blade scratched into the skin around its mouth and glanced off its numerous fangs—no two fangs of a common adder for this beast—and the flames made it jerk back, but its thick, magical scales protected it.

“Keep running!” Harry said. They couldn’t keep this up for long, but with the basilisk blinded and him with a sword, he might get in a lucky swing…

“That’s not sporting, Mr. Potter,” Riddle called from in front of the statue. “Let’s even the odds, shall we?” He waved Harry’s wand, and the torches around the Chamber went out one by one, until only the murky green glow that emanated from the statue itself remained. In the near darkness, the basilisk was invisible. Harry could barely even see Neville beside him or his blade glinting in front of his face.

“Harry, do something!” Neville cried.

“I don’t have enough power—ahh!” Harry yelled as the basilisk’s teeth made contact with the sword again, and he unsuccessfully tried a _Diffindo_ with his free hand. They ran from it as best they could. “I need to get to Riddle.”

“Harry,” Neville said, “now would be a good time to turn into something small and fast with good night vision.”

Harry was so shocked that he nearly dropped the sword. “How—?”

“You hiss at danger, your nickname is Ratsbane, and remember Halloween first year? How many wizards can speak _cat_?”

“R-r-right—okay,” Harry snapped out of it. “I’m going. Take this.” He forced the sword into Neville’s hands and transformed into Ratsbane.

His cat’s eyes could see much better in the near-total darkness of the Chamber of Secrets. His nose was assaulted by the foul odour of poison and decay that came from the basilisk, but he pushed past it. The basilisk itself was an incredibly dangerous predator, but it was slow, not very agile, and distracted, and a cat was quicker and stealthier than a human.

He heard shouts of terror from Neville and the clack of metal on fangs as the boy continued to run and distract the monster. In fact, Neville was nearly as competent as Harry was. All that exercise over the past two years had done him some good, and he was really fighting. If there was any doubt Neville belonged in Gryffindor, it was gone now. Ratsbane, on the other hand, ran in an arc to come up behind Riddle. He took a flying leap and unsheathed his claws.

Ratsbane hadn’t hunted in a long time. To his feline instincts, it felt good to tear flesh, to draw blood. And since this was Voldemort he was dealing with, Harry revelled in that feeling. But he kept his wits about him. Before Riddle could come up with a coherent response to being scratched up, Ratsbane climbed over him and just barely managed to grab all three wands in his teeth. But then, he heard a horrible scream of pain. He looked back and saw the basilisk jerking back from another sword strike, but this one had been too close. A fang had stabbed Neville in the arm, and he dropped the sword.

Ratsbane ran faster than he ever had in his life. He raced over to Neville as the basilisk readied itself for another strike, and in one smooth motion, he untransformed, picked up the sword and held it out with one hand and, instead of swinging it to block the fangs, thrust it into the serpent’s mouth, while he took the three wands in his other hand and shouted, “ _Contego_!” The Block Charm pressed back the fangs that would have dug themselves into his own arm while the sword penetrated its brain. The basilisk lurched back mechanically one last time, and then it rolled to the side, dead.

Harry sank to the floor and crawled over to Neville. He pulled the fang from his friend’s arm, but he knew it was too late. Neville had gone limp and was shaking in pain and looking disoriented. He probably only had a couple minutes. “Neville, I’m so sorry,” Harry whispered. “I should’ve been faster.”

He heard footsteps approaching. “And so passes the Noble and Most Ancient House of Longbottom,” Riddle said in a voice of barely-contained anger. “Such a waste of magical blood. And yet you still live, Harry Potter—but not for long. _Accio wands_!” Riddle’s wandless Summoning Charm wrenched Harry’s entire arm, but with his iron grip, the wands stayed in his hand. Riddle tried again: “ _Accio—_ Pfft!”

He was cut off as Fawkes smacked him in the face with a wing as the bird swooped down to land beside Neville. Fawkes leaned close over the wound on his arm and began to cry. Harry’s eyes grew wide. “Of course,” he breathed. “Phoenix tears have healing powers. Oh, thank God! Thank you, Fawkes, thank you!”

 _Caw!_ Fawkes said, apparently saying, “You’re welcome.”

Neville started to breathe easier and blinked at Harry. “You got it,” he murmured.

Riddle, however, was growing angrier and angrier. “So the Longbottom line lives on,” he spat. “It makes no difference because you cannot stop me, Potter. Ginny Weasley will die, and Lord Voldemort will return, very much alive. _ACCIO WANDS_!”

This time, the wands slipped from Harry’s fingers and into Riddle’s hand, but at the same moment, he knew seemingly by instinct what to do. He snatched up the broken fang from beside Neville, and ran across the Chamber towards where Ginny had dropped the diary. Riddle fired curses at him, but he felt them coming with his magic sense and dodged. Remembering a line from a movie he saw once, he screamed, “ _I cast you out, unclean spirit_!” And before Riddle could react, he plunged the fang into the diary with both hands.

It was a scene worthy of _The Exorcist_. Black ichor poured out of the wound in the diary by the quart, knocking Harry back, and a bright, almost divine light burst out of Riddle’s body, tearing through him until he disintegrated into vapour, dropping the wands on the floor.

Harry dropped to his knees and called back to Neville a he was struggling to get up. “We did it,” he said, a smile forming on his face. “We stopped the monster— _and_ the Heir.”

Neville started to smile, too. “We saved the school,” he called back. “And we’re _still alive_.”

They were interrupted as Ginny let out a soft, high moan.

“Ginny!” Harry said. Defying the aching in his limbs, he crawled forward to kneel beside her. “Ginny, are you okay?”

Ginny’s eyelids fluttered and slowly opened. Her bright brown eyes stared up into Harry’s emerald ones. Then, her face contorted in fear, and she scrambled away from him, crying, “Ahh! Harry! No! Don’t kill me!”

Harry pushed himself to his feet in confusion: “Huh?”

“I didn’t wanna do it!” she babbled, still backing away from him. “Tom made me. I tried to fight him, but I couldn’t!”

Harry stepped towards her. “Ginny, it’s okay—” he started.

But she kept backing up until her back came against a pillar. “I didn’t mean to do it!” she wailed. “Please don’t kill me! I don’t wanna die!” She cringed away from him and covered her face with her arms as if shielding herself from a blow, looking disturbingly like Harry thought he must have looked in front of Uncle Vernon all those years ago.

“Ginny!” he said loudly, genuinely perplexed. “ _Why_ would I kill you?”

She lowered her arms part-way and peaked around her hands. “B-b-but…” she said softly. “But I attacked you…I attacked the Boy-Who-Lived. I petrified your sister!”

Harry successfully knelt beside her without her backing away. “Ginny,” he said softly, “all of that was Riddle’s fault. He _made_ you do it. None of it’s on you—you’re the one who fought him off. No one’s going to blame you.”

“But what if—what if they expel me?”

“They won’t,” Harry said determinedly. “It wasn’t your fault.”

“But—”

“If they try, they’ll have to answer to me—and I’m Harry Potter.”

“The same goes for me.”

“Eep!” Ginny spun around to see Neville standing behind her.

“Except for the being Harry Potter part,” he added.

“You gave it a good try, though, with that sword,” Harry quipped. He offered Ginny his hand and pulled her to her feet. She smiled shyly and leaned against him, albeit still trembling. “Now how do we get out of here?” he said.

 _Caw!_ said Fawkes.

* * *

Minerva McGonagall, Severus Snape, Mad-Eye Moody, Nymphadora Tonks, Rufus Scrimgeour, Sirius Black, and Remus Lupin all stood around the out-of-order sink in the out-of-order bathroom, at a loss for what to do. Tonks was carrying a rooster in a cage. They knew what was down there, and they knew how to kill it, but they didn’t know how to open the damn door.

“It’s no good,” Moody growled after they each tried and failed to pry, blast, or dig open the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets. Even Mad-Eye’s eye couldn’t penetrate it. “We need Dumbledore—or a curse-breaker.”

“Unfortunately, we have no idea when Dumbledore will be back,” McGonagall said. “And by then it could be—” her voice caught. “It could be too late.”

She had been awakened in the bathroom by Severus, who had been the first to get there, with no sign of Potter but his invisibility cloak. She soon learnt that there was a message outside the bathroom, written in foot-high scarlet letters underneath the first one: _THEIR SKELETONS WILL LIE IN THE CHAMBER FOREVER._

“It appears that the door will only open in response to Parseltongue,” Snape said. “Unfortunately, Dumbledore is the only other person I know of besides Potter who _might_ know enough Parseltongue to open it.”

Sirius whined softly with a canine sound. The thought of his godson being trapped down there with the Heir of Slytherin was so horrible that he didn’t even care about having to be in Snape’s presence. But then, something clicked in his brain. “Wait a minute,” he said. “Wait a _minute_. Harry and Hermione told us they were doing a linguist—lingual—they were studying Parseltongue with another student. Oh, Moony, what was her name? Tiny girl, blond hair, squeaky voice, head in the clouds—”

“Lovegood,” Snape and McGonagall said together. “Luna Lovegood,” McGonagall continued. “First year Ravenclaw. You think she might be able to open it?”

“It’s worth a try,” Sirius said, “and we don’t have any other ideas.”

“I’ll fetch her at once.”

Some minutes later, McGonagall returned to the bathroom with a wide-eyed girl carrying some notes in tow. “Hello everyone,” she said in her high-pitched voice. She looked around curiously. “Myrtle, are you here?”

A ghostly girl swooped out of a toilet. “Luna? Is that you?” she said.

“Mm-hmm. Hello, Myrtle. How are you?”

“No better for having all these _men_ stomping around my bathroom and—” Myrtle cut herself off and went cross-eyed when she found Moody’s wand poking through her nose.

“Let’s just get to the Chamber, eh, girlie?” Moody said.

“Yes, sir. Hmm…” Luna thumbed through her notes. “I think I’ll try ‘Open up, please’ first. That sounds like the polite way to get in.”

The adults all looked at each other sceptically, but they shrugged their shoulders. With the password being in Parseltongue, it was as good a guess as any.

Luna found the correct entry and whispered, “ _Hesha-hassah_.” Immediately, the sink pulled back and slid down, revealing the entrance to a dark chute descending below the castle.

“Yes!” Sirius roared in triumph. “Now we can—”

“Heads up!” Moody yelled, shoving everyone back from the entrance. A brilliant golden fireball grew in the pipe, then shot out the end and stopped in the middle of the bathroom, where it materialised into three human figures.

The eight witches and wizards and one ghost looked on in awe. Harry Potter stood before them with a sword in his hand, a girl on his arm, and a phoenix on his shoulder, with Neville Longbottom standing by his side as an ally as strong as any.

The first words out of Harry’s mouth were, “Oh, _now_ you guys show up.”

“Harry!” half the group yelled.

“Oh, Cub, thank Merlin you’re alive,” Sirius said. He rushed forward and tried to hug him, but the sword and Ginny were both kind of in the way.

“Mr. Potter, what happened down there,” Moody said, getting right to business. “Where’s the basilisk?”

“Dead,” said Harry.

“What?!” everyone cried.

“You’re certain, Potter?” Moody said.

“Go down and check if you don’t believe me. I don’t think it could survive a sword through its brain.”

“What about the Heir?” asked Tonks.

“Also dead.”

“What?!” was repeated even louder.

“Mr. Potter, did you kill a _student_?” McGonagall asked worriedly.

“No, I killed a _book_ ,” Professor. Neville held up a small, black diary with a hole burnt through it.

“A _book_?” said Scrimgeour in confusion.

“But then, who _was_ the Heir,” McGonagall asked.

“Oh, it was Voldemort— _again_.”

There were more gasps around the room. Tonks and Scrimgeour looked like they might faint, and even Luna looked fearful. “Oh my,” she said.

“Luna?” Harry asked in surprise.

“Hello, Harry. I was here to save the day, but it looks like you’ve already saved it.”

“Right…So, does someone want to explain why your little monster problem had to be taken care of by a couple of twelve-year-olds?” Harry demanded.

 _Caw!_ Fawkes protested.

“Oh, sorry. A couple of twelve-year-olds, a songbird, and an old hat.”

 _Caw,_ the phoenix grumbled.

“I…I think a full explanation is in order…” McGonagall said shakily. “But first, you three should get checked over in the Hospital Wing. Now that the danger is passed, I will contact your families to meet us there.”

“Great,” Harry muttered. “Now _they_ can kill us.”

No one was entirely sure how it happened, but it appeared as if the Weasley Twins became aware of Harry’s reemergence from the Chamber of Secrets and somehow overheard the talk that the monster was dead and the danger gone, and they alerted the rest of the school. A number of students then sneaked out to get a glimpse of their hero. However it happened, the image of Harry Potter striding through the school like a mythical Greek hero with a sword and a phoenix (and Ginny) was on everyone’s lips by the next day and was an official part of the Harry Potter legend inside a week.

Fortunately, they didn’t harass Harry too much on the way, and the large group got to the Hospital Wing with no trouble. Harry immediately put the sword down and detached Ginny from his arm to sit by his sister’s bedside.

“We did it, Mione,” he whispered. “Neville and I—we killed the basilisk and got rid of the Heir.”

“I’m afraid she can’t hear you, my dear,” Madam Pomfrey said as she started to scan him.

“When will the Mandrake Draughts be ready?” he asked her.

“Professor Sprout says it’ll be about three more weeks.”

“Isn’t there some way to get it faster, though?”

“Not in this country. Down around the Mediterranean, maybe, but importing it would be very expensive. I’m sorry, Mr. Potter, but it’s the best we can do.”

Harry stewed on this for a bit. No Hermione for three weeks. Even at her most annoying, he didn’t think he could ever enjoy that. He wished he could do something more. Then he looked up. “Wait a minute,” he said, “I’m rich and famous, aren’t I? _And_ I’ve got a pen pal in the south of France! Sirius, what’s the fastest way to get a letter to Baton Vert?”

* * *

 _“Gabrielle! Gabrielle!”_ a Frenchwoman’s voice called in a villa in the Pyrenees.

A tiny, silver-haired girl came running. _“What is it, Maman?”_ she said.

 _“A letter.”_ Apolline Delacour told her daughter. _“It’s from Harry Potter. He finally stopped the Heir of Slytherin!”_

_“He did? That’s wonderful, Maman! How did he do it?”_

_“The monster was a—a giant snake, Gabrielle. Harry—he killed it with a sword.”_

_“Wow!”_

_“Oh my goodness,”_ Apolline said as she continued reading over the letter. _“His sister was petrified…and he’s asking for our help.”_

 _“He is?”_ Gabrielle said in surprise. _“We have to help him, Maman.”_

_“Yes, I believe we can, ma fille.”_


	60. A Depetrified Debrief

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Harry Potter doesn’t go looking for JK Rowling. JK Rowling usually finds Harry Potter.
> 
> The reason for the dates will be clear later.

_11 May 1993_

The last thing Hermione remembered was seeing a big yellow eye in the mirror and feeling like her head had been slammed into the wall. The next thing she was aware of was waking up on a soft bed. That must mean—she’d been petrified by the basilisk! Her eyes flew open, and she saw her brother’s emerald eyes and smiling face hovering over her. The Mandrake Draught must have worked fast because she sat up in bed so fast she nearly clonked their heads together.

“Harry!” she said urgently. “The monster! It’s a—”

“Basilisk, yes,” Harry said dismissively.

“It’s getting around through—”

“The plumbing,” Harry finished again.

“And the Chamber of Secrets—it’s in—”

“Second floor girls’ loo, the one that’s always out of order.”

“You solved the clue?” she said in astonishment.

“Always the tone of surprise. I’m _your_ brother, aren’t I?”

“But then…what about the basilisk?”

“Oh, that? I killed it.”

Hermione’s jaw dropped. When her voice started working again, she said, “I’m going back to sleep. I’m obviously dreaming.”

“I wish you were, honey,” a female voice said.

Hermione’s eyes widened, and she turned the other way. “Mum, Dad, Sirius, Remus! You’re here!”

“Well, of course, we’re here, silly,” Emma Granger said with tears in her eyes. “We were so worried about you.”

Hermione hugged each of them in turn and looked around the infirmary. The place was more crowded than she had ever seen it, filled with families of muggle-borns who were just waking up as Professor Snape and Madam Pomfrey administered the Mandrake Draughts. “Harry, _you_ killed a giant, forty-foot snake with a lethal gaze?”

“Forty?” Harry snorted. “Try fifty. It was the oldest basilisk ever recorded, after all. Dad looked it up, and it was probably the biggest land snake that ever lived, including the extinct species. Anyway, Neville and Fawkes helped me out.”

“ _Neville_?”

“Oh, yeah, you should’ve seen him. He was really worried about you and wanted to help. I mean, it was kinda of an accident we were down there, but he was there right beside me, swinging a sword and everything.” He leaned closer and whispered in her ear: “Oh, and he kinda figured out the cat thing.”

“Harry James Potter!”

“Heh, that’s what Mum and Dad said…” he replied uncomfortably.

 

 _“Harry James Potter, you are grounded!” Emma yelled, doing her best Molly Weasley impression. “Letting your animagus ability slip_ and _letting yourself get ambushed and almost killed again. We raised you better than that._ _”_

“Well, you kinda deserved it,” Hermione said. _And we live in a really weird world when what Mum said actually makes sense,_ she thought.

“Yeah, I kinda did,” Harry agreed. “At least Neville was pretty cool about it…”

 

_“So…is the animagus thing a Boy-Who-Lived thing or just another weird thing you did?” Neville asked._

_“That might actually be a Boy-Who-Lived thing,” Harry told him. “It’s not the first time it’s happened, but it’s really, really rare. McGonagall thinks I first changed by accidental magic.”_

_“Accidental magic? But how’s that possible?”_

_“Beats me, but you gotta admit, it comes in handy.”_

_“I’ll say. So who else knows about it?”_

_“Just my family, Dumbledore, and McGonagall—and Ron found out by accident.”_

_Neville nodded._ _“That Pettigrew guy? The one who could turn into a rat—oh Merlin, you caught him as a_ cat _?_ _”_

_“Uh huh. Anyway, I’d really appreciate it if—”_

_“Your secret’s safe with me, Harry,” Neville said firmly. “It’s the least I can do after all you’ve done for me.”_

_“I think helping fight that basilisk pretty much covered that, but thanks, mate. D’you think anyone else has figured it out yet?” Harry asked nervously._

_“Hmm…could be, but Ron and I probably spend the most time with you, and I don’t think Dean and Seamus pay that much attention, so you’re probably good if you’re careful.”_

“Anyway, Neville’s a pretty good guy,” Harry concluded. “And there’s definitely some hidden depths to him.”

“I’ve always thought so,” Hermione said. “What did his Gran say when she found out, though?”

“Well…”

 

 _“Neville Harfang Longbottom, don’t you ever scare me like that again! What were you_ thinking _, running off like that when you_ know _there_ _’s a dark wizard loose in the school? I raised you better than that.”_

_“Neville was great, though, Madam Longbottom,” Harry tried to soften the blow for his friend. “He can really fight. I’d be dead if it weren’t for him.”_

_That gave Augusta Longbottom some pause._ _“Truly, Lord Potter?”_

_“Yes, ma’am. He even came up with the idea of how to get our wands back from the Heir.”_

_“Well…then…” she said stiffly. “I’m glad to see you have your father’s strength in you, Neville. And I know your parents would be proud of you for coming to the aid of your friends…I just wish you could have found a less…outrageous way to show it.”_

 

“Well, I guess that’s good for him…I think,” Hermione said. “Harfang?”

“It was his great-granddad’s name, apparently.”

“Huh…So who was the Heir, then?”

“Oh, right, turns out it _was_ Voldemort.”

“What?!”

“Yeah, it’s complicated, though. There was this cursed book that had Voldemort’s memories in it, and it possessed Ginny Weasley and made her do his bidding.”

“Ginny?”

“Yeah, that was kinda awkward…”

 

 _“Ginny!” Molly Weasley sobbed. “Thank Merlin you’re alright! The clock had you at_ Mortal Peril _for over an hour, and we tried to contact the school, but no one would_ talk _to us! What happened?_ _”_

_This led Ginny to made a tearful and rather incoherent attempt at a reply, so Harry and Neville had to fill in the gaps until the horrified Mr. and Mrs. Weasley didn_ _’t know which child to hug in gratitude anymore._

_“You seriously did all that?” George said._

_Harry and Neville nodded wearily._

_“Bloody hell,” Ron said. “I don’t know if I could’ve—” He trailed off with a shudder._

_“Harry, Neville, mates, if either of you ever need a favour, just ask,” Fred told them._

_“Ginny, why didn’t you tell someone about that…_ thing _?_ _” Mr. Weasley asked._

_“I’m sorry, Daddy. I was just so scared—and I thought I’d got rid of it for good.”_

_“None of it was Ginny’s fault, Mr. Weasley,” Harry said. “I know I’d be scared to say anything if all that stuff happened to me. In fact, you should be proud of her. She fought off his control three times. I bet not just anyone could do that, especially at her age.”_

_Mr. Weasley sighed and approached Harry._ _“Lord Potter,” he said, “today, we owe you a debt we can never repay—for bringing Ginny back to us even after she attacked you—whether you blame her or not—and for trying to keep her safe, even when you were in danger yourself.” Harry just shook his head in dismissal._

_“He’s right. I…I owe you a life debt, Harry…” Ginny said timidly._

_“A what?”_

_“A life debt,” Mr. Weasley repeated. “And we certainly do.”_

_Harry looked to his godfather:_ _“Sorry, I don’t know this one.”_

_“A life debt,” Sirius said. “It’s a sort of magical bond that occurs when a witch or wizard saves another’s life. It’s not very strong—I understand it’s like a sort of mental nudge to repay it—so it can be resisted, but most people will want to repay it if the opportunity arises. It can be sort of repaid with help or favours, but it can only be fully discharged by saving the rescuer’s life in return.”_

_“Huh…” Harry said, confused. “Doesn’t that happen a lot, then? Like with Aurors or Healers?”_

_“No, it’s actually not very common,” Sirius clarified. “It has to be a completely selfless act—not borne out of friendship or family or duty. It doesn’t apply to Aurors or Healers because it’s their job to save people.”_

_“Oh, well then it doesn’t count,” he told Ginny._

_“What?”_

_“It was friendship. I mean…I guess I don’t know_ you _all that well, Ginny, but you_ _’re Ron’s sister, and Ron’s my friend, and Sirius just said there’s no life debts between friends.”_

_The Weasleys were all amazed that Harry would dismiss a life debt so freely. Even if he was probably right, it was a surprising show of generosity._

 

“That was nice of you, Harry,” Hermione told him. “But there’s one thing I don’t understand. How did Ginny get the diary in the first place?”

“Well, we can’t prove it, but we’re pretty sure that Lucius Malfoy slipped it in with her schoolbooks that day we were shopping before school started.”

“Malfoy! That scheming bas—So it really was his plot all along?”

“Yeah, Dobby kind of admitted it without admitting it after we told him what we figured out, not that _he_ was making it easy for us…”

 

 _“But there’s one thing I don’t understand, Dobby,” Harry said. “Back when you first came to warn us about it, you told us that He-Who-Must-_ Not _-Be-Named wasn_ _’t involved, but he was.”_

 _“It was a clue, Master Harry, sir,” Dobby said as if it were obvious. “The Dark Lord, when he was young and made the diary,_ could _be named, sir._ _”_

Hermione groaned. “That’s it. For Christmas, I’m getting him a book on how to write riddles properly.” With all her urgent questions answered, she looked to Harry nervously and asked, “So, what _exactly_ happened…do I even want to know?”

“Probably not, but…” Harry explained to her everything that happened from when she was petrified until he destroyed the diary. Sirius jumped in at one point and complained about how hard it would be to find another pair of communication mirrors, but Remus pushed him down. Hermione gasped and cried when Harry told her how close he and especially Neville had come to dying, and even their mother was still tearing up in places. Even after last year’s debacle, she couldn’t believe the two boys had done all that. “Oh, and by the way, Parseltongue didn’t help me when Voldemort attacked me with a giant snake,” he finished.

Hermione rolled her eyes. “So you used a _sword_ instead.” She looked around the Hospital Wing and sighed in resignation. “So I’ve been out for three weeks, then?” she asked.

“Nope, it’s only been three days.”

Hermione’s heart leapt. “Three _days_? But Professor Sprout said—”

“There are advantages to being Harry Potter.” He pulled a letter from his robes and started to read: “Ahem…”

 

_Dear Harry,_

_Of course we_ _’ll help you acquire Mandrake Draughts for Hermione and the other petrified students. A lot of us in France were wondering why Hogwarts didn’t buy any last fall. We’ll talk to the Headmistress and the Herbology Professor at Beauxbatons and see if we can connect with any growers or apothecaries in the area. We think we can get you a pretty good deal fast with that trade you mentioned._

_We_ _’re all very glad you’re safe after facing that basilisk, especially Gabrielle. It must have been very terrifying. We hope Hermione gets better soon and that you and your family are doing well._

_Sincerely,_

_The Delacours_

“Harry,” Hermione gasped. “ _You_ paid for the Mandrake Draughts? You shouldn’t have done that. It was too much money to spend on me—eight doses imported from France? That’s a lot, even from your vault.”

“Mione,” he cut her off. “You’re more than worth it. And besides, it wasn’t as much as you think. I got it for a fraction of the price by promising them some of Hogwarts’s crop and seeds once they’re harvested.”

Hermione’s eyebrows vanished into her hair at that.

Harry shrugged. “Dumbledore said I could. We would’ve had to spend them on unpetrifying everybody, anyway.”

“Dumbledore’s back?” she asked.

“Indeed, I am, Hermione.” Albus Dumbledore strode into the infirmary, looking as serene as ever. “In fact, Elphias Doge set the events in motion to bring me back as soon as he heard that you and Miss Clearwater had been attacked.” The Headmaster wandlessly levitated a chair up to her bed and sat facing her family. “I am also pleased to inform you that, although we have no hard evidence against him, Lucius Malfoy has been removed from the Board of Governors. He will not be able to tarnish this proud school’s reputation from the inside again.”

“That’s great, Professor,” Hermione said. “And hopefully he won’t be able to try to kill us all again.”

“I should hope not. I highly doubt that Lucius Malfoy is in possession of another artifact as dark as that diary. I must thank you for destroying it, Harry. You have done an even greater service than you realise.”

Sirius’s and Remus’s eyes widened. “You mean it was a—” Remus glanced at the Grangers. “—a you-know-what?”

“It was,” Dumbledore said, lowering his voice. “We will speak more on this later. In the meantime, we can focus on the more happy events here at Hogwarts. I think that a feast is in order now that the petrified students have been cured.”

Harry snickered a little. “We already had one on Saturday after we took care of the basilisk. And McGonagall gave us some ridiculous number of points that the other houses couldn’t possibly make up.”

“Yes, I suppose they couldn’t,” Dumbledore said with a twinkle in his eyes. “Also, you and Mr. Longbottom will both receive Special Awards for Services to the School, and I believe Minster Fudge is talking about upgrading your Order of Merlin to Second Class at the next Wizengamot meeting, Harry.”

Harry rolled his eyes. “Of course he is. Well, he’d better give Neville one, too. He was as important as I was.”

“I shall be sure to pass that along to the Minister. Now, Quidditch, as I understand it, had to be cancelled again. I have received numerous requests since my return to finish the season, despite the tight schedule, and I believe it would be an excellent boost to morale to do so. We should be able to fit the three remaining matches in this Saturday, the next, and the fifth of June.”

“Awesome, sir,” Harry said. “I bet Wood’ll really happy about that. He was freaking out when Quidditch was cancelled the first time.”

“Hagrid, too,” Hermione said. “He loves Quidditch. Is he back, yet?”

Harry looked down sadly, and even Dumbledore looked depressed.

Hermione frowned: “He’s…he’s not still in Azkaban, is he?”

“No, he is not, Hermione,” Dumbledore said. “Hagrid is currently in St. Mungo’s. Four months in Azkaban took a heavy toll, and under the circumstances, I gave him the rest of the term off.”

“Fudge has a lot to answer for,” Sirius grumbled.

“Yeah,” Harry said grimly. “Professor, how did this happen? How did they diary and Ginny not get caught, and how did no one find the Chamber?” _Including you_ was clearly implied.

Dumbledore was clearly uncomfortable being put on the spot, but he answered, “Lucius Malfoy’s interference probably made things worse; however, I admit that I have had a very poor year as opposed to my usual knack for figuring things out. In my defence, the diary and Miss Weasley’s possession would virtually undetectable unless someone familiar with dark magic actually laid hands on it. As for the Chamber and the basilisk, they successfully remained hidden for a thousand years, including under Slytherin headmasters. I had my suspicions, but no more. And need I remind you that you, Harry, as the only natural Parselmouth in the school, did not have enough information to identify the monster as a basilisk until last weekend?”

“Okay, Dumbledore,” Dan Granger spoke up. “We can understand all that, even if we don’t like it, but it still doesn’t explain why our twelve-year-old son had to be the one to defeat the dark wizard who had infiltrated the school _again_. In the muggle world, we have security officers in schools where trouble tends to happen. In America, they even have metal detectors—uh, machines that detect weapons.”

“Again, Lucius Malfoy’s interference,” Dumbledore said. “A problem that has since been resolved. While I admit I could have been quicker in taking measures to keep the students safe, he blocked all efforts to address the threat directly. It is my hope that as his plan has backfired, it will hurt his social standing further. As for Harry’s involvement, I can only plead bad luck—or perhaps Fate.”

“And Professor Lockhart was supposed to be a great dark creature hunter,” Hermione added. “He should have been perfect for the job, and of course, he was useless—he wasn’t even there.”

Everyone around her got uncomfortable looks on their faces.

“What is it?” she said nervously. “ _What?_ You need to keep me up with this stuff.”

“I am afraid that Professor Lockhart has been dismissed for gross misconduct,” Dumbledore said.

“Gross misconduct?” Hermione gasped.

“Yeah, it was the night after that feast,” Harry said cagily. “I don’t really know the details.”

“Well, the way _I_ heard it—” Sirius started conspiratorially.

“Sirius,” Emma chided. “I’m not sure this is appropriate.”

“We might as well tell them,” he replied. “It’ll be in the paper—if it’s not embargoed, Albus?”

Dumbledore sighed. “We won’t be able to cover it up. We haven’t with similar incidents with other Defence Professors.” He stood up and went to speak with the other families, conspicuously removing himself from the conversation.

“Alright,” Sirius said, “so _apparently_ , around midnight Saturday night, Professor Lockhart was discovered in a _highly_ compromising position with a seventh-year Slytherin girl by a fifth-year Hufflepuff prefect.”

Hermione gasped again.

“Yeah, but that’s not the worst of it. Lockhart grabbed his wand and Obliviated the prefect on the spot. And then, he also tried to Obliviate his, erm, companion. Of course, she didn’t like that—said she wanted to remember it, but of course you can’t be…he’s still her teacher so it’s not acceptable, even though she was of age. He didn’t want her to be able to talk. Anyway, she fought back when he tried to Obliviate her, and she basically kicked his arse.”

“Sirius,” Emma said again.

“I call them as I see them.”

“I guess it’s not surprising,” Hermione said. “That she beat him, I mean. He really was pretty useless.”

Now, Remus chimed in: “You have no idea, Kitten. Once the reason came out _why_ they’d been fighting, McGonagall called the Aurors, and they took Lockhart in for questioning. Apparently, he’d been…having trysts with other female students all year—all of them were of age, but that was still bad enough to get him fired several times over.”

“I should say so,” she said indignantly.

“Right, but even _that_ _’s_ not the worst of it,” Sirius said. “All those great stories in his books? Stolen. He stole them from other people and Obliviated _them_. He’ll be in Azkaban for life for _that_.”

“Good Lord!” Hermione exclaimed. “How do we get such awful teachers here?”

“Unfortunately, Lockhart was the only one who applied for the job.” She jumped as Dumbledore had circled back behind her. “With the bad luck that has become associated with the position, it is very hard to find someone willing to do it anymore.”

“That’s why we’ve been saying you should get an Auror to do it, Professor,” Harry said.

“Yes, a sound idea in principle, Harry,” Dumbledore said. “However, as I mentioned before, I would at least like to make the effort to find someone outside the Ministry. In fact, I believe you have a mastery in Defence, Remus. Would you perhaps be interested—”

“Oh, no you don’t, Albus,” Remus said quickly. “Not with that curse on the post hanging over my head. Think about it: the easiest way for the curse to get rid of me would be if my _furry little problem_ were exposed,” he whispered. “I’m not risking that.”

Sirius thought he saw Dumbledore glance in his direction, so he nipped that in the bud: “Don’t look at me either, Albus. Aside from the fact that I _am_ in the Ministry, being a Hitwizard is safe most of the time. I could get _killed_ teaching Defence…Say, Harry, didn’t you tell me once that Snape’s been angling for the Defence post? Hey, Snape,” he called with a grin, “how would you like to teach Defence next year?”

Snape glared at Sirius from across the room and then swooped over to the group. “ _Muffliato_ ,” he cast. “I don’t appreciate your tone, Black. And I’ll thank you not to discuss our staffing decisions in public.” He shot Dumbledore a disapproving look as well.

“Hey, it’s a valid point isn’t, it?” Sirius prodded him. “You were always deep in the dark arts in school.”

Snape looked about ready to _use_ those dark arts on Sirius, but he restrained himself. “If you _must_ know, Black, the Headmaster has not seen fit to accept my applications.”

“Oh, of course he hasn’t,” Sirius replied. “Well, it was worth a shot.”

“Now hang on a minute,” Emma said. “Professor Snape, you mean to say that you’ve _repeatedly_ applied for the Defence Professorship—the post that’s supposed to be cursed?”

“Cousin Andi said no one’s stayed in that post for more than a year since 1958,” Hermione confirmed softly.

“But that doesn’t make any sense,” Emma said. “Why would you do that unless…unless you _want_ to get fired! Is that it?”

Snape glared at her, but it was ineffective. He wasn’t used to having to deal with parents face to face. They tended to glare back. He suppressed the reflex to make a cutting remark like he would with a student and spoke stiffly: “Teaching is not my preferred profession. Unfortunately, the Headmaster believes that—”

“That with Voldemort still at large, I need Professor Snape here at Hogwarts, close to me _and_ close to Harry, in case his services are needed.”

That gave them some pause. Snape was Dumbledore’s spy and therefore the best source of inside information on Voldemort. He was an incredibly valuable resource because of that, but that came at a significant cost to the school.

“Is that really worth it, Dumbledore?” Dan asked. “It’s no secret that hardly anyone _likes_ having Professor Snape teaching here—including himself, apparently. And do you remember all those complaints about not turning out enough Potions qualifications? It’s been a problem for years, and it’s affecting the entire community. Isn’t there some kind of alternative arrangement you can make?”

“I assure you that I have considered my options carefully, Mr. Granger,” Dumbledore said. “I regret that he is not well-suited for the job—be honest, Severus, you aren’t—but I have yet to see another choice.”

“And you, Professor Snape?” Emma asked. “Isn’t there—I don’t know, isn’t there another job here that you might be better suited for?”

“If there were, do you think I would be where I am now?” Snape said icily. “The only other subject I would be qualified to teach is Arithmancy, and Professor Vector is a popular teacher with both seniority and no other qualification.”

“What about History, Professor?” Hermione suggested. All eyes turned to her in surprise. “Hardly anyone ever learns anything from Professor Binns, and he can’t even remember our names. Frankly, Professor I don’t think you could teach that subject worse if you tried.”

“Careful, Kitten,” Sirius said. “He’ll take that as a challenge.” Snape, however, just looked horrified at the thought of actually having to _lecture_.

“That is a clever solution, Hermione, but with an important flaw,” Dumbledore said. “In order to remain a spy—and I tell you this in confidence—Professor Snape must keep up the appearance of following the pureblood ideology—something that I cannot allow in a History classroom, for obvious reasons.”

 _Well, we_ _’re stuck, then,_ Emma thought. _And History will have to be dealt with at some point, but this is more pressing. Better go with the direct approach._ “Fine, but we still need to deal with this,” she said.

“Excuse me, Mrs. Granger?” Snape said raising a formidable eyebrow.

“Yes, we do. The fact is, Professor Snape,” Emma said, “you aren’t good at teaching, and you don’t even _like_ teaching. We don’t like the idea of someone like that trying to educate our kids, and neither do most other parents. We’ll tolerate it if it’s necessary for security, but we expect higher quality from what’s supposed to be the best school of magic in the world. And even if you stay on, we probably have enough influence by now to push for some more reforms to the class.” Snape’s eyes widened in shock. “We’re not asking for special treatment. We’re just asking you to _try_ to do your job.”

Snape felt blindsided. _Never underestimate the power of a mother_ , he thought. He should have learnt that from Lily years ago. “Mrs. Granger, I am a highly qualified Potions Master—” he said stiffly.

“You can brew anything you like; that doesn’t make you a good teacher.”

“She is correct, Severus,” Dumbledore agreed. “With the increased media attention and Lucius Malfoy now off the Board, you are likely to be under increased scrutiny already.”

 _Blast it, he_ _’s right_ , he thought _._ The Grangers had been a thorn in his side for over a year now with their admittedly justified campaign to improve the teaching staff. They were Snape’s worst nightmare as a teacher: muggle parents, and therefore accustomed to high quality and more willing to question the status quo; but also connected enough in the wizarding world to do something about it. And now, they’d taken steps that couldn’t be easily taken back, even if they wanted to. “Very well, Headmaster,” he grumbled through clenched teeth. “I shall take that into consideration.” He left the privacy ward up and stalked away in a worse mood than usual. Now, he’d have to put in some actual effort and attempt to learn teaching properly. _Hmm_ _…_ he thought. _The muggles must have some books on how to teach their chemistry._

Harry, Hermione, Sirius, and Remus watched him go in shock. “Mum, do you realise you just became the envy of three-quarters of the school?” Harry said.

Emma rolled her eyes. “I was just doing what any parent should have done years ago.”

“You may have just done this school a great deal of good, Mrs. Granger,” Dumbledore confirmed. “I have been trying to impress upon Severus for years the importance of good teaching practises.” He waved his wand and cancelled Snape’s ward. “Well, if Madam Pomfrey does not object, I think you will be fine to go, Hermione. The feast will begin shortly…” The twinkle came back into his eyes. “As a show of solidarity, I think it would be appropriate to invite the parents of the revived victims. Sirius, Remus, I should like to speak with you in private.”

Madam Pomfrey gave Hermione her customary stern look, but allowed her to leave. The other victims were soon dismissed as well.

“Harry! Hey, Harry!” Colin Creevey ran up to him with his little brother in tow. He was as hyper and excited as ever, as if nothing had happened. “Is it true you really fought that giant snake with Dumbledore’s phoenix and a sword?”

“Um, yeah, me and Neville,” Harry said.

“That’s awesome! That thing was _huge_. It’s too bad my photo didn’t turn out. It would’ve looked pretty good with Ginny standing next to it.”

Harry and Hermione both gave him a funny look, but he didn’t seem to notice.

“Say, Dean Thomas paints, doesn’t he? Maybe I can get him to paint it.”

“Er, sure Colin, you go do that,” Harry said. He leaned towards Hermione as the Creevey boys ran back to their parents and whispered, “Well, _he_ _’s_ a weird one.”

“You just described half the school, Harry, but yes, I can see where you’re coming from.”

“Hi, Harry,” a timid voice called from behind a pillar.

“Speaking of,” Harry muttered. “Hello, Ginny.”

Ginny was still trembling a little as she approached the Grangers, though that could have been because of Colin’s remark. “Hi, Hermione. I’m glad you’re better…I’m sorry about—”

“It wasn’t your fault, Ginny,” she assured her.

“I know. That’s what everyone keeps telling me. But it’s a lot better to see it’s all over. Harry…” she said excessively sweetly, leaning closer to him. “We haven’t really had a chance to talk since…I heard you talking about what happened down there, but…I didn’t get a chance to thank you—for helping me fight off Tom, I mean. I really thought he’d beaten me that time. I just…I wish it’d been soon enough to help you…” She trailed off, sounding like her voice was about to give out.

“Well, we don’t know that you didn’t,” Harry said uncomfortably. “It might have made him weaker or something…and…” He remembered Quirrellmort again. “And I think it might have saved your life when I destroyed the diary…You know, we have something in common now.”

“W-we do?” Ginny squeaked.

“Yeah…we’ve both fought Voldemort three times and won—and one of mine was by accident. Not many living people can say that.”

“W-w-wow…” she breathed, looking like she was about to faint. Harry’s family looked a bit ill at that, too.

“I mean it. That was really impressive the way you fought him off down there,” he insisted.

“Well…erm…thank you.” Ginny looked away, rubbing her arms unconsciously and rapidly turning red. Suddenly, she leaned in and kissed Harry on the cheek, then turned without hesitating and ran away.

Harry stood there, frozen with surprise, and so, in fact, did his parents, at Ginny doing that in front of them. They almost might have been petrified. Only Hermione kept her wits about her. She snapped her fingers twice in front of Harry’s face.

“Hello, Earth to Harry,” she said.

“Huh?” he snapped out of it.

“Come on, lover boy, let’s go get dinner.”

Harry turned bright red. “Mione, if you call me that again, I may have to duel you.”

“Now, that’s not being very nice to Ginny, Harry.”

“Hey, she’s a good kid, but she’s still a fan girl. I just hope she can grow out of it—I guess I can’t blame her, though, not after I saved her like that…You know, when she first woke up in the Chamber, she was terrified I was going to kill her.”

“What? Why?” his mother said.

He turned around to face her. “Well, the way she saw it, she’d attacked Hermione, and then she’d attacked me. I think she thought I’d want revenge or something.”

“But that’s ridiculous,” Hermione exclaimed. “It’s not like you’re a Death Eater or something. You’d never do that, especially not when it wasn’t her fault.”

“I know, but she was really terrified. It was awful seeing her like that. She reminded me of…well…me—way back with Uncle Vernon. I felt…I don’t know—like… _dirty_ , seeing her that scared of me.” He gave an uncomfortable shudder.

Emma pulled her son into a hug and scratched him behind the ears. “You’re a good person, Harry,” she whispered. “Don’t forget that. The fact that you couldn’t stand to see her like that is proof that you have a good heart.”

Harry slowly pulled away with a smile. “Thanks, Mum,” he said.

The Great Hall had not seen a feast like this for many a year, if ever. Ten muggle parents and one muggle sibling, Cassandra Clearwater, sat with the six restored victims of the Heir of Slytherin at three of the house tables. Well-wishers huddled around them, eager for a chance to see them again. Cassandra had her own group of admirers, too, being by now a well-liked actress at the Diagonal Theatre. A number of the Slytherins clearly resented having so many muggles wandering around the castle as if they were welcome there, but they didn’t dare say anything at a time like this, not with all the teachers taking the opposing side. And they hadn’t forgotten what Harry did to Theo Nott last week, either. Things were going to change with him _and_ Granger knowing wandless magic.

* * *

Sirius and Remus followed Dumbledore up to his office, where they could speak freely without the risk of being overheard. The school may be safe, but they had work to do.

“So the diary was a horcrux?” Sirius said anxiously. “And you’re certain that Harry destroyed it?”

“Quite certain,” Dumbledore said. “My scans have confirmed it is assuredly dead.”

“So that’s two down out of who knows how many,” Remus observed.

“I suspect only a handful,” the old wizard replied. “Voldemort’s soul could not withstand much more than that, which means that we are making good progress. However, the reason I wished to speak with you is that I believe I have determined the location of another one.”

That got their attention. “You have?” Sirius said.

“Yes, and as you suggested, I believe it would be safer if you two assisted me in retrieving it—if you are willing.”

“To tear Voldemort a new one? I’m in!”

“I will help as well, Albus,” Remus confirmed. “When will we be going?”

“After the term ends, I think. There is no hurry, and there is much to do in the meantime. And, fortunately, young Harry has unknowingly given me a much easier way to destroy them.”

“Harry’s sword?” Remus said as Dumbledore held up the deadly weapon.

“Look closely.”

Letters near the hilt said _GODRIC GRYFFINDOR_.

“Gryffindor’s sword?” Sirius gasped. “Merlin’s socks! Harry pulled _that_ out of the Sorting Hat?”

“He did. I think we can be assured that your godson is a true Gryffindor.” Dumbledore turned the sword over in his hands. “Goblin-made,” he said. “It resists even the most powerful corrosive agents and absorbs that which makes it stronger.”

“Like basilisk venom,” Remus reasoned. “So now it can destroy horcruxes.”

“Precisely. A far superior method to Fiendfyre, if I do say so.”

Sirius nodded. “Sounds like a plan. Oh, and by the way, have you given any further thought to Harry’s…issue?”

Dumbledore lowered his gaze. “I still know nothing for certain,” he said. “However, the fact that Harry seemed to know instinctively how to destroy the diary is…worrying. I am investigating options.”

Sirius forced himself to take a calming breath. “Good,” he said, “keep on that.”


	61. Reactions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Harry Potter is just as sane as JK Rowling is.

_18 May 1993_

The following weeks were happy ones for Harry and, indeed, the rest of the school. The euphoria of getting rid of the Heir of Slytherin was really all they needed. Beating Hufflepuff in the next Quidditch game felt like little more than an afterthought to the chaos of the rest of the year. On the other side, they still had exams coming up, but no one seemed to mind. Even Hermione was going easy on the studying. There was a rumour that exams would be cancelled, but of course that turned out to be false. After all, they couldn’t very well cancel O.W.L.s and N.E.W.T.s. The Slytherins had been cut down to size, too. Theo Nott was scared to come near Harry or Hermione, and Draco Malfoy was practically a pariah. Fred and George Weasley pranked him several times on Ginny’s behalf. Meanwhile, Penelope Clearwater was seen walking around, holding hands with Percy.

Neville naturally had a lot of questions about the whole thing, and Ron caught him up on what had really happened when Harry caught Pettigrew.

The one problem Harry was having in all of this was a certain red-haired firstie who kept following him around, peaking from behind corners and pillars, but always running off whenever he tried to approach her. It was after about a week of this that he took his concerns to Hermione.

“Honestly, she’s been following me around like a lost puppy,” he said. “What’s her deal?”

“Well, you knew she had a crush on you,” Hermione said sagely over her book.

“Yeah, but before it was just blushing and losing her voice whenever I tried to talk to her, just like half the other first-year girls. Now, she’s completely flipping out around me.”

“You saved her life, remember? You just became the hero from her storybooks.”

Harry groaned. “I did, didn’t I? I don’t want her to the wrong idea, though. I mean, she’s nice, but…”

“But you don’t know if it’ll ever turn into anything?”

“Yeah.”

Hermione closed her book and stood up. “That’s very mature of you, Harry,” she said. “A lot of boys your age would try to exploit a crush like that…Actually a lot of seventh-year boys would try to exploit a crush like that.”

“I couldn’t do that. It would just feel wrong. And her brothers would kill me.”

“True. You should go talk to her, then.”

He sighed. “I figured you’d say that. Will you come with me? I think it might go better with we had a third party there.”

“A girl, you mean?”

“That too.”

“Fine, Mr. Basilisk-Slayer. If you can’t handle a little girl on your own, I’ll save you.”

“Hey, fighting a basilisk is easy. Talking to girls I’m not related to? That’s hard.”

“Technically, _I_ _’m_ not related to you,” Hermione quipped.

“You know what I mean. Come on.”

Ginny wasn’t hard to find, but she _was_ hard to catch, since she always lost her nerve and ran for it whenever Harry got close to her. After one failed attempt, he motioned for Hermione to circle around to cut her off. When they caught up with her, Ginny again tried to make a break for it, but she practically ran Hermione over.

“Oh, Hermione, I didn’t see you there,” she squeaked. She tried to get past her, but the older girl cut her off.

“Hello, Ginny.”

“Ahh!” She spun around to see Harry right behind her.

“We need to talk,” he said gently. “Will you follow us, please?”

Ginny swallowed, unable to speak as Harry and Hermione led her to the relative privacy of the Clock Tower Balcony. Harry sat leaning against the railing and admired the view for a minute before turning back to her.

“Harry—” she started babbling. “I said I was sorry—”

“Ginny,” Harry said softly, cutting her off at once, “this isn’t about the Chamber or the Diary or any of that. That’s all water under the bridge. I told you I didn’t blame you, and I meant it.”

“You can sit down,” Hermione whispered.

She did so slowly. “Wh-what is it?” she asked.

“Well, I’ve just been…concerned…with the way you’ve been following me around,” Harry said awkwardly.

“Oh…” Ginny said worriedly.

“It’s just that…” He wasn’t sure how to broach the subject.

Luckily, Hermione saved him: “It’s just that you weren’t like this before.”

“I’m sorry,” she said quickly. “It’s just every time I see you, Harry, I start to freak out. You saved my life down there, and—”

“Only because I had to,” Harry interrupted. Then, he realised what he said and clarified, “I mean, I’d do it again if I had to, but—I wasn’t planning to go down there. The plan was to find the Chamber and call the Aurors. That’s it.”

“But what you did down there was amazing, Harry,” she insisted. “You’ve done so many amazing things—fighting Quirrell last year, catching Pettigrew—”

“Also an accident. The plan was to find out what he was and call the Aurors there, too. And Quirrell was only because I was scared there wasn’t time to get help.”

“But…”

“Look, Ginny, I know this is probably gonna be hard for you, but I think it’s better if you learn the truth now,” he said, taking a deep breath. “I know you’ve had a crush on me since long before we met.”

“Eep!” She turned red and looked like she was about to bolt, but Hermione laid a calming hand on her shoulder.

“And I also know you read all the _Harry Potter Adventures_ books.”

“Harry, I know those aren’t—”

He held up a hand. “I know you know those aren’t real—up here.” He tapped two fingers to his temple. “But I’m getting worried I’m starting to look like them. And you…I mean…” He looked to his sister for help.

“We’re worried about you because you’re still acting like Harry’s the fairy tale hero in those books,” she said.

“I didn’t mean to…but…” Ginny screwed up her courage and said, “but you _are_ a hero, Harry. You saved me, _and_ Hermione, _and_ your godfather. I…I don’t wanna make you uncomfortable, but it’s…it’s hard not to crush on you.” She said the last part so fast that Harry could barely make it out. She tried to get up and run away, but Hermione stopped her again, so she just covered her face in embarrassment.

“Ginny, I’m not letting you run away from this,” Hermione whispered. “We need to deal with this now.”

“That’s why I wanted to talk to you,” Harry said, finally hitting his stride. “Because that’s not _me_ —not really. I’m not a hero—or if I am, it’s only by accident. Look, whether you believe them now or not, the fact is you read those books, and you heard all the stories, and you…well, let’s be honest—you fell in love…with a boy who…never existed.” Ginny looked up to face him in confusion. “That Harry Potter only exists in stories. I’m not the person everyone thinks I am. I’ve never done any of those things. I don’t go on holiday to India to save the village of Mayapore from Thuggee Cultists. I go on holiday to Spain to relax on the beach. I’ve really only ever wanted to be a normal kid and not have to deal with this Famous Harry Potter stuff…It’s not your fault. It’s the fault of that Wendell Somerlad guy who wrote the books, but that’s the truth.”

The little redhead started to cry as her life-long hero shattered all of her illusions one by one. That he was so nice about it made it even worse. He could have rudely told her off like any other fan girl (though he probably wouldn’t do that to any other fangirl, either), but he was trying to be polite and understanding.

Ginny had really tried to set herself reasonable expectations. She knew Harry was way out of her league. He was rich, famous, and powerful, while she was none of those things, but then he’d befriended Ron and recruited her dad’s help in politics, and she’d dared to let it give her hope. “I’m sorry, Harry,” she whispered, sniffling. “I just thought…with what you did for me…”

“Yes, I saved your life,” he replied, “and I’m glad I did. But you have to understand, I’d do that for any of my friends. If there’s a part of me that’s a hero, I guess it’s that, but I just call it loyalty.”

“I call it a saving people thing,” Hermione said flatly.

“No, I understand,” Ginny said sadly. “I should have known from the start. I’m sorry for following you around like that. I’ll leave you alone from now on.” She got up to go, her face downcast.

“Ginny, wait,” Harry said, standing up to reach after her. “Come on, it doesn’t have to be like that. I’m not trying to…I’m not trying to get rid of you or anything. But I’m only _twelve_ —and _you_ _’re_ only eleven. Can’t we just…you know…be friends?”

Very slowly, she stepped back towards him. Her hands were trembling slightly. “I’d…I’d like that…Harry,” she said, barely keeping her voice with her.

He offered his hand to shake. “Good. Friends?”

She shook his hand lightly. “Friends,” she said, though he could see her tearing up again. She abruptly broke off, saying, “I should go,” and she took off down the corridor, suppressing a whimper.

Harry frowned as he watched her go. “She looks like she’s really hurting,” he said.

“She’ll be better off in the long run,” Hermione said. “You did the right thing, Harry.”

He smiled: “Thanks for the help, sis.”

After sitting there and relaxing for a while longer, they got up and headed back to the more populated parts of the castle. But to their surprise, they didn’t get very far before running into Professor McGonagall.

“Oh, Mr. Potter, _there_ you are,” she said. “I’ve been looking all over for you. Professor Dumbledore needs to speak with you in his office. Minister Fudge just arrived.”

* * *

Ginny really needed to get away from other people right now. She darted from the Clock Tower, ran here and there and eventually circled around to archway beside the Quad, which was partially open-air, where she was finally able to sit and think. After everything that had happened, Harry still wanted to be friends with her. It seemed too good to be true. And maybe someday…but she couldn’t let herself think about that again. Right now, she needed to focus on just being friends.

She still let herself cry for a while—to cry for the loss of such an important part of her childhood, after Harry had forced her to see the truth behind the legend. But when she was done, she felt stronger for it. She’d had a glimpse of the real Harry, now, and even if he didn’t think he was a hero, he was still a friend whom she could be proud to have.

“Alright, Ginny?”

“AHH!” She jumped at the interruption. Beside her had sat possibly the last person she expected to see. “Colin?”

“Uh huh,” the little mousy-haired boy said.

“What’re you doing here?”

“Well, I haven’t seen you around much. You doing okay, Ginny? You don’t look so good.”

“I…I will be,” she answered. “I’m just working some stuff out. You…I…I thought you’d be scared of me.”

“Nah,” Colin said with a smile. “Harry told me everything. It wasn’t your fault.”

 _Harry again. I don_ _’t think I’ll ever be able to thank him enough._ “It’s still awful, though,” she said. “You were asleep for six months. Are you…are you gonna have to repeat your first year?”

“I don’t think so. McGonagall, Flitwick, and Sprout said they’d tutor everybody who got petrified, and Harry’s cousin, Mrs. Tonks, said she’d tutor us in Potions, and his friend, Mr. Lupin, said he could tutor us in Defence, but I hear you didn’t learn anything in that class anyway.”

“Sure we did, Colin,” Ginny deadpanned. “We learnt the proper way to whiten teeth, style hair, and be a lying git.”

Colin laughed, which immediately set Ginny off. Ginny almost didn’t notice when she’d started laughing again. It felt like it had been all year since the last time she had, but Colin Creevey’s chortling was infectious. She was amazed to find that she somehow felt…good again.

“Anyway, Mum and Dad gave me a new camera,” Colin told her.

“That’s nice.”

“Uh huh. Say, Ginny…I never did get that picture.”

“What?”

“That picture I took of you—you know, right before…”

“What, _that_ picture?” She couldn’t believe he was still interested in that.

“Yeah, I thought it would’ve looked pretty good. D’you think I could take a new one of you.”

“A new one? But…but…” She didn’t have the heart to tell him that Tom had made her pose for that picture. “Why do you want a picture of me?”

Colin frowned slightly. “You make a good subject. Your hair really stands out. And so do your eyes—they’re really bright, especially for brown eyes.”

Ginny stared. Was Colin Creevey complimenting her now? “Well…I…guess…you…can?” she said nervously. “But not today,” she added. “I must look awful right now.”

“Sure thing. Thanks, Gin,” Colin said, and he ran off excitedly.

_Gin?_

* * *

Harry could hear loud voices arguing inside Dumbledore’s office when he arrived outside the door.

“That basilisk is school property,” complained the deep voice of Severus Snape. “Those ingredients are extremely valuable and—”

“Even if you can argue that it _was_ school property, Mr. Snape, with it not being an official part of the school,” another voice said, which Harry recognised as belonging to Cornelius Fudge, “the law is quite clear on its disposal. By all means, put the question to the Wizengamot but—”

At that moment, Harry opened the door and entered the office. “You wanted to see me, Professor Dumbledore?” he said.

But it was Fudge who answered him, coming over to shake his hand. “Ah, good to see you again, Lord Potter, and I think I speak for all of Britain when I say thank you for getting that beast out of the school. I just had a little bit of business to take care of before the next Wizengamot meeting, you understand?”

Harry hesitated to say what he really wanted to say, but he reminded himself that he _was_ , technically, a Lord and went ahead with it: “Do you mean like why Hagrid was taken to Azkaban without trial, Minister?” he said as innocently as he could.

Fudge paled. He was clearly hoping not to have to deal with this. “Well…that was…simply a tragic misunderstanding,” he said.

“Then I’m sure you won’t have any trouble cooperating with the investigation I requested Amelia Bones make into the incident, will you, sir?”

Fudge paled even further at the thought, and he wiped his brow with his handkerchief. “Well…that’s…that’s…Now see here, Lord Potter. This is about the dead basilisk down in that Chamber.”

“It is? What about it?”

Professor Dumbledore spoke up: “It was Professor Snape, Harry, who pointed out that a basilisk of that size would be an excellent resource for extremely rare and valuable potions ingredients, along with other materials such as its hide and fangs, and he suggested that it be rendered and sold and the proceeds donated to the school.”

“Okay?”

“However, Minister Fudge has brought up a complication.”

“That’s right,” Fudge spoke up again. “I wouldn’t expect you to know about such minutiae, Lord Potter, but there is an old principle in magical common law called the Dragonslayer’s Right. Simply put, it states that if a wizard is attacked by a known-wizard-killer creature and slays it in combat, then the previous owner forfeits all rights over it to the slayer.” He handed Harry some complicated, legal-looking parchments. “Now, this basilisk is known to have killed one student in 1943, in addition to being a class five-X creature, and therefore it is covered under the Dragonslayer’s Right, and the carcass falls to you.”

“Me?” Harry’s eyes widened in shock.

“And as you would have little use for either the money or the potions ingredients, Potter,” Snape growled, “the appropriate thing would be to donate the corpse to the school, where it can be of the most use.”

But Harry was still looking over Fudge’s documents. To his surprise (considering this was Fudge) it all looked pretty tight, but just to be sure, “Professor Dumbledore, is all this stuff good?” he asked, holding up the parchments.

“I have looked over the documents myself, Harry. Under the law of the land, you have the first right to dispose of the basilisk.”

“Wow…and how much money are we talking about?”

“Potter!” Snape said indignantly.

“Severus?” Dumbledore warned him.

Snape grumbled, but he answered, “A basilisk of that size could fetch over three thousand galleons.”

 _Three thousand galleons?!_ Harry thought. _That_ _’s a hundred and fifty thousand pounds! Even black market rhino horn doesn’t go for that much, according to the RSPCA. But then again, the basilisk was bigger than a rhinoceros._ “Well…” he said cautiously, “I don’t really need the money…” Snape started to look happy again (not a pretty sight). Harry was about to go along with his demand for lack of an alternative when a better idea hit him: “But it seems to me that the _fair_ thing to do would be to render it down for ingredients and split the proceeds evenly amongst all of the Heir of Slytherin’s victims.”

Snape scowled, but Dumbledore smiled. “An excellent idea, Harry,” he said.

“Yes, that’s very generous of you, Lord Potter,” Fudge said. He started to roll with it: “The Ministry could connect you with someone who could render and sell the ingredients at a low cost, and I wonder if you might permit us to hand out the eight shares to the victims at the Wizengamot meeting.”

“Excuse me, _eight_ shares, Minister?” Harry interrupted.

“Yes, for the six petrified students, yourself, and Mr. Longbottom.”

“I believe I said _all_ of the victims of the Heir of Slytherin, sir. That includes Hagrid because he was framed by him. Also Ginny Weasley was possessed by him. Filch’s cat was petrified, and so was Sir Nicholas, and I believe four students were also attacked by the Heir in 1943, so by my count, that makes _sixteen_ shares.”

“Well, of course, I suppose it does. Except two of those people aren’t still alive, and one isn’t even human,” Fudge said.

Harry gave the Minister his feline stare. “They must have families—and I happen to like cats, sir.” Fudge quickly backed off.

Dumbledore broke the silence: “I don’t know if we can track down Myrtle’s living relatives that quickly, Harry, but I will look into it. As for Sir Nicholas—Severus, I am sure that if you asked politely, Sir Nicholas would be happy to donate his share of the proceeds to the school.”

Snape didn’t look too happy about only getting a one-sixteenth share, but it was better than nothing. He sighed and said, “Very well.”

* * *

_29 May 1993_

The Wizengamot meeting on the twenty-ninth of May soon became a major event. Once people heard that Harry Potter, the Basilisk-Slayer, would be there, they turned out in droves to see him ( _Oh great, I_ _’ve got a new nickname_ , he thought.), and so many students were being excused from school the attend the meeting that the Knight Bus was summoned to transport them. Harry didn’t think that was the best way to repay them for being attacked, but there wasn’t much else they could do.

The Wizengamot Chamber was filled with people, most of them having come to see the award ceremony at the end, even if they had to wait through a lot of boring legislating first. Arthur Weasley updated the Grangers on the latest political goings on while they waited. Harry noticed Lucius Malfoy and Charles Nott glaring at him from across the Hall. With the current cloud over him, even with no proof, Malfoy’s influence was less here than it had been a year ago when he’d nearly derailed the Muggle Protection Act.

Nothing so momentous was being discussed today, but one interesting issue came up when Dumbledore called for further business, and a man Harry didn’t recognise stood up to speak.

“That’s David Monroe,” Mr. Weasley whispered, “the new head of International Cooperation and also Ambassador to the ICW. His father Lord Solomon’s over there.”

Harry nodded and regarded both men. Lord Solomon Monroe wore plum robes with the silver trim of the Most Ancient Houses. He had a stern face and wore large glasses, a black moustache, and a short, white beard. His son, David, looked to be in his late thirties and had short, brown hair and a pointed chin, and for some reason he couldn’t pin down, the black toque on his head looked highly out of place on him.

“I have a matter to add to the agenda, Chief Warlock,” David Monroe said in a gruff voice. “On Monday, the muggle province of Eritrea formally achieved independence from Ethiopia after many years of conflict. I request that the Wizengamot make an official recommendation to the ICW on the issue of the establishment of a separate Ministry of Magic for Eritrea.”

This was a rare event these days; there hadn’t been many new muggle governments created since the fall of the Soviet Union. Since the Statute of Secrecy required certain forms of interaction between magical and muggle governments, it was most convenient for them to administer the same geographical areas, but this was by no means a universal, as the wishes of the magical community also had to be taken into account, not to mention sheer practicality. That was why Scandinavia had only a single magical government with field offices for the five muggle countries in its jurisdiction, while muggle India had no fewer than ten magical governments operating wholly or partially within its borders.

“I concur,” Dumbledore said. “The Wizengamot should make a recommendation. Do you have a report on the status of the magical community in Eritrea, Ambassador Monroe?”

“Yes, Chief Warlock. The magical community in Eritrea mostly supports an independent ministry. I understand that the chief argument in favour it is that Eritrea and Ethiopia speak different languages—along with some solidarity with their muggle cousins. However, the difficulty is that Eritrea is very small. It is similar in population to Albania with a magical population of just a few hundred witches and wizards. Large scale efforts like law enforcement would likely require on-call outside assistance, as in Albania—assistance that most likely would still have to be provided by Ethiopia. An incomplete break like that could cause more problems than it solves.”

A few Wizengamot members traded points. David Monroe himself steadfastly refused to state a preference. Harry whispered to his parents, asking what they knew about the situation. Some of what he heard concerned him, so as the debate was winding down, he rose to his feet.

“Lord Potter?” Dumbledore recognised him.

“I have a question for Ambassador Monroe, sir. The muggle government of Ethiopia was known for trying to excessively control Eritrea, which is what led to the muggle war of independence there that lasted thirty years. I would like to know how relations between the Ethiopian Ministry and Eritrea were during that time.”

That surprised many of the spectators. Few people had expected Harry Potter to actually get involved in politics so young—especially international politics. But Ambassador Monroe just nodded contemplatively and said, “Lord Potter, from what I can tell, tensions were never as high as in the muggle world. However there have been significant difficulties over the years, particularly because of the language barrier I mentioned.”

Harry nodded. “Thank you, Ambassador,” he said without stating an opinion. However, when the vote came around, he gave Cousin Andi a subtle nod to vote in favour of an Eritrean Ministry—in line with what the people wanted. As it was, the full Wizengamot also voted solidly in favour, including both Monroes.

Once that was settled, Harry stood again and said, “Chief Warlock, I also have an item for the agenda.”

“Yes, Lord Potter?” Dumbledore said.

“In 1943, then-thirteen-year-old Rubeus Hagrid was arrested for several attacks on muggle-born students at Hogwarts.” Harry looked over at Hagrid kindly where he sat wearily in the audience. The half-giant was noticeably thinner, having lost at least ten stone in Azkaban, and his beard was growing in a little bit greyer. “We now know that he was framed for those attacks. Although he was not charged at the time, he was still expelled from Hogwarts, and his wand was snapped. Four months ago, Mr. Hagrid was again arrested for attacking students. This time, he was still not charged, and yet he _was_ taken to Azkaban without a hearing—a lesson that the Ministry _should_ have learnt a year and a half ago from Lord Black.” There were angry murmurs from around the Hall. “This is a miscarriage of justice and should be investigated thoroughly. In the meantime, I suggest a motion that both arrests be expunged from Mr. Hagrid’s record, that he be compensated one hundred galleons for four months’ wrongful imprisonment, and that he be qualified to purchase and carry a wand.”

“I so move,” Cousin Andi confirmed.

“Seconded,” Sirius said quickly.

Hagrid’s small, black eyes seemed to double in size at that last bit. He’d dreamt of this day for fifty years—being able to use a wand again (in public), but he could hardly believe that Harry would go so far for him. Harry Potter could definitely be sure of a loyal ally in Rubeus Hagrid.

“Is there any further discussion of the motion?” Dumbledore asked.

“Chief Warlock,” Lucius Malfoy spoke up, “Mr. Hagrid does not have the _educational_ qualification to carry a wand.”

“No, he does not, Lord Malfoy,” Dumbledore replied, “but I’m sure he can make it up in good time. And as he lives on the Hogwarts grounds, I foresee few problems. Any other discussion? No? Very well. All those in favour…” Enough hands went up that it was clear Harry’s motion passed by a wide margin.

With that settled, it was time for the presentation of awards. Dumbledore turned the floor over to Fudge, who asked the recipients to come down. “As most of you will know,” the Minister said, “Lord Potter slew a basilisk at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry—the same beast that had been attacking students and terrorising the school for several months. Lord Potter claimed the corpse under the Dragonslayer’s Right and has generously elected to divide the proceeds from its sale equally among its victims, who we have invited to attend today. All of you have the sympathy of the Wizengamot for your ordeal, and we admire your resilience. Please come forward as I call your names to receive your awards…”

After the processing costs, taxes, and other complications had been settled, each of the nine current Hogwarts students, Filch, Hagrid, Snape (who accepted his share on behalf of Nearly-Headless Nick), and two wizards and one witch in their sixties who had been victims in 1943 received about two hundred galleons—the equivalent of about ten thousand pounds. Ginny Weasley was floored when she saw the amount. That much money was a major investment in her future for a family that feared they would be able to give their children very little. When Harry shook the hands of everyone who had received a share, Ginny lunged forward and hugged him immediately before backing off and turning bright pink. Hagrid also hugged him, nearly flattening him in the process. “Thank yeh so much, Harry, thank yeh!” he sobbed.

Fudge then dismissed the group, asking Harry and Neville to remain. Neville looked more proud than Harry had ever seen him as the Minister read the citations for their medals: “Lord Potter and Mr. Longbottom took it upon themselves to locate the fabled Chamber of Secrets in Hogwarts Castle when all other methods had failed. Finding it successfully, they were forcibly thrown in by the murderer known as the Heir of Slytherin.” Fudge was being very careful not to mention Voldemort’s name. “Inside, the Heir of Slytherin set upon them a fearsome basilisk, the largest ever recorded. Armed with only a sword, Mr. Longbottom distracted the basilisk while Mr. Potter retrieved their wands to make a more powerful attack. Mr. Longbottom was bitten, and was only saved by the timely application of phoenix tears. Lord Potter then took up sword and wands and slew the beast which a very dangerous strike into its mouth. He also destroyed the dark artifact with which the Heir of Slytherin was attacking the school. Through their actions, these two young men saved the life of Miss Ginevra Weasley and possibly others, and saved Hogwarts School from closure by removing the threat of the Heir of Slytherin forever. For these actions, the Wizengamot is pleased to award Lord Potter and Mr. Longbottom with the Order of Merlin, Second Class.”

The Hall watched as Harry and Neville each received a silver star and wreath on a blue ribbon, Harry’s over top of his Third Class medal, and broke into thunderous applause. Even after three weeks, the relief across the whole country at the ending of the threat at Hogwarts was palpable, and Augusta Longbottom was crying with joy as Neville received his medal.

On the way out, Harry was greeted by a great many parents and families of students thanking him and Neville for saving the school. It was starting to get a little creepy, he thought. They tried to avoid the press, but as usual, they couldn’t escape them completely. “Lord Potter,” one reporter called out, “what are you and your sister going to do with the money?”

“Well, it’s really a windfall as far as we’re concerned,” Harry said after some consideration. “We thought we’d find a worthy cause to donate most of it to. We’re working on some ideas.”

* * *

_10 June 1993_

The worthy cause they eventually decided upon was one that had grown close to Hermione’s heart over the past year. After seeing her classmates struggle for so long, she decided it was time to do something about it. Their parents weren’t so sure it was the _best_ use of their funds, but Sirius loved the idea, and for the sake of student safety, if nothing else, they relented. All it took was a brief consultation with Ron and a letter.

Thus, as the Flying Club headed out to the Training Grounds for their second-last meeting of the year, they were surprised to find an older wizard there to meet them. They were even more surprised when Madam Hooch recognised him.

“Winston?” she said in surprise. “Winston Keitch, is that you?”

“Yes, Rolanda, it’s good to see you again,” Keitch said. He half-hugged her as the students started whispering to each other excitedly: “ _Winston Keitch? Are they serious_?”

“Yes, students, this _is_ Winston Keitch, head of the Comet Trading Company—and what in Merlin’s name are you doing here, Winston?” Hooch demanded.

“Just making a delivery, Rolanda,” he said. He waved to someone at the outer wall of the Training Grounds, and two other wizards began hauling in large boxes.

“A delivery?” Hooch said.

“Yes, it was the funniest thing, I got a letter from a couple of students last week placed an order for twenty _Comet 260s_.”

The workers opened the boxes, revealing twenty shiny new broomsticks. The Club collectively gasped and swarmed the boxes.

“ _Twenty?_!” Hooch said. “From _students_?”

“That’s what the letter said, and the money’s good. Oh, that reminds me, Lord Potter, could I get you to sign this?”

“Oh, sure.” Harry signed the delivery form. “A pleasure doing business with you, sir.”

“Mr. Potter?” Hooch enquired.

“I said we were going to put our money to a worthy cause, if you read the paper, Madam Hooch,” Harry told her. “You’re the one who said someone was gonna get hurt on the school brooms one of these days. We don’t want some little firstie to get stuck in the Hospital Wing over faulty equipment.”

“Well, that is the most—thank you, Mr. Potter, and you, Miss Granger,” she said with tears in her eyes. “I wasn’t sure I ever see the day we got replacement brooms.”

Ron had picked up one of the new brooms and was inspecting it like a connoisseur. “Harry, Hermione, this is awesome!” he said. “ _This_ is why you asked what the best beginner’s broom on the market is?”

“Well, if Hogwarts is the best magical school in the world, we figured we should have the best flight training, too,” Hermione told him. “That the Flying Club has working brooms now is just a bonus.”

“At least, that’s what we told the _Prophet_ ,” Harry added.

“Thanks so much, Harry,” the rest of the Club told him. “Yeah, thanks Harry.” “I can’t believe you did this.” “This is the best!”

“Come on, everybody, let’s get a _real_ pickup game going,” Ron said eagerly.

Everyone agreed that it was the best pickup game all year, and they were so grateful that even the Ravenclaws in the Club couldn’t help but be happy for Harry when he led Gryffindor to victory in the Quidditch Cup on Saturday. _Next year, though_ _…_ they thought.

* * *

_13 June 1993_

Robson Circle was empty—unsurprisingly for the quiet Sunday afternoon—when a man appeared in the middle of it, seemingly out of nowhere. Nothing like this man had ever been seen on Robson Circle, or indeed, anywhere else in that little village in Lincolnshire. Though he had toned down his appearance with plain grey robes (he just _didn_ _’t_ look good in black), his waist-length white hair and beard would have made him stand out anywhere. The old man walked up the garden path to Number Eight and rang the doorbell.

The person who answered the door was an old woman, dressed all in black, white-haired and bent, walking with a cane, her eyes red with tears. When she saw the old man, she gasped in surprise and pressed her hand to her chest as if she’d seen a ghost.

“Hello, Mrs. Warren,” said Albus Dumbledore.

Amy Warren couldn’t believe her eyes. It had been so long—she was eighty-four years old, now, and this man—she remembered him quite well—had to be at least twenty years older than she was, and he was still alive. “It’s you,” she said. “You’re the one who took my Myrtle to that school all those years ago—Du…Dumb…Dumbledore. You’re here.”

“I am here,” he replied.

“Do you—do you know what _day_ it is?” she demanded.

“I know quite well what day it is, Mrs. Warren. In fact, that was one reason I chose it.”

“But why? What reason could you have for coming back here…?” Her words began to fail her. “For coming here on the…it’s fifty years. Fifty years to the day since my daughter was taken from me. Why are you here?”

“I am here,” Dumbledore said, “because I wanted to inform you in person that we have finally determined what it was that killed Myrtle.”

Mrs. Warren stared at Dumbledore like a deer in headlamps. “After fifty years?” she said incredulously. “It took you fifty years to find out?”

“The creature was a basilisk,” he explained. “A very large and very deadly snake. However, the basilisk was hidden—hibernating these past fifty years, so that no one could find it. It was recently woken up and began attacking students again. Fortunately, no one was killed this time. But more importantly, I can inform you that the basilisk is now dead.”

“Dead? You got it this time?”

“We did. Two young boys at our school, Harry Potter and Neville Longbottom, were able to locate the basilisk’s lair and kill it.”

“Well, then…” she said uncomfortably. “I suppose that is good news. I guess I should thank you for informing me.”

“You are quite welcome, Mrs. Warren. However, there is something else. After killing the basilisk, Harry Potter insisted that the carcass, which was very valuable, be rendered and sold, and the proceeds split equally amongst the victims—all of the victims. As you are Myrtle’s next of kin, her share goes to you.”

“I…I guess that’s kind of the boy, then. How much is it?”

Dumbledore smiled and withdrew a slip of paper from his robes. “I have a cheque here for you for ten thousand pounds sterling.”

“T-t-ten _thousand_?” Mrs. Warren said. “That…that boy gave it to _me_? That much?”

“He did. In fact, young Harry was most adamant that I track you down. He also wished for me to give you a message on his behalf, and I quote, “I know it can’t replace what you’ve lost, but I hope it will be some help to you. And please know that Myrtle is happy where she is.’” That last bit was a stretch, but the ghost did seem a good deal happier with the basilisk dead and Miss Lovegood around to talk to from time to time. Harry had suggested the possibility for Myrtle’s ghost to meet her mother directly, but Dumbledore had refused. In history, nothing good ever came of such a meeting. Even at her age, it did not do well to dwell on dreams and forget to live.

Mrs. Warren began to cry again, but this time, oddly, it was tears of joy. It wasn’t about the money, though at her age, she could use what she could get of that, but the thought that a young boy could be some generous and caring was a rare ray of light in her rather closed-off world. “P-please tell…Mr. Potter thank you for me, Mr. Dumbledore,” she said. “Thank you…for bringing justice to my Myrtle, and for thinking of her. And thank _you_ for making the effort to do this.”

“You are most welcome.” He handed over the cheque. “And you have my condolences again, belated though they are. Good afternoon.”

Dumbledore left Number Eight in silence and vanished once he was out of sight.


	62. The Death Eaters Return

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Remember, if the time should come when you have to make a choice between what is right and what is easy, remember JK Rowling.

_10 May 1993_

 

_HOGWARTS SAVED: HARRY POTTER DEFEATS HEIR OF SLYTHERIN!_

_SLAYS ANCIENT BASILISK AFTER SISTER ATTACKED!_

_AIDED BY PHOENIX AND LAST SON OF LONGBOTTOM!_

_REVEALED WANDLESS MAGIC SKILL BEFORE FIGHT!_

 

Those were the headlines that had greeted magical Britain the day after Harry’s (and Neville’s) latest feat of daring. Excitement at the news and relief that the school was safe were widespread, and eager talk about Harry’s supposed anti-dark magic abilities quickly made the rounds. Lockhart’s firing became the shortest-lived scandal in recent memory.

It was Monday before the international papers got a hold of the story. They ran headlines like _BRITAIN_ _’S BOY HERO SAVES SCHOOL BY KILLING BASILISK_ and _HOGWARTS SCHOOL SAFE. BOY-WHO-LIVED DISCOVERS MONSTER IS BASILISK, KILLS IT._ The newspapers that Amycus and Alecto Carrow scrounged up were in Polish, but they said much the same thing.

“I don’t believe it!” Alecto said as she translated the articles in a fury. “Everything was going perfect. Dumbledope was gone, Malfoy half-took over Hogwarts, the mudbloods were all gonna die…and then _Saint_ Potter comes in and ruins everything again.”

“But how’d he get the Heir of Slytherin?” Amycus demanded.

“Hold yer hippogriffs, I’m working on it.” Alecto grumbled as she worked through the article. “Ah, it says some titchy little girl was being possessed by a cursed book and controlling the basilisk. Oh, well _that_ _’s_ easy. That’s got Malfoy’s grubby prints all over it. At least the Dark Lord won’t be trusting _him_ again. But bloody hell, that brat Potter goes up against a giant basilisk with a damn sword, and the basilisk is the one that dies. What’s it gonna take to off him for good?”

“You know, the Dark Lord _was_ awful specific about going after him himself,” Amycus observed.

“Hmm…makes you wonder…but it’s no good unless we find the Dark Lord.”

“I’m starting to think this was a mistake,” he said. “We’ve been looking for ten months and found nothing.”

“Well, it was _your_ idea to come to Poland, brother. I told you that—”

“And it was _your_ idea to leave home, sister, and that’s where all the action is.”

“Action that doesn’t involve the Dark Lord, you idiot!”

“Don’t call me an idiot!”

“I’ll call you whatever I want!”

“ _Bombarda_!”

“ _Defodio_!”

* * *

While the Carrow Siblings were sorting out their differences, they were not to only ones taking notice of the weekend’s events. Basilisks were very rare, and a basilisk in a school was enough to garner worldwide attention. Three schools in India called in Parselmouths and did thorough searches of their own campuses just on the off chance that one was lurking about. A couple of Americans published another open letter criticising Hogwarts’s handling of the situation. Most of the European community expressed relief that the children of Britain were once again safe.

There was one man, though, in far-off Australia, who was less interested in the sensational story and more interested certain other details of the article. When the news hit his country, that man carefully pored over the published information over his morning coffee. He was a tall man with hair like iron and bright amber eyes. His skin was a medium brown, signifying a mixed ancestry. And he had a very keen eye for the unusual details of the story.

 _Hmm_ _…a cursed book_ , he thought. _That sounds suspicious. Curses are one thing, but it would have to take some pretty dark rituals to make it able to possess someone. Well, we_ _’ve got a few ex-Death Eaters around here. I’ll have someone look into that._

 _“Potter and Longbottom emerged from the Chamber wielding a phoenix and a jewelled sword, with which they had killed the basilisk and rescued the Heir’s latest victim,”_ the article said. _Ah, a Phoenix—Dumbledore_ _’s Fawkes, I’m sure. I’ll have to ask Dumbledore about it when next I see him. But by the Rainbow Serpent, two twelve-year-olds face the oldest basilisk ever recorded and live to tell about it? I didn’t realise things had changed so much in Britain. That’ll definitely be something to investigate on my tour._

Edward Grayson was the recently retired Minister for Magic of Australia and now the Ambassador to the International Confederation of Wizards. But more than that, he was a cultural icon Down Under. His power, skill, and vast, esoteric learning had led him to be called “Australia’s Dumbledore,” and he was considered the most beloved Minister of his generation. And it was because of one of his skills in particular that something else in the article caught his eye:

 _“Potter and Granger had already caused a sensation at Hogwarts earlier in the week when they revealed that_ both _of them possess great proficiency with wandless magic, on a level that few wizards ever attain. One witness compared Potter to Albus Dumbledore directly. However, Potter and Granger reportedly claimed to have developed this skill by a dedicated self-study and to know other children with some proficiency in the subject._ _”_

 _Ah, now that_ is _interesting,_ Grayson thought. _Wandless magic is very rare in Europe—no great love for the old practises there—and self-study is even rarer. To impress people with it at the age of twelve—I think a conversation with those two children would be very interesting. Perhaps I_ should _book a reservation for the Quidditch World Cup over there next year._

He mentally filed the knowledge for future reference. Today, however, Grayson had other duties to attend to. As Ambassador-at-Large, he had resolved to take a world tour to speak with the leaders of many of the key players in the international magical community personally and to better gauge the current major issues. _And if that tour ends with an extended stay in Britain next year, I doubt many would complain._

Grayson believed in travelling light—a tribute to his Aboriginal ancestors. He took only a small pack filled with a few clothes, some money, and other essentials, including his two communication mirrors, one allowing him to speak to the new Minister, and the other to his children and grandchildren at home. Thus packed, he stood outside his summer home on the edge of the Outback, admired the stark scenery for a moment, and began chanting one of the most ancient chants in the magical world.

Immediately, the landscape blurred and shimmered around him. A softly glowing road seemed to stretch before him to the north, and the scrub flowed like water under his feet. When the magic reached its crescendo, he took a step, and his foot came down nearly a hundred yards away. He took another step, and another, and the landscape rushed past him in a blur faster than a bullet train. He walked at a leisurely stroll in the half-dream, continually following the songline, or as westerners called it, the ley line.

Six hours and twelve hundred miles later, thanks to a voice strengthened by many years of practice, he came to the Torres Strait, but at this speed, that was no obstacle. He stepped out onto the water as easily as on land. It took some more walking and chanting after that, but finally, tired and a trifle hoarse, Edward Grayson took dinner than night in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea, the first stop on his tour.

* * *

_20 May 1993_

“So what do you have to say for yourself, Lucius?” Cornelius Fudge demanded. “ _I_ _’m_ taking heat for this whole mess, and I was barely involved—on _your_ recommendation, I might add.”

“Calm yourself, Cornelius,” Lucius Malfoy drawled. “The public can hardly blame you for the goings on at Hogwarts.”

“You know that in politics, they will anyway. And besides, _you_ were the one who suggested I lock up Hagrid, and now he turns out to be innocent. Even he has _some_ friends, including Potter, I remind you. He’s already got Amelia looking into it, and after Black, another mistake of that sort reflects very poorly on the Ministry, very poorly indeed.”

“Mistakes happen, Minister. We had evidence against Hagrid, certainly more than against anyone else. Issue an apology, and emphasise that you were doing your best to act in the interests of the children. That always plays well.”

Fudge sighed and sat back down at his desk from his standing position. “I question why I should still listen to your advice, Lucius. You’ve already lost your seat on the Hogwarts Board of Governors. Who are they replacing you with, now?”

“Elphias Doge as Chairman,” Malfoy said disdainfully. “He was the dissenting voice in the affair and so was the ‘natural’ choice. And for the empty seat, Augusta Longbottom. Her grandson was one of those attacked, and she had them eating out of her hand. But the point is—”

“The point is that your little plan to sniff out the Heir didn’t work very well, did it? A little muggle-born girl found the Chamber before you did.”

“A girl who was raised with Harry Potter,” he dismissed it. “It seems that nothing happens normally around him. Our plan _was_ a good one. Amos also pursued it wholeheartedly. Have you also interrogated him?”

“I have, as a matter of fact,” Fudge replied. “And he also defended his choice. But _you_ Lucius, Dumbledore seems to think you were behind the whole thing from the start.”

Malfoy bristled with feigned anger: “Dumbledore should have retired years ago. Do you really think I’d be fool enough to unleash a basilisk on my own son’s school, even if I were so inclined?” That was a blatant evasion. In fact, he _had_ been fool enough. He had been sure it would be safe for purebloods, and it was, at least for non-blood traitors. But Narcissa had thoroughly chewed him out for it just the same.

“No, no I know you’re not,” Fudge admitted. “But the fact remains that you just lost a fair part of your power and influence with that gambit. It’s enough to make a man start questioning his confidence.”

Malfoy sighed and said, “Do you still trust my judgement, Cornelius?”

“Not as much as I used to,” Fudge grumbled. “Certainly not on security.”

He suppressed the urge to roll his eyes. “Have I ever steered your political career wrong?”

Fudge grumbled some more, but he couldn’t very well refute that. And he was well aware that Malfoy’s coin was still good. “No, no I suppose not.”

“Then if you truly want my advice, if the public outcry and the investigation begin to cause you problems, the easiest thing to do would be to find a scapegoat. After all, you weren’t the only person involved in the decision to arrest Hagrid, Cornelius. Let some of your staff take the fall. The Minister’s office could use a few new reforms anyway, and I know some good people in the departments who deserve a promotion.”

The Minister considered this and quickly decided that it couldn’t hurt to look a little closer. “Alright, Lucius, I’m listening.”

* * *

_31 May 1993_

“Oh, joy, Potter gets the Order of Merlin, _Second_ Class, now,” Alecto Carrow grumbled when she saw the latest headline. “And that Longbottom boy, too.”

“I’m telling you, Alecto, we’re looking in the wrong place,” Amycus insisted. “We’ve got nothing here. The only place where people know what’s going on is England. We should look back there.”

“Quit being a prat. Where would we look there? We’ll never get near Potter. Think we can just waltz up and kidnap Amelia Bones, do you? It took Rosier _and_ Mulciber to take down her brother, and he didn’t have Aurors.”

“Will you shut up, woman. I’ve got an idea.”

“Ha! That’d be a first.”

“I’m telling you, I do,” Amycus shouted over her. “There’s one bloke in England who knows stuff and _isn_ _’t_ protected.”

“Oh yeah? Who’s that?”

“Crouch. Barty Crouch.”

“Crouch? He’s been out of the DMLE for seven years,” Alecto sneered.

“Which makes him five years more up to date than we are. And he was still in the Ministry a lot longer than that. Knowing him, he was still asking around. He might just know what country the Dark Lord went to hide in. _And_ he’s disgraced and alone now.”

“Huh…” Alecto considered this, turning it over in her mind. To her astonishment, it actually made sense. “Well, mark it on the calendar,” she said. “You actually said something smart for once.”

“I’m not a total idiot, Alecto.”

“Oh yes, not a _total_ idiot. Come on, we need a plan.”

“And costumes,” Amycus said. “If we wanna do this right, we gotta break out the old costumes.”

“ _Two_ smart things! Quit now. I may have a heart attack.”

* * *

_13 June 1993_

After returning to England and spending a few days scouting out the area, the Carrows were ready to make their move. Barty Crouch, so far as anyone could tell, was a lonely, bitter retiree, living a miserly life off his considerable family wealth. He was the last of a once proud pureblood house, with seemingly no interest in continuing his line and few prospects to do so after being forced to resign in disgrace over the imprisonment Sirius Black.

He would be a soft target.

And so, late in the night on the thirteenth of June, two figures in black robes and skull masks approached Crouch’s residence, one at the front door and one at the back. They had synchronised their (stolen) watches, and when the clock struck eleven, they blasted both doors in.

Somewhere in the house, an ageing man, once an Auror, though those days were long past, shot up in bed and cried, “Who’s there?” He grabbed his wand and staggered to his feet, stalking into the living room. When he got there, he was practically bowled over by something he had hoped never to see again: two Death Eaters. With a cry of horror, he began casting curses at them, even as he wondered whether he was having a nightmare. Unfortunately, he was years out of practice, and the fight didn’t last long before he found himself disarmed and tied to a chair.

“Hello, Crouch,” the shorter of the two Death Eaters hissed. To Barty Crouch’s surprise, it was a female voice. “It’s been a long time, hasn’t it?”

Crouch stared at the pair fearfully. Two years ago, he would have been defiant in the faces of these animals, but his forced retirement had not been good to him. He still kept up his severe appearance, keeping his hair unnaturally straight and perfectly parted down the middle, shaving every day and carefully trimming his toothbrush moustache, but he looked lean and haggard compared with his previous impeccable health, and if his thin face looked a little skull-like before, it was very pronounced now. “Wh-what do you want?” he said. “I’m not at the Ministry anymore. I have nothing you want.”

“Oh, I think you do,” the woman said. “I think you have exactly what we want—information.”

“Mr. Crouch! Mr. Crouch!” They were interrupted by a squeaky voice as a tiny house elf with brown eyes and a nose like a tomato ran into the room.

“Winky, help me!” Crouch ordered.

“ _Depulso_!” said the other Death Eater, a man, and Winky was slammed into the wall and soon found herself pinned there, despite her struggles.

“Mr. Crouch! No! Do not hurt Master—Mmph!” The man gagged the elf.

“Good. Now that distraction’s taken care of,” the female Death Eater said. “You’re going to tell us everything you know about the current whereabouts of the Dark Lord.”

“The Dark Lord? He’s dead,” Crouch said.

“ _He is not dead_. We have seen the proof. He is still out there somewhere, and I think you have information that can lead us to him.”

“I know nothing,” he said defiantly, “and even if I did, I would never tell you, Death Eater.”

“I think you’re wrong, on both counts. At least, you’d better be if you want to avoid the taste of my wand.” she levelled her wand at his head. “Last chance, Crouch.”

“Never!”

“ _Crucio_!”

The funny thing about certain curses is that to maintain them requires a constant trickle of concentration and magical energy. The actual amount is tiny. One can be distracted, far away, or even asleep and still keep them up without even noticing. But the Cruciatus Curse completely overloads the sympathetic nervous system and pours a dangerous amount of magical energy directly into the brain. It effects a superlatively painful near-seizure, and it is neurologically impossible to maintain uninterrupted concentration under it.

Thus, Amycus and Alecto were only a couple of minutes into their crude interrogation when they were interrupted by a disembodied voice that said, “What the hell is going on here?”

Both Carrows jumped and fired off curses, but they passed through thin air. Then, a hand reached up and pulled an invisibility cloak off a thin figure.

“ _Barty Junior?_!” the Carrows gasped in shock. Winky squeaked and struggled against her bonds twice as hard.

Barty Crouch Junior looked much older than when they had last seen him, when he had barely been out of school, but he still had that same lean, freckled face and a now-long mop of fair hair. He squinted at the two figures. He was good with voices, and that there was a male and a female voice gave them away. “Amycus? Alecto? Is that you?” he said hoarsely.

Alecto flipped up her skull mask, and Amycus followed suit. “Barty Junior!” she repeated. “How are you here? You’re dead!”

The younger Barty staggered forward in his tattered nightclothes and picked his father’s wand up off the floor. “That’s what _he_ wanted everyone to think,” he said, kicking his father in the shin.

“Son—” Crouch Senior said.

Barty waved the wand and conjured a gag on him. “Mr. Straight-and-Narrow here broke me out of Azkaban by having me switch places with my dying mother. And _then_ —” He kicked him again. “—he kept me a prisoner in my own home with the Imperius Curse for the past eleven years.”

The Carrows gasped and sneered at the older man. “Barty Crouch Senior,” Amycus grinned. “Who woulda thought _you_ _’d_ stoop so low, what with throwing people in Azkaban left and right?”

“Even threw Sirius Black in there, and he was innocent,” Alecto added.

“And here you break out your own son and Imperius him. You’d have made a good Death Eater.”

“Mmph!” Crouch grunted with rage. _No one_ compared _him_ with a Death Eater.

“Oh, yes,” Junior said. “He’s got darkness in his soul, just like his _dear_ son. But why are you two here after all this time?”

“Us? We’re looking for the Dark Lord,” Alecto said. “We thought your old man might know something.”

“ _Oh,_ so after he’s been gone eleven years, someone finally decided to do something about it?” Barty said indignantly.

“Hey, we froze our arses off for a year in Scandinavia and Poland,” Amycus roared.

“Ten years, then. So you went looking for the Dark Lord, came up dry, and came back to question a man who’s been out of law enforcement for years, is that it?”

“Hey we were doing the best we could,” Alecto said. “I don’t suppose you could do any better.”

“Well, considering I have more brains than both of you nitwits put together, I’d have to say yes.”

“Hey, who are you calling a—?” Amycus started, but then he turned purple with rage as Barty silenced him.

“ _I_ actually have some contacts on the continent. Contacts the Dark Lord had made during his decade of travelling before he returned and formed the Knights of Walpurgis. And I can still find some of them, especially with the mutterings my old man’s heard over the years. And if you’d had the sense to look there, you would’ve found them down in the Balkans.

“Oh, the _Balkans_ ,” Alecto said. She smacked Amycus in the back of the head. “Poland,” she scoffed. “Idiot.”

Barty unsilenced Amycus. “How do we know you’re not lying?” he said.

The younger man sneered at him. “Would _I_ lie about the Dark Lord?”

“You can silence him again,” Alecto said. “He’s just the muscle.”

“Shut up, woman! So if we know now, we can _all_ go find him,” he said.

“Oh, so it does have a brain,” Barty said. “Of course that’s what we’re gonna do.”

Alecto grinned at Crouch Senior and said, “Well, then, old man, it looks like you’ve outlived your usefulness. _Avada_ —”

“Wait!” Barty stopped her. “As far as anyone knows, he lives alone, and we were never here. We’ll make it look like a robbery. That’ll be less suspicious. I’ll get the money and the valuables. You two grab some supplies from the kitchen and make the rest of the place look ransacked. I trust you can handle that much.”

“We’re not total idiots, Barty,” she snapped.

“Yes, not _total_ ones. Get moving.”

Barty Crouch Senior watched in horror, still gagged and tied to a chair, as his son and the two other Death Eaters trashed his immaculate house. Within minutes, they had taken everything of value, packed bags to leave, and his son stood before him one last time with nought but cruelty in his eyes. “Well, now, it looks like the tables are thoroughly turned, aren’t they?” the younger Barty said. A flick of his wand, and the gag fell away. “Any last words?”

“Son! Son, please, I tried! I tried to help you! Son, please don’t! I’m your father!”

Rage flashed in the young man’s eyes. “You are no father of mine!” he bellowed. “I have no father! _Diffindo_!”

The elder Crouch’s throat was slashed, and he bled out on the floor. Winky gave a long, anguished squeak and went limp, sobbing where she was pinned to the wall.

“And may you rot here,” Junior said.

“Good one, Barty,” Alecto said approvingly.

“I’ve been wanting to do that for eleven years,” he responded. He unbound the old man’s corpse from the chair with his wand and dropped it on the floor, as if he’d been killed in the scuffle. Then, he turned to Winky and looked her over. “Hmm, you could still be useful,” he said. Without even using his wand, snapped his fingers. Her gag fell off, and she dropped to the floor.

“Oh, Master Barty! Master Barty!” the elf cried. “What has you done? What has you _done?_ You has killed Winky’s master!”

He crouched down in front of her, extending a hand, and said, “Winky, listen to me. _I_ _’m_ your master, now. Come with me.”

Winky whimpered, but she couldn’t disobey. She reluctantly reached out and took Barty’s hand.

Barty took one last look at his house, satisfied with his work. Then, he strode to the open front door with a cry of “ _Allons-y_!” and left for good.

* * *

_15 June 1993_

 

_BARTY CROUCH MURDERED!_

_PUREBLOOD LINE ENDED BY UNKNOWN ROBBER!_

 

“Okay, that’s not good,” said Harry Potter.

“What happened?” Hermione Granger said as she leaned over to see the newspaper.

“I don’t know,” Harry said. He started reading bits of the article aloud: “ _The body of Bartemius Crouch, Sr was discovered in his home on Monday morning after a neighbour reported a disturbance. The initial investigation indicated that Crouch_ _’s throat had been cut by a Cutting Curse during a struggle. The house had been looted and all valuables taken, suggesting that the murder was a robbery gone wrong…house elf is missing and presumed dead…Crouch was the former Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement and the Department of International Magical Cooperation…suffered a blow to his career after imprisoning his son…was forced to resign in disgrace eighteen months ago after it was revealed he had imprisoned Sirius Black without trial…was the last living member of the House of Crouch, an ancient pureblood family still listed on the Pure-Blood Directory_ …”

Harry stopped and looked over at the Slytherin Table. It was the last week of school, normally a happy time, but many of the Slytherins looked as if they were in mourning. They surely considered Crouch himself a blood traitor for his crusade against the Death Eaters, but to the purity-obsessed crowd, the ending of one of the Sacred Twenty-Eight Lines was a tragedy under any circumstances. The Crouches were the fourth family to go extinct in the sixty-one years since the Directory was first published, and that didn’t bode well for the others.

“They look like they’re taking it pretty hard,” Hermione observed.

“Well, they can do that,” Harry said. “I’m not happy he’s dead, but that lot could use some shaking up. Anyway, I’m a little worried about what this means.”

“What do you mean?”

“Crouch locked up a bunch of Death Eaters. What if this was a revenge killing and was just made to look like a robbery?”

“Hmm…I suppose it’s possible,” his sister replied. “But Crouch was pretty thoroughly ostracised and lived alone. And if a rogue Death Eater did it, why wouldn’t they take credit? I think the robbery explanation is more likely.”

“Huh, maybe.”

* * *

_15 June 1993_

_Our beloved son,_

_As you no doubt agree, Draco, the murder of Bartemius Crouch is a tragedy for the pureblood community, even if Crouch himself was a blood traitor. Both of us are working through our connections to ascertain further details of the murder. Despite recent unfortunate events, your father_ _’s connections in certain areas are still quite good._

_At the moment, we have heard no evidence to contradict the Ministry line that the incident was an ordinary robbery gone wrong. Only two points are suspicious: first that the body of Crouch_ _’s house elf was never found, which, insignificant though it is, may indicate something more complex. Second, a rumour that Amycus and Alecto Carrow have again been seen in Britain. Given the opportunity, the involvement of those two may reasonably be suspected._

_We ask you not to discuss this with anyone during the remaining days of the term, but to keep your ears open for any information you hear along these lines, particularly from Flora and Hestia Carrow. We will discuss these and other recent events when you return home._

_Father and Mother_

* * *

_23 June 1993_

_A politician_ _’s work is never done,_ the Grangers thought. _Even the reluctant ones._ Andromeda had called them that night, along with Sirius and Remus, to an emergency family gathering to deal with something that had suddenly come up on the agenda for the Wizengamot meeting on Saturday, so they had met up at Sirius’s house to discuss the situation.

“I’m sorry to bother you during your first week back,” she said as Dobby passed out refreshments, “but I suspected you’d want to face this head-on.”

“It’s alright, Andi,” Emma said. “If there’s something that affects the children, we need to deal with it.”

“Not the children so much, but definitely the family,” Andi clarified. “Sirius, have you heard—?”

“No, sorry, I wasn’t paying that much attention. What’s up?”

Andi sighed. “Fudge has been shaking up his office,” she said. “He’s replaced a number of people who are key to drafting legislation, and the most important one is his new Senior Undersecretary—a Dolores Umbridge.”

Remus shot to his feet: “Bloody hell! He hired Umbitch?!” He stopped as he realised everyone was staring at him and sat back down. “Um, sorry,” he said sheepishly. “Dolores Umbridge is a…frankly, she’s exactly what I said. All the werewolves have heard of her. She’s one of the biggest anti-werewolf crusaders around, not to mention a pureblood supremacist. She’s also an extremely unpleasant woman—ambitious to the point of sociopathy and ruthless to the point of tyranny, if you ask her former employees. She ran the Improper Use of Magic Office for a few years and then moved over to the DMLE, where she ran the Werewolf Control Squad with an iron fist. I shudder to imagine what she could do with a higher position.”

“You don’t have to imagine it,” Andi said flatly, removing a dossier of papers from a folder. “She’s already drafted a new anti-werewolf bill, ostensibly for the public safety. She’s going to bring it to the floor on Saturday.”

“Oh no…” he grumbled. “Let’s see the damage…” He started thumbing through the pages, and then he started growling. “Merlin’s saggy left—”

“Ahem,” Emma coughed.

“Sorry.”

“That bad, Moony?” Sirius said.

“Worse. Employers _must_ be informed of werewolf status. Stricter penalties for failure to inform and failure to register. Closer scrutiny on those few with spouses or children. Then there’s a whole list of jobs we’re not allowed to do—healing, teaching, anything working with children, really, anything in law enforcement, a lot of things working directly with the public, several involving magical creatures. _And_ it basically strips all protections from wrongful termination, including missing work for the full moon.”

“But that’s not fair!” Hermione exclaimed. “How’s that public safety?”

“Probably something about a “level playing field,’” Sirius said. “I know how they think. It’s same way they justify blatantly unfair rules about underage wand use.”

“Probably,” Remus agreed. “But with these rules, it’ll be almost impossible for werewolves to get jobs in the magical world—good jobs, anyway. And it’s already bloody hard in the muggle world because so few jobs give enough sick days. How can she get away with this? Werewolf attacks are at their lowest in years since the introduction of the Wolfsbane Potion.”

“That’s politics for you,” Andi said unhappily. “You can make almost anything into a major issue if you use the word “reform.” If you know so much about her, you probably know her rhetoric better than I do.”

Remus sighed and thought back to what he knew about the woman. Then, he made a face and spoke in a high-pitched, sickly-sweet voice, “Clearly, the incomplete adoption of the Wolfsbane Potion by the werewolf population indicates that they are not prepared to take responsibility for the protection of themselves or others.” He growled again. “The same Wolfsbane Potion that most of us can’t afford because it’s hard enough to get a job already—Oh, why do I bother?”

“Why don’t they just find a way to make the Wolfsbane Potion more available?” Harry asked.

“Money,” he replied. “No one wants to spend money on werewolves. That and some…other political issues.”

“Well, we can’t just sit by,” Harry said. “We need to stop her.”

“Definitely,” Hermione added.

“I agree,” Dan said. “What options do we have?”

“Umbridge can’t introduce the bill herself,” Sirius said. “Only the Minister and the seven Department Heads have votes in the Wizengamot from the Ministry. Is Fudge gonna bring it up?”

“I doubt it,” Andi said. “He can’t afford much controversy right now. But he promoted Amos Diggory to the head of the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures shortly before the mess with the Hogwarts Board—probably a reward to Diggory from Malfoy for taking his side, and the rumour is Umbridge is getting him to sponsor it.”

“Diggory. Figures,” Remus said. “Everyone says he’s a decent bloke, but he’s always been tough on ‘dark creatures’.”

“How do the battle lines look?” Sirius asked.

“The two of us, of course,” said Andi. “Solomon Monroe, and his son—it’s a lucky break he’s running International Magical Cooperation, now. I can appeal to Hippocrates Smethwyck as a fellow healer. After that, it gets harder, though. We’re not playing the popular position, even less than with the Muggle Protection Act. Just looking at the Ministry seats, I _might_ be able to get Algernon Croaker from the Department of Mysteries, and we can probably offer Ludovic Bagman from Magical Games and Sports enough _quid pro quo_ to side with us. Amelia Bones will want to stay neutral as long as possible. I’m sure Valentinus Dudley from Magical Accidents and Catastrophes will take Umbridge’s side, and I don’t know about Antioch Wildsmith from Magical Transportation.

“As for the other Lords and Ladies, I think even Augusta Longbottom will be a tough sell, even if we get her brother-in-law on board. We can get some of our usual allies, of course—Denbright, Macdonald, Montgomery—but it’s not a whole coalition.”

“Isn’t there a youth representative?” Hermione asked.

“Yes, a seventh-year student appointed by Dumbledore at the start of the school year. Do you think you can talk to whoever it is this year?”

“I don’t know who it is,” Harry said. “Next year’s representative, maybe. If it’s Penelope Clearwater, definitely. If it’s Percy Weasley, I don’t know. He’s aiming for a Ministry job after he graduates. But Andi, can’t I just make a speech or something? That’s worked before.”

Andi shook her head sadly. “Not with this—or at least not all at once. This is something where we have to win people over gradually. You’ll also have to be careful what you say,” she added, “and not just because of Remus. There might not be that many people who are actively anti-werewolf, but pro-werewolf isn’t a very popular position either. Push too hard, and people will turn against you.”

“It’s ridiculous,” Harry said. “It’s just a disease, and it’s not even dangerous twenty-nine days a month.”

“Yes, Cub, _we_ all know that,” Remus said. “ _Most_ wizards even know that in their heads. But the emotional arguments about safety get the better of them. And the public face of werewolves isn’t as…well-kempt as mine, which doesn’t help the cause. It’s the prejudice I’ve have to deal with my whole life,” he said dejectedly. No one mentioned the fact that he didn’t make his status public. Things were hard enough for him as they were, even living with Sirius full time, and they wouldn’t push that on him.

“Remus, we’ll do everything we can to stop that woman,” Dan assured him. “We won’t tolerate that kind of bigotry.”

“Thank you, Dan,” he replied. “I’m eternally grateful to have such a supportive family.”

* * *

_25 June 1993_

“It’s about time you got back,” said Paul. “We’ve been waiting to see this film.”

“Mostly Paul,” Tiffany clarified, “but it’s good to have you two back.”

Harry and Hermione got precious little time to see their best muggle friends anymore. (Grounding Harry had proved a bit difficult as there had still been a month left in the term at the time.) It was hard to believe how much the pair had grown, and they were surprised to see the two of them holding hands.

“It’s good to see you, too,” Hermione said, hugging Tiffany. “So when did you two get together?”

“Just a couple months ago. Paul asked me to the spring formal.”

“That’s nice. I wish we had school dances.”

“No school dances? That’s lame.”

“I know. Harry, we should put that on our list for after we lobby for decent replacements for Snape, Binns, and Lockhart.”

“Er…sure,” Harry said uncomfortably. That didn’t sound like it was high on _his_ priority list.

“So what about you, Hermione,” Tiffany said. “Got your eye on a boy yet?”

“No, Tiffany, I’m taking that slow.”

“Hey, Harry, what about you, mate?” Paul asked.

Harry rolled his eyes: “No, Paul, I do not have my eye on a boy.” Everyone laughed. “Or a girl,” he added.

“Okay, okay, so how _was_ school?” Paul continued.

“Oh, you know, searching for secret chambers, fighting giant serpents, saving damsels in distress—the usual,” Harry said, getting more laughs from his friends.

“Sounds like fun. This film should be right up your alley, then.”

“Er, yeah, sure,” Hermione said uncomfortably. Both she and Harry were trying to mask the fact that they were a little worried this film might bring up unpleasant memories. After all, it was _Jurassic Park_. Their mother was at home for this. Only Dan was adventurous enough to chaperon this one.

The beginning of the film, where a park worker was killed by an unseen Velociraptor, was just plain creepy, but things were fine for a while after that. The graphics were really impressive. Even to Harry and Hermione, who had seen _actual_ giant reptiles, seeing a realistic Brachiosaurus on the big screen was pretty cool.

The trouble started when the Tyrannosaurus escaped its enclosure. The huge beast actually did resemble the basilisk, especially its head, which was about the same size and even had the same size teeth. Needless to say, both Harry and Hermione became very uncomfortable when it began stomping towards the jeep, and when it first appeared on the screen, with only its head visible, Hermione instinctively covered her face with her hands and cried, “Don’t look it in the eye!”

A couple movie-goers glanced her way in confusion, and Paul whispered, “No, it’s “Don’t move so it can’t see you.’”

That was bad enough, but when the T. rex attacked the jeep and smashed the sunroof in to try to get the kids, even Harry screamed, and when it picked up the lawyer in its jaws and shook him like a chew toy, something the basilisk could easily have done to Harry or Neville, even Dan shouted out, and it was only Harry’s grip on Hermione’s arm that kept her from jumping up and running from the theatre. A lot of people thought the Velociraptors were the scariest part of the movie, but after that scene, they looked like pushovers.

“That’s it,” Hermione said when it was over. “No more monster movies.”

“Yeah,” Harry agreed. “At least not until Christmas.”

“Wow, I didn’t think you two would be so freaked out about that,” Paul said. “You okay?”

“Yes,” Harry assured him. “We, uh, just have issues with giant reptiles…apparently.”

“That’s…kinda weird.”

“Well, weirdly specific phobias happen occasionally,” Hermione said. “Now, if you want to see _Free Willy_ , that’s one we can do.”

“ _Free Willy_?” Harry said sceptically. “I was thinking _The Fugitive_.”

“Hmph. Boys. Well, there’s always _Hocus Pocus_. That should be good for a laugh.”

“Well, I _do_ like talking cats,” Harry agreed.

“Hmm, there’s a lot of good movies this summer,” Tiffany said. “Are you gonna be here the whole time or are you going on holiday again?”

“We’re not sure,” Hermione said. “Things were hectic at school. We haven’t had time to plan a holiday.”

“I hope we can hang out more, then,” Paul said. “We can go on some more double dates.”

Harry’s and Hermione’s eyes widened, and they stared at each other in horror. “Eww!” they both said.

Paul doubled over laughing. “You should’ve seen your faces!” he said. “I wish I’d brought a camera.”

But despite the ribbing and their panic during the film, the two siblings had a lot of fun with their muggle friends.

“Probably wasn’t the best film to see a month after fighting a basilisk,” Hermione concluded when they got home.

“Eh, the basilisk was scarier,” Harry said.

Both of their parents choked a little. “How’s that?” Dan asked nervously.

“It was bigger, for one. And way faster in an enclosed space. Not to mention it was poisonous and could kill with a look. Seriously, if Alan Grant had had a sword and a wand, he could’ve brought that T. rex down easy.”

“And if he’d been named Harry Potter,” Hermione corrected. “I think more than a few wizards would’ve panicked and got eaten.”

“Well, maybe Theo Nott would.”

“Harry, that’s awful,” Hermione said, but she laughed in spite of herself.


	63. Fenrir Greyback

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Whether or not you find your own Harry Potter, you’re bound to find some Harry Potter. If you happen to find JK Rowling’s Harry Potter, please return it.

The Wizengamot meeting the next day turned out to be pretty boring. Amos Diggory introduced the anti-werewolf bill and made an impassioned speech about “public safety,” “reform,” and “regularising the management of werewolves. Solomon Monroe was the main voice against it that day. Harry’s family had agreed to hold back for now and see how the battle lines were being drawn. The debate on the bill was short, and it was shelved until the next meeting, officially for public comment and unofficially to build coalitions.

The most interesting part of that meeting was when Cousin Dora ran up to the family beforehand, yelling, “I passed! I passed!” and hugging everyone enthusiastically.

“That’s great, Dora,” Hermione grunted as she hugged her tightly, “but _what_ did you pass?”

“Stealth and Tracking!” she said. “That’s my hardest subject in Auror training. I nearly flunked it—I can still barely walk a straight line. But I passed it. Now I’ve just got one more year, and I’ll be fully qualified.”

“Oh, that’s great!” Hermione said. “I’m sure you’ll do a good job.”

Other than that and a session with Maxwell Barnett to practice Occlumency, the summer got off to a pretty uneventful start. The biggest news in the muggle world (in Harry’s and Hermione’s estimation) came the following Monday, as their father was reading the paper.

“Harry, Hermione, you’ll want to hear this,” he said.

“What is it, Dad?” Harry said.

“The BBC has announced a new _Doctor Who_ telefilm titled _The Dark Dimension_ to air on the show’s thirtieth anniversary this November.”

“New _Doctor Who_?” Harry said excitedly.

“ _Finally_!” Hermione exclaimed. “I can’t believe they’ve waited this long to start it again. It’s almost four years. You have to tape it for us, Dad.”

“Don’t worry, we will. Your mother and I grew up with that show. We won’t want to miss it either.”

“Good,” Hermione said. “You know, we should try to find a way to introduce wizards to _Doctor Who_. Honestly, they think they’re upholding ancient British traditions, but what could be more British than hiding behind the sofa whenever Daleks appear?”

The Grangers all laughed.

* * *

Unbeknownst to the Grangers, however, the events at the Wizengamot _were_ big news in some circles. At that very moment, in the backwoods of what was now Slovakia, a man wearing a ratty black coat and no shirt read a newspaper nicked from a bin in the magical district of Bratislava—specifically, the international politics section. The man made sure to follow most of the politics in Europe to find new target areas and new safe havens. He was accustomed to moving frequently.

The man growled when he saw the new legislation proposed in Britain. That little piece of bigotry was the worst he had seen in quite some time—the worst new one, anyway. A few countries were chronically worse. But this wasn’t one of those old, tough governments. This would be a soft target—and an opportunity. The revolution was coming.

He needed to move fast, though. He had to get to Britain before moonrise on Saturday. He made his way back to his travelling companions and announced his decision: “Time to move.”

* * *

The Grangers got a big surprise on the fourth of July when Sirius and Remus showed up at their door, soaking wet thanks to a late afternoon shower, and barely able to stand. Being that it was the day after the full moon, Remus really shouldn’t have been up and moving, but he was, and he looked agitated. Sirius had to hold him up to keep him from falling over, but Remus was the one who pushed his way into the house and loudly called for everyone to come to him like a man with a bad hangover.

“Remus? What is it? What’s wrong? Shouldn’t you be resting today?” Emma said with concern. She tried to make him lie down on the sofa, but he refused.

“Had to come,” he said. “We have a problem.” And then he held out a half-soaked newspaper that they hadn’t seen yet.

 

_The Evening Prophet_

_Special Edition_

_FENRIR GREYBACK SIGHTED IN BRITAIN!_

_SAVAGE WEREWOLF RETURNS TO HOME SHORES!_

_MUGGLE FAMILY KILLED IN UPPER FLAGLEY!_

 

Below the headlines was a magical mugshot of something like a man growling at the camera with pointed yellow teeth. He was very burly and had an impossibly hairy face. His chest, which was bare beneath his ratty coat, looked almost furred. The oddest thing about him, though, were his eyes. They were two-toned, with a ring of pale blue inside a ring of black. He certainly looked very savage.

“Werewolf?” Dan said in confusion. “Is he worse than the other werewolves or something?”

“Much worse,” Remus gasped. “Greyback is—”

“Remus, you really must lie down,” Emma said. “Wolfsbane or no, having your body forcibly rearranged can’t be good for you.”

“Excuse me!” Sirius, Harry, and Hermione, who was still in training, all said at the same time.

“Oh…you know what I mean,” she groused. “We don’t have much in the way of potions here, but I can get you some ibuprofen or paracetamol, if you like.”

“Whatever…whatever you have is fine,” he groaned as he lay down. “The muggle stuff isn’t great, but it helps some.” A couple minutes later, and he had eagerly downed a couple of pills and was resting well enough to continue the conversation.

“Okay, Remus, who’s this Fenrir Greyback, and what’s so bad about him?” Dan asked.

Remus took a deep breath and began speaking: “Greyback…is the werewolf who bit me.” The Grangers gasped softly. “But it’s about a lot more than just me. Greyback is a revolutionary. He despises the prejudiced treatment of werewolves, but his response is to try to infect as many werewolves as he can to build an army to take over the magical world. He’s also by far the most savage werewolf in Europe—the worst of probably a couple thousand of us. He’s wanted for murder or manslaughter in at least twenty countries. When he comes around everyone double-locks their doors during the full moon, and a couple of days before. He has to move every few months just because he’s hunted so heavily, but he always gives the Aurors the slip.”

“But what does he _do_?” Emma said. “What makes him so much worse than all the others?”

“He particularly targets young children,” Remus said with a grimace, to the horror of the listeners. “Around age five is when he likes them. He deliberately places himself near them on the night of the full moon, infects them, and if he can, kidnaps them—raises them with his pack to hate normal wizards like he does.”

“That’s horrible!” Hermione gasped, to general agreement.

“Is…is that what he tried to do to you?” Harry said cautiously.

“Me? No—or not exactly. I was a revenge attack. Before I was infected, my own father was one of the worst anti-werewolf bigots in the Ministry, I’m sorry to say. The Ministry actually caught Greyback in 1964, near the beginning of his reign of terror, but he passed himself off as a muggle tramp, they let him go. My father was the only one who suspected him, and he came after me because of that.

“You see, Greyback may act like an animal, but he’s really cunning. He talked his way out of a Ministry holding cell, and on the night before the full moon at that. He’s deliberately built up his resistance to the Homorphus Charm, so that it’s basically useless on him now. And going after children isn’t just a terror tactic, and it’s more than just an easy way to get followers. It’s a way to build up his own personal pack the way he wants it. True wolf pack structure is pretty simple. Usually it’s one breeding pair and their young over several years, down to the current litter of pups. In the right living conditions, larger packs can form with two or three or rarely even more breeding pairs. Most _werewolf_ packs resemble human social groups, but Greyback deliberately models his on true wolf packs—except that he acquires “pups’ by “adoption.” It’s too hard to take care of infants in those conditions, so he has no hope of out-breeding wizards, and he tries to infect young children instead.”

“In other words, he’s really bad news,” Dan summarised. He took another look at the paper. “This says a _muggle_ family were killed. Can muggles become werewolves?” he asked worriedly.

“They can, but it’s rare. The Wolf will seek to infect wizards, but it sees muggles as prey. So even though they’re a lot easier to find and catch, muggles rarely survive the attack. By the best numbers I can estimate, no more than a tenth of werewolves are muggles. It used to be even rarer before modern muggle medicine.” Then, Remus rolled over and stared at Harry. “Harry,” he said, “you asked me last week why the Ministry doesn’t make the Wolfsbane Potion more accessible. What I didn’t say at the time was that they want it to stay tightly controlled. Even most werewolves agree that it’s imperative Greyback _never_ gets his claws on Wolfsbane Potion. If he could go after muggles with his wits about him, he could become a dark lord to eclipse Voldemort overnight.”

The Grangers all shuddered. It wasn’t hard to do the maths on that.

“Okay, that’s bad,” Dan said obviously. “How do they control it?”

“The recipe is only available to certified potions masters,” he explained. “Everyone who knows the recipe and everyone who buys the potion has to be background checked, and I suspect the only reason they’re not doing more than that is because the supply is so limited, and the price is so high. That’s probably why Umbitch didn’t bother with it in her bill,” he added, in too much pain to care about his language.

“So what happens now?” Emma said. “What do we need to do?”

“The whole country will be on lockdown during full moons,” Sirius answered. “Auror and Hitwizard patrols in all major wizarding populations centres. Intense investigation the rest of the month. A few ICW Police officers on the ground. In fact, I’m surprised I haven’t been called in today, yet. They’ll want us to catch or kill him, or at least put the screws to him enough that he flees the country.”

“But I bet he’ll stay at least until the final vote on Umbitch’s bill,” Remus added.

“Right,” Sirius agreed. “And _you_ need to stay inside your wards during full moons. If they’re not already set to keep out transformed werewolves, ask Dumbledore to add that.”

“Also, be careful where you go in the day or two before,” Remus added. “Greyback’s not known for kidnapping people beforehand, but it’s possible.”

“It should be fine around here, though, right?” Hermione said nervously. “Hardly anybody knows where were are.”

“In principle, yes, but remember, the Wolf can smell magic like you wouldn’t believe. If he happens to be in the area, he could pick up your scent.”

“Okay, I think we can handle this,” Emma said after taking a few deep breaths. “We’ll make all the arrangements by the next full moon. You should rest, Remus. Tea, either of you? Crumpets? Stay for dinner? It’s nearly time anyway.”

“I could do with a bite, thank you,” Sirius said.

“Maybe later,” Remus groaned.

The Grangers uneasily returned to their activities while Remus tried to sleep for a while. He woke again after dinner, feeling a little better and finding a plate of roast beef, potatoes, and peas left out for him with what seemed to be a wandless Warming Charm on it, plus a bar of chocolate. He smiled. It was a bit of a joke in the family since chocolate was only really a remedy for dementor exposure (Sirius had gorged on it till he threw up when he first got out of Azkaban), but he certainly wasn’t going to turn it down.

“Hey, Moony.”

He looked up to see his honorary nephew standing over him, holding a pair of notebooks. “Hello, Ratsbane,” he said. “Sorry for disrupting your day.”

“It’s fine,” Harry replied. “Er, when you’re feeling up to it, I finished _Harry Potter and the Philosopher_ _’s Stone_.”

Remus’s eyebrows rose: “You did?”

Harry handed him one of the notebooks. “Yeah,” he said, “I wrote about the fight with Quirrellmort and the aftermath, and then I thought I should keep going up through passing the Muggle Protection Act, since that was connected to a lot of it.”

Remus nodded his agreement, then chuckled softly. “If you actually put ‘Quirrellmort’ in print, I’ll have to have Padfoot buy you…I don’t know, something really expensive.”

“Hmm…” Harry nodded contemplatively.

“You’re a good writer, Harry,” Remus said as he thumbed through the new pages.

Harry didn’t feel convinced. Even by the lower standards of the tiny magical world, he could see the problems with it. “It’s not as good as those books,” he said unhappily.

“No, I suppose not, but you’re a lot better than your father was at your age, and equal to your mother. Growing up with Hermione’s done you a lot of good. The quality is just something that will have to come with experience. What did you think of the changes I suggested on the early chapters?”

“They were good. I though they made them a lot better…but I didn’t know what to do about some of them. It’s hard to really see how to change them.”

“Well, we can discuss them over the summer when we have the time. Have you shown your family?”

“Yeah. They say they like it, but I think they might be biased.”

Remus chuckled again: “That’s possible, but I do think it has a lot of potential.”

“Thanks…It’s too bad I couldn’t get away with publishing it, though.” Harry said. “Taking a shot at Voldemort’s reputation like that would be great.”

At that Remus laughed loudly. “You know, Ratsbane, I think only someone who was raised by muggles could say that and mean it. You know what I think you should do? Once you get a good, clean draft, show it to Dumbledore and ask him how much of it you can print. I think you could still sell it.”

“Are you serious?”

“No, _I_ _’m_ Sirius,” a voice called from the dining room. The rest of the family half-laughed and half-groaned.

“What he said,” Remus replied. “But everyone knows an actual autobiography by Harry Potter would be a bestseller. I know you don’t need the money, but you _do_ keep saying you want to set the record straight. Play your cards right, and it could hit the shelves in a couple of years.”

“Wow. Thanks, Moony, I’ll have to…I’ll have to think about that,” Harry told him. In the meantime though, he had a whole new mess of stuff he needed to get off his chest. While Remus was reading, he opened his second notebook and wrote at the top of the page, _Harry Potter and the Heir of Slytherin_.

* * *

John Major, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, set his glasses on his nose and sighed to himself and steeled himself for the _Other_ Minister to step out of the fireplace, of all places. Why that man couldn’t just come in the door like a normal person was beyond him.

The first time this Cornelius Fudge character had stepped into Major’s office, his very first night in the position, he thought he’d finally gone mad from the pressure of the campaign. Honestly, a talking portrait, a man jumping out of the fireplace like Father Christmas in an atrocious lime green bowler, a secret society of witches and wizards with its own government—its own bloody government right in the heart of London! Oh, don’t worry, they had everything under control, Fudge had said, including the dragons. Dragons! They kept actual fire-breathing dragons in Scotland and Wales! And then, just to prove his point, Fudge turned a teacup into a gerbil and left. To be honest, Major had barely absorbed any of the conversation to start with, and that last stunt made him lose track of most of what he had. It was almost enough to make a man want to resign in frustration on the spot—almost.

And it wasn’t like he could tell anyone. He remembered Fudge’s patronising laugh and his final words to him: “ _My dear Prime Minister, are_ you _ever going to tell anybody_?” No, he wasn’t.

Or at least, that was what he thought at first.

Once he gathered his wits about him again (and it took considerable prodding of that gerbil to convince himself he hadn’t dreamt the whole thing), Major started to think that there must be someone else he could talk to about this “magic.” Embarrassingly, with the busyness of setting up the new government, it took him three whole days to think of the answer: _If Fudge told_ me _about magic, then surely Her Majesty must know as well._ He wasn’t disappointed.

“You mean Maggie didn’t tell you?” the Queen had said. “That’s quite an oversight.” Then, when Major gave a largely incoherent explanation of his conversation with Fudge, “Oh, dear, he didn’t explain anything at all to you, did he? I thought that Fudge didn’t sound like much. I’ll ask the Royal Court Magician to pay you a visit and brief you.”

John Major’s primary thought after that call had been, _Her Majesty has a Royal Court Magician?_ This was shortly followed by _Of_ course _she does._

That was how he had met Maxwell Barnett. Unlike Fudge, he was a very agreeable chap—a war veteran who had fought against some evil wizard who was working for Hitler—and a man who knew how to use a door properly. Also unlike Fudge, he was patient, answered all of Major’s questions thoroughly, and didn’t treat him like a child for not knowing things that were supposed to be secret anyway. He’d learnt a lot that day about magic, the magical world, the structure of the wizards’ government, and its history. Barnett had even brought some relevant books for him to peruse.

Major had been furious when he learnt that mind reading existed in the magical world. That was the _first_ thing that anyone with access to nuclear weapons ought to know. At that point, he could see why Maggie had tried to throw Harold Minchum out the window, even not knowing that particular wizard. Needless to say, he’d learnt that “Occlumency” meditation stuff from Barnett as soon as possible.

Some of the other information he’d learnt had also been alarming: widespread prejudice against non-magicals and their magical children, what amounted to a race war that had been inexplicably stopped by a baby, important government officials weaselling out of prosecution for terrorism and murder. And then, a year ago, Barnett had met that baby, now a boy of twelve, and learnt that the most evil wizard of his generation was still roaming the land as a disembodied spirit.

And Fudge hadn’t said a word about any of it. If he wanted to talk _now_ , it must be _really_ bad.

Cornelius Fudge appeared in the fireplace in the Prime Minister’s office at 10 Downing Street, spinning like a top, and then he stepped out, still wearing that lime green bowler. “Ah, Prime Minister,” he said, extending a hand, “good to see you again.” Fudge was sopping wet, evidently having just come out of the rain to whatever fireplace he’d climbed into. “Oh, what a day! What a day!” he said, not waiting for a response. “Howlers at the Ministry! Whole country in an uproar! Aurors on high alert! But then, what do you expect when Greyback comes around?”

“Ahem,” the Prime Minister interrupted him. “Good evening, _Minister_. Could you kindly explain to me in complete sentences what the blazes you’re talking about?”

“Oh, well, nothing to worry about here, I’m sure,” Fudge said nervously. “Nothing to worry about. But I had to come because of those poor muggles, you know?”

“Sorry, _which_ ‘poor muggles’?”

Fudge lapsed into that patronising tone of his. Lord, only two visits, and Major already hated it. “Well, _surely_ you’ve heard about the murders in Upper Flagley last night, Prime Minister,” he said.

Well, that was troubling. Major had indeed been informed just that morning of the gruesome deaths of a family of four up in Yorkshire. The police said it looked more like an animal attack than a murder, but there were no reports of an escaped animal in the area large enough to do that. “You—er, your—I mean to say, your people were involved in that?” he asked.

“To use the term loosely,” the Minister for Magic said with an air of disgust. “Hard to really call Greyback one of 'ours.' Nasty, brutal character, he is. Merlin knows we don’t get werewolf attacks like that very often.”

“Werewolf?!” Major said in horror. That was one he wasn’t too familiar with. Barnett had only mentioned werewolves in passing and said they “usually” didn’t cause much trouble.

“Yes, of course, werewolf. What else did you think could rip people to pieces like that? I saw the photos—a horrible tragedy. Fenrir Greyback really is the worst of the lot. Luckily, we’re working on some laws to control them better.”

“So there’s a werewolf loose in Britain?”

“Oh no, there’s about a hundred of them, but we keep tabs on them, of course. Don’t normally cause any trouble. But Greyback’s come back to Britain, and he’s agitating.”

“Agitating? You call children torn limb from limb _agitating_?”

“Come now, Prime Minister, I told you Greyback’s the worst one, didn’t I. Absolutely savage. More like a wolf than a man, now, even when the moon’s not out.”

Major stopped and sighed. “So now you have to deal with _another_ monster, Fudge?” He said. “You just got rid of one, and another comes along.”

“Excuse me?” Fudge blustered. “What are you talking about?”

Now, the Prime Minister played his ace: “A giant snake I believe it was? Loose in your school, attacking children? It was that Potter boy who got rid of it, wasn’t it? Him and a friend of his? You gave them a couple of awards for it, I believe. That’s really bad form sending a couple of kids to stop a giant monster.”

Fudge turned stark white. _At last, vengeance_ , the Prime Minister thought. This time, it was the Other Minister’s turn to be shocked by the impossibility of John Major’s words. “Now—now see here—” he sputtered. “How could you possibly know about that?”

Major just smiled and said, “My dear Minister for Magic, just because _you_ haven’t seen fit to visit me in the past two and a half years doesn’t mean I have no way of finding out what’s happening in your world. I understand a number of ‘our’ families were affected by those attacks at your school. Why didn’t you inform me?”

Fudge opened and closed his mouth like a fish a few times as he searched for an answer to that one. “They were all families that already knew about magic,” he sputtered. “Nothing to worry _your_ government about. To your world, they would have appeared to have no connection with each other whatsoever. We dealt with it on our own.”

“By sending a couple of kids to kill it?”

“They wound up down there by accident!” he said indignantly. “It was an unfortunate accident. I assure you that my Auror force is highly professional.”

“Very well, Minister. So what do I need to do about this situation?”

“Oh, no, no, there’s no need for _you_ to do anything. We’ve got this covered. And after all, you can’t very well tell the public to lock up on the full moon because there’s a werewolf on the loose, can you?”

The Prime Minister didn’t miss a beat: “No, but I can tell them there’s a serial killer at large with a thing for attacking on the full moon.”

“There’s no need to start a panic, now—”

“It’s better than having people be sitting ducks. I’ll let you deal with _your_ people, Mr. Fudge. You let me handle mine.”

Fudge drew himself up stiffly. “Very well, Mr. Major,” he said. “I just wanted to make sure you were informed. Good evening.” And with that, he stepped back into the fireplace and was gone, leaving nothing but water drippings on the rug.

John Major immediately reached for the button on his intercom to speak to his secretary. “Miss Langford,” he said, “call Mr. Barnett and tell him to come in for an appointment as soon as possible. Rearrange my schedule however you have to.”

“Yes, Mr. Major.”

Now, he would get the _real_ story.

* * *

But despite the unrest with Fenrir Greyback being back in the country, or perhaps because of it, Dumbledore decided they needed to make their move on the horcrux he had located right away. The following weekend, once Remus was certain he was back in full fighting form, he took them by Portkey to a remote, wooded area on the outskirts of Little Hangleton. Sirius carried the Sword of Gryffindor with him.

“I guess the cubs are mad because that television program they wanted to see got cancelled,” Sirius said conversationally as they made their way through the brush.

“Yes, production difficulties or some such I think it was,” Remus said. “They sounded pretty ticked off. I was a little surprised.”

“I suppose I can’t blame them if that program’s as good as they say. Lily always raved about it, too.”

The three men felt shivers down their collective spines and froze.

“We have crossed the outer ward boundary,” Dumbledore said quietly.

“I still can’t even _see_ the place,” Sirius whispered.

“I suspect that was intentional,” Dumbledore continued. “That one was likely intended to scare off anyone who casually wandered in here before they _could_ see it—and to active the defences inside…and an Anti-Apparition Ward, I believe,” he added as he felt the magic out.

“Oh. So much for the element of surprise, then,” Sirius grumbled.

“I would not have expected our presence to go unnoticed. Let us continue.”

A couple of dozen yards further in, they crossed another ward, subtler than the first, but still noticeable to people experienced with the Dark Arts. They stopped again to see what would happen. Suddenly, there was a hissing sound, and dozens of poisonous adders slithered out of the bushes.

“Snakes! Why did it have to be snakes?” Sirius said.

“You’re the one with the sword, Padfoot. Do something,” Remus said as he lashed out at the serpents with his wand.

However, it was some quick charm work by Dumbledore that dispersed the snakes, allowing them to continue. “Likely intended to force the curious to retreat, but still blending in with the non-magical surroundings,” he said. “The rest of the defences will not be so easy.”

“Yeah, no kidding,” Sirius quipped.

They crept forward slowly, waiting to feel the next ward, but it didn’t come. Instead, about a dozen yards farther on, Dumbledore faded into thin air.

“Albus!” Sirius and Remus cried.

But then, Dumbledore reappeared, taking careful steps backwards, and they sighed with relief. “Oh my,” the old wizard said, “I haven’t seen one of these in the field since Grindelwald’s War—it’s a Disillusionment Ward, and a powerful one. I was entirely blinded when I stepped through it.”

“Can you work around it?” Remus asked.

“By myself, I can counteract the Disillusionment to maintain my sight,” he said. “As could Voldemort. But to bring the two of you with me, we would need to bring down the ward.”

“I don’t think you should go in there alone, Albus,” Remus said. “That was the whole point of this.”

“A fair sentiment. Thus, we must bring down the ward, and hopefully reestablish it afterwards, in case Voldemort should return here.”

“The question is,” Sirius said, “do we want to try to bring down the ward by force or risk the traps set for anyone trying to mess with the rune stones?”

“If they’re inside the ward, we won’t even be able to find the rune stones,” Remus observed.

“Let us first ascertain the shape of the ward,” Dumbledore said. “That should give us hints.”

By simply walking around and finding were the vanishing of objects began, they found that the ward was a perfect heptagon marked by seven rune stones. Remus was right that they couldn’t find the stones inside the ward, but Dumbledore was also right that the locations of the corners gave them away approximately. Dumbledore being Dumbledore, he found a clever solution: move large sections of the soil with the rune stones inside them. By moving two of the stones around the heptagon until the planes crossed (with some dampening spellwork to make it less likely they would set off anything), it would create a weak spot that would allow him to open a gap in the ward. They would also be less likely to set off any traps if their magic didn’t touch the stones directly.

The catch was that the two rune stones would have to be moved in a perfectly synchronised manner over a considerable distance, and even with Dumbledore on one and Remus and Sirius working together on the other, it would take a lot of effort to move that much soil.

“Well, you know wards better than we do,” Remus said. “Let’s try it.”

Dumbledore directed them where to go, and they carefully began pushing with their wands. The soil shifted beneath their feet and two large masses slid through their surroundings. They began to move towards each other, and they could feel the magic shifting in the air, concentrating where the stones were coming close to together.

But then, just as the planes of magic crossed, a cord of energy seemed to snap in the air, the soil shifted much more drastically, and with a chorus of moans, about twenty bodies clawed their way out of the soil.

“Crap! Inferi!” Sirius yelled.

“I’ve got this!” Remus said. He _was_ the dark creature expert, after all. He began firing Cutting Curses to dismember them and fire spells to burn them as top speed, but the mob of inferi threatened to overwhelm him. “I could use a little help, though!” he added.

It was good that there were three of them. Dumbledore probably could have taken them on his own, but even as it was, they had a real fight on their hands. “I thought Voldemort stuck all his inferi in that lake,” Sirius yelled. He decided to forgo his wand and started hacking the bodies to pieces with the sword, knowing it would probably be enough to slow them down until the others could burn them, though the closer quarters made it riskier.

“Obviously not all of them!” Remus said between spells. “Padfoot, watch out!”

“ARGH!” Sirius screamed as one of the inferi dug its claws into his shoulder. It clutched him from behind, trying to reach its hands far enough to wrap around his neck. Sirius failed with the sword, narrowly avoiding cutting himself with the poisoned blade.

“Hold still!” Remus yelled. Two carefully-aimed Cutting Curses, and both of the inferius’s arms fell to the ground. Sirius spun around with his wand and burned it to ashes.

The three men looked around and found all of the inferi destroyed, or no longer able to attack. Dumbledore burned what was left of the bodies.

“Try to avoid tripping the traps, you said,” Sirius said. He was bleeding from the shoulder, but still standing. “Thanks, Moony.”

Remus conjured a bandage for him. “Can you get through the ward now?”

“I believe I can.” The old wizard made precise movements with his wand for a minute, and then, something like a doorway appeared in the air, and through it, they could see a ruin of a shack. The roof had been completely stripped away by the elements, and nettles and ivy threatened to choke the walls. The windows were completely opaque. The only part that looked well-preserved was a dead snake nailed to the door.

“What is this place?” Remus said as they approached.

“The childhood home of Voldemort’s mother,” said Dumbledore.

“Ugh,” said Sirius. “I don’t even want to think about him having a mother.”

They didn’t run into any more wards as they approached the door, but Dumbledore held up his hand and hissed a word: “ _Hesha-hassah_.” The door opened.

Sirius shivered: “Do you have any idea how creepy it is when you do that, Albus?”

“Severus has mentioned it on occasion,” Dumbledore said dryly. He started forward, but he had only gone one step when bright, unnaturally ruby-red flames sprang up in the doorway.

“Oh, come on!” Sirius complained.

“Is that what I think it is, Padfoot?” Remus said.

“It’s a cursed fire barrier. Nasty piece of work. They usually need a _potion key_ to get through.”

“Yes, Sirius, I am familiar with the concept,” Dumbledore said. “We will need to determine the properties of the potion that’s needed and then…”

“Now, hold on,” Sirius interrupted. “There are advantages to being a son of the House of Black. I know my curses. My parents used one of these against me when I ran away from home to keep me from coming back for my stuff. I spent two weeks figuring out a way to get through without the key.”

“Hey, I remember that…” said Remus. “I also remember it was _really_ dangerous.”

“Yes, but we can do it faster here. Come on, Moony, it’ll work.”

Remus sighed and helped his friend. Dumbledore watched with confusion as the two men piled up dirt high enough to fill the entire doorway. The dirt pile seemed to glow like a furnace, but then, the pair started casting a number of anti-dark magic spells and some very obscure Glass-Cooling Charms, and the Headmaster understood. A _Scourgify_ later, and it was revealed that the flames were frozen, not by magic, as was usual, but imprisoned in a beautiful sculpture of cloudy glass made from the sandy soil.

“Okay, that’s it,” Sirius said. “If we smash through it fast enough, we’ll have a couple of seconds before the fire reactivates.”

“Ah,” Dumbledore said, “so your plan was to force your way through by sheer nerve.”

“Hey whatever works, right? Just be warned, it’ll only work so many times in a row. I learnt that the hard way. Took ages for my hair to grow back.”

“Quite. I suppose we might as well try it if we are fast enough.” He took his place in front of the door. “If you are right, we will need to take it at a run. Both of you stay close behind me. If you are ready? On three. One…two…three!”

They ran towards the shack, and Dumbledore smashed the glass sculpture into sand just before he reached it. The three men tumbled into the front room and landed in a heap. The flames reappeared behind them.

Dumbledore stood up, dusted himself off, and cast about with his wand. “Very ingenious, Sirius. The horcrux is nearby…Here, under the floorboards.”

The trio carefully lifted up the floorboards at that spot. No traps triggered. Under the floorboards was a box. It was sealed, but not heavily warded. Dumbledore quickly prised it open. Inside the box was a ring—a strange ring—a gaudy old gold thing with an impractically large stone. The stone itself was black and apparently pyramid shaped. And yet, the more one looked at it, the more it seemed…beautiful.

Lupine instinct, plus a certain sensibility of character, was what snapped Remus out of it first—that and the rule that James and Sirius had drilled into the lone half-blood of the Marauders: _“Don’t touch unfamiliar jewelry without checking it for curses first!”_ Jewelry was the most common non-dark item to be cursed by purebloods, and the strange sense he was getting from the ring definitely qualified. And Dumbledore was reaching towards it as if in a trance.

“Albus? Albus! Albus, stop!” he cried pulling the man’s arm back. Dumbledore shook him off, elbowing him painfully in the process. He began to reach again, and Remus did the only thing he could think of: he tackled Albus Dumbledore to the ground.

The next thing Remus knew was a painful blow to the chest, and he flew across the room and slammed into the wall of the shack, rattling the rafters. He felt his ribs crack and a disorienting pain in the back of his head. Dumbledore lay on the floor propped up on one arm with his other hand extended towards him and a terrible rage in his eyes. Remus had just been hit with a wandless Banishing Charm strong enough to give him a concussion, and he feared he was about to face something much worse, but the rage faded from the old man’s eyes, and he instead looked up in horror.

Meanwhile, Sirius had barely noticed. He stood unmoving, transfixed by the sight of the ring. Presently, he began reaching for it.

“Pa—Pad—Padfoot, stop! The ring’s cursed!” Remus coughed.

Sirius hesitated for a moment, but didn’t look at him. He began reaching again.

“Padfoot, the sword! It’s a piece of Voldemort! You’ve got to use the sword!”

Sirius’s hand started shaking. His eyes widened in understanding. Slowly, he drew his hand back and put it on the hilt of the Sword of Gryffindor. Then, in a swift motion, he raised it over his head and brought it down hard on the ring.

_CRACK!_

A pulse of energy blasted him back into the other wall of the cabin, when he slumped, groaning. Dumbledore and Remus staggered to their feet, and Dumbledore waved his hand and closed the box again. He would take a closer look once he was sure the curse was dispelled. “Well done, Sirius,” he said shakily. “It seems you were more than right about needing help.”

“Swell, now help me!” Sirius groaned from the floor. He held up his hands. They were contorted with pain, and the veins had turned black, as if by poison.

“Shiriush!” Remus slurred. His head was going cloudy “What’sh wrong?”

“The curse on the ring, no doubt. It was released when the ring was broken,” Dumbledore said, frantically waving his wand over the man. “But treatable, I believe, if we move quickly. It looks as if the sword absorbed most of it. If any of us had touched the ring directly…”

“Yer welcome…”

“And you, Remus, also need urgent help. Nothing for it—we’ll have to risk the attention at St. Mungo’s. We must go.”

Getting out also took some work, but it went faster than getting in. Dumbledore quickly re-formed the glass barrier on the door of the shack and pushed the three of them through it. He left the two rune stones where there were; he could always move them back later. From there it was just a short run to get out from under the Anti-Apparition Ward, and they were gone.

* * *

The Granger Family stood in front of the Welcome Witch in St. Mungo’s Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries, who, surprisingly, didn’t even seem to notice who Harry was. “Hello,” said Emma, “we’re here to see Sirius Black and Remus Lupin.”

“Let’s see…” the Welcome Witch went through her files. “Here’s Remus Lupin—ground floor, mundane injuries, Ward Nought-Three…And Sirius Black—fourth floor, spell damage, Ward Forty-Two.”

“Thank you,” Emma said.

“And which ward does Healer Tonks work in, ma’am?” Hermione added. “We might want to see her.”

“Ward Thirty-Five, third floor, poisonings.”

“Thank you, ma’am.”

Remus, however, assured them he was fine. He just needed a few hours to get over the concussion with the right potions, and Sirius was the one they really needed to see. So the Grangers took the lift up to the fourth floor, and in Ward Forty-Two, they found Sirius in a bed with Dumbledore standing over him. Sirius’s arms were splayed out, and each of his hands seemed to be soaking in a bowl of potion. But one thing they hadn’t expected was to see a third person there: Victoria McKinnon, who was sitting by his side and wiping his forehead.

“Hey, there, cubs, Dan, Emma,” he said, smiling uncomfortably. “Good to see you. How’s Remus doing?”

“He was fine, and he said you were the one we should be worried about,” Emma told him.

“Of course he _says_ that.”

“Well, he looked fine,” she answered. “Miss McKinnon, is it? It’s been a while.”

“New Year’s, I think. She shook their hands. I don’t want to intrude on family. I just heard that Sirius was here—”

“I’m sure they don’t mind,” he interrupted. “I just sent Vicky an owl telling her I was in here. Very nice of her to actually show up, don’t you think.” He let them see a spark of his usual self as he wagged his eyebrows. Vicky rolled her eyes and messed up his hair, knowing he couldn’t fix it himself.

“Sirius, what happened to you?” Harry asked. “What were you doing?”

“Oh, right,” he said darkly. “Well…the three of us were…doing a special job—one of the Headmaster’s secret projects. The…item we were looking for was cursed. I only got a bit of it, and I still feel like I was run over by a hippogriff.”

“Are you gonna be okay?” Harry said in horror.

“Should be. The healers say there was no permanent damage, but it’ll take a month or two to fully purge the curse from my system.”

“That bad? What were you looking for?” said Dan.

“Ah, one of those things that you really must master Occlumency before learning about, Mr. Granger,” Dumbledore said. “If you continue to progress in the art, I will inform you in the fall.”

“What about Remus?” Hermione asked. “He wasn’t cursed too, was he?”

“No, I’m afraid that was my doing, Hermione,” the Headmaster replied. “There was a…misunderstanding when we found the _item_. However, he did save me from a potentially lethal curse, and for that I am, naturally, grateful.”

“I do hope you don’t pull any more dangerous stunts like this for a while,” Emma said.

“I agree,” said Vicky.

“Unfortunately, I have ascertained the existence of at least one more such item,” Dumbledore told the group.

Sirius started coughing violently. “You—couldn’t—tell us—before?” he choked.

“It was not relevant to today’s mission. And I am still investigating the details.”

“Great…” he grumbled, and kept coughing so much that Vicki had to help him take a drink of water. “Ach!” he sputtered. “Sorry you have to see me like this,” he said to none of them in particular.

“It’s okay, Sirius,” Vicki replied, taking it to be directed at her. “I’ve seen a lot worse, you know. And I’m sure it was for a good cause.”

“Oh, definitely. Definitely a good cause. It’s just that…I don’t know—it’s harder than it used to be. I don’t think I ever fully recovered from Azkaban.”

Dumbledore lowered his gaze. “Azkaban is a very dark place, Sirius,” he said. “It’s understandable that it would change a man. The best thing you can do is to keep moving forward.”

“Besides, I think you’ve bounced back pretty well,” Vicki said, affectionately brushing his hair from his eyes. “You’re back on the job, making a difference—”

“Oh, I still do alright as a Hitwizard, I know, but I’m not the same man I was when I was twenty-one and invincible.”

“Believe me, Sirius, no one stays twenty-one and invincible for long,” she said. “But you’re still a good man, and you still know how to have a good time, and that’s worth a lot.”

“Hmm…thanks, Vicki.” Sirius gave her a half-smile. He didn’t have the heart to tell her what was really eating him, or how she was making it so much harder by treating him like this. It was horrible to think, but even without the curse, he really was starting to feel _old_ sometimes—or maybe not old, but at least middle-aged.

He blamed his family for it. Sirius remembered Lily telling him how inbreeding messed up something called “genes,” which affected lifelong health, and how inbreeding over many generations caused both physical and mental health problems to multiply. It made sense. The Blacks were deeper down that rabbit hole than anyone, except maybe the Crabbes and the Goyles, and look how his parents had turned out: unstable, chronically angry, jinx-happy, and downright depraved with some of the curses they’d left on the house, though he wondered if constant exposure to dark magic had made it worse.

But their poor health was his greatest worry. That was the thing that had haunted Sirius (and probably Andromeda, too, though he’d never asked) for many years—most acutely when he’d been named Harry’s godfather. Wizards were long-lived. Living to a hundred was more or less expected if one didn’t die violently.

But so many of the Blacks of the last few generations had died in their fifties and sixties.


	64. A Holiday in Egypt

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Tonight, Harry Potter is free from JK Rowling, and JK Rowling protects Harry Potter.

_Dear Harry and Hermione,_

_Guess what. Dad hit the jackpot! He won 700 galleons in the Daily Prophet Draw! We_ _’re going to use it for the whole family to take a trip to visit Bill in Egypt for a month. He works as a cursebreaker there breaking into all the old tombs for Gringotts. We always wanted to see the stuff he does there. It’s going to be awesome! (I just hope Mum lets me go inside—G.)_

_They_ _’re gonna get me a new wand and stuff with the extra money, too. The tip’s busted on my old one—R._

_What do you think about that werewolf? Greyback sounds like a really bad guy any day of the month. Fred and George say he brought a whole pack with him and he_ _’s trying to take over the wizarding world. I don’t know if I believe them—it sounds pretty crazy, but werewolves give me the creeps, anyway—R. Mum’s glad we’ll be out of the country for the next full moon, but the one after that will be the night before we go to Hogwarts. We don’t know what we’re doing for that._

_Mum and Dad have been arguing about that new werewolf law. Mum likes it, but Dad thinks it_ _’s too harsh and will just make things worse. What do you think? Or is it some secret political thing?_

_We hope your summer_ _’s going well. We heard your godfather’s in the Hospital. What happened to him? Is he getting out soon? How’s the muggle world? (Dad wants to know all about it.) We’ll be back the last week before school starts. See if you can visit then._

_Your friends,_

_Ron and Ginny_

_P.S. Percy just found out he_ _’s Head Boy, and he’s being exactly as bigheaded as you think about it._

“Oh, great, Ron’s got a problem with werewolves,” Harry complained when he read the letter.

“Well, you can’t expect all of our friends to be okay with them,” Hermione said sensibly. “We knew it was a common prejudice in the magical world. And we’ve never told the Weasleys about Remus. At least Mr. Weasley is thinking clearly about it.”

“Well, there’s that,” Harry said. “And wow, Egypt—and _magical_ Egypt. That’s great for them. I think they deserve a holiday like that after last year.”

“Definitely,” Hermione agreed. “And I’m sure magical Egypt must be absolutely fascinating. The ancient Egyptians had the oldest written magic tradition in the world, even older than the Sumerians. Their amulets are still highly prized, and modern spellcrafters still study their animal magic, and—mmph!”

Harry had covered her mouth with his hand. “Say, Mum, Dad, why haven’t _we_ ever been to Egypt?” he asked.

Dan and Emma raised their eyebrows. “I guess we never really thought about it,” Dan said. “There’s so much to see in Europe. Do you _want_ to go to Egypt?”

“Sure. It’d be great, especially with all the Weasleys there. We’ve never even met Bill and Charlie before, and we’ll get to see a really different magical culture.”

“Oh, yes, that would be wonderful,” Hermione started up again, pushing his hand away. “Did you know that Arabic speakers use calligraphy in place of runes? Although they sometimes use geometric mosaics, too.”

“I think you’ve mentioned it,” Harry cut her off. “I also know that they used to worship cats in Egypt.”

Hermione rolled her eyes and smacked him on the arm. “That’s not exactly a convincing reason to go,” she said.

“That _does_ sound like a nice trip, though,” Emma said. “I think we can swing a week starting the day after your birthday, don’t you, Dan?”

“Yes…I think so,” he said. “It’s a _bit_ short notice, but we can move things around at the practice to open up that week. I guess it’s good that we didn’t plan a holiday this year.”

“Yeah,” Harry agreed.

“Although…that means we won’t be here to take care of Remus on the third.” Hermione remembered, “Sirius might still be in the hospital, and Dobby has to spend most of his time with him because he can’t use his hands.”

“I’m sure Cousin Andi would be willing to check in on him,” Emma suggested.

“That could work,” Harry said. “It _is_ good to have a lot of cousins. She’s already covering for us so I don’t have to go to a Wizengamot meeting on my birthday.”

“We should get her something nice sometime,” Hermione said.

“Okay, I think we’re settled,” Dan concluded. “We’ll fly into Cairo on the first, and…look up the Ministry of Magic there?”

“I think we’ll have to,” she said.

“Uh huh. Are you going to write Ron and Ginny?”

“Hmm…no,” Harry said with a grin. “I think we should surprise them. Besides, it’ll be a great prank on Fred and George. I’ll write Bill so he knows what’s going on. I’m sure he’ll be happy to help.”

* * *

Harry’s birthday came and went, thankfully uneventfully. A perfectly ordinary party was the only thing they had to worry about that day. The Wizengamot continued to debate the Orwellian “Werewolf Safety Act,” but it was a lot of bluster, from what they heard. The battle lines redrew themselves after Greyback’s return, unfortunately more in favour of the bill, but that also caused the whole process to lose a month.

Early in the morning of the first of August, the family packed up and drove to Heathrow, from whence they took a non-stop flight to Cairo and, following Bill’s instructions, located the Egyptian Ministry of Magic, where there was already a registered Portkey waiting for them.

The Grangers had never travelled by Portkey before, and it didn’t sound any more pleasant than the other forms of magical travel they had tried. In this case, the Portkey was a teapot. They had the urge to actually grasp the thing, especially as it was supposed to fly through the air, or perhaps some magical hyperspace, but the Egyptian Ministry official told them that touching a finger to it was enough. The Grangers felt rather silly as they held onto the teapot while the official counted down the seconds: “Three…two…one…”

Suddenly, there was a very unpleasant sensation of being pulled by a hook somewhere inside the gut, a feeling of being knocked around roughly in something outside the normal three dimensions, and a rush of wind at an impossible speed. They had a vague sense of sand rushing past them in some wildly distorted view, but they only had a couple of seconds before—

Wham! They hit the ground hard, and all four of them fell over in a heap.

“First Portkey trip?” an accented voice said.

They looked up and saw a fairly dark-skinned Egyptian man wearing a white keffiyeh staring down at them. “Er, yeah,” Dan said. They stood up.

“You are the Grangers, here to see William and his family?” the man said.

“That’s right. I assume we’re in the right place.”

“Yes, Mr. Granger. My name is Sayed, William’s partner on this expedition. I will take you to him.” He paused in front of Harry. “Harry Potter, I am honoured to meet you,” he said. The Grangers tried to remain polite, thinking he was referring to Harry’s fame in Britain, but he continued, “Your recent feat is already legend among cursebreakers. We must face treasure guardians frequently, and basilisks are among the rarest and most feared.”

“And with good reason,” Harry quipped.

“Indeed. Follow me, please.”

They were walking across a small valley in the desert. It was a stark and barren place. There was no sand, but the ground was strewn with jagged rocks of all sizes. The whole place would have fit comfortably inside the Hogwarts grounds. The floor of the valley was dotted with tents, and around the edges, they could see the partially-excavated entrances of tombs.

“This is a joint expedition by Gringotts and the Egyptian Ministry,” Sayed explained. “The team is built from both sides. Gringotts provides its cursebreaking services in exchange for a share of the treasure. I am an archaeologist. I identify the artifacts and, as well as I can, the curses that are on them.”

Hermione was hanging on his every word, and the rest of the family also found it interesting. They came to one of the larger tents, and Sayed put a finger to his lips and directed them to slip inside quietly. They barely succeeded in keeping their astonishment to themselves. The tent was bigger on the inside, and was fully furnished flat. _We just walked into the TARDIS!_ they all thought.

In the middle of the tent, they saw nine heads of red hair. All but one was facing away from them. A tall young man with long hair and a fang earring was up at the front of the room, entertaining his family with some tale about his exploits—Bill, apparently. His eyes passed across the Grangers without acknowledging them, which was apparently part of the plan.

“So the guardian turned out to be a griffin,” Bill Weasley said. “And normally, we could handle a griffin, but this thing had been feeding on the magic of the enchantments on the cave for a long time. The first thing we noticed was that it was about twice as big as normal, and then we started slinging spells at it, and they just bounced off! The thing had turned magic-resistant. Tougher than dragon hide.”

And Harry saw his cue. “Sounds like you could’ve used a sword,” he called from the back of the tent.

The Weasleys all spun around, wide-eyed. Even Charlie knew him by description. “Harry!” they all shouted, followed immediately by several cries of “Hermione!” There was a mad scramble to jump up and greet their visitors. Ginny hugged Harry enthusiastically, but quickly jumped back, red-faced, before hugging Hermione. Ron and the Twins all slapped Harry on the back, and Mr. and Mrs. Weasley shook hands with Dan and Emma.

“Harry, Hermione, what’re you doing here?” Ron said.

“Can’t we go on holiday if we want to?” Hermione said.

“Well, sure, but we didn’t expect—It’s good to see you though. Egypt’s great. You’ll love it here.”

“Harry Potter, Charlie Weasley. Honoured to meet you,” the Weasley’s second son said, shaking his hand. “I wanted to thank you for everything you’ve done for my family.” Charlie seemed to be the only one of the seven Weasley children who took after his mother instead of his father in terms of looks. Charlie was short and stocky instead of tall and thin like the others (though Ginny was perhaps in between). He he looked calloused and weather-beaten, though, and he wore a mop top that Mrs. Weasley surely didn’t approve of.

But the Grangers barely had time to acknowledge Charlie before the crowd parted and Bill stepped forward. He clasped Harry’s hand firmly. “Lord Potter,” he said softly. “I can’t tell you how grateful I am to you for saving my baby sister. When the circulars went around and said that two twelve-year-olds had fought a thousand-year-old basilisk and won, we couldn’t believe it, but I suppose if anyone could do it, it would be you.”

“Mostly luck and a lot of help,” Harry disagreed, “but I’m glad I saved her. And Ginny’s a real fighter too, you know.”

Bill smiled: “More than I think she realises. If you don’t mind, Lord Potter, I’d like to speak with you privately about what happened in the Chamber. As a cursebreaker, I may be able to pick up on some details other people would miss.”

“I…I’d be okay with that,” he replied. “And please call me Harry.”

“Thank you, Harry.” Bill then addressed the group: “Yes, if you’re suspecting I knew the Grangers were coming, you’re right. I asked the cook to prepare a special dinner, and we’d be glad to have you join us.”

“We’d love to, William,” Emma said. “And thank you for your hospitality.”

“No trouble at all. It’s the least we can do.”

The dinner was a traditional Egyptian feast, which, as cosmopolitan as they were, was a little jarring to the Grangers’ palates. Harry especially did not appreciate that the meal was so heavy on legumes and mostly loaded up on kebabs and shawarma. Hermione, on the other hand, absolutely loved the falafel and also the garlic and tomato salad, and she continued to chide Harry for not eating enough vegetables, to Mrs. Weasley’s agreement and everyone else’s amusement. ( _Just wait till you become an animagus_ , Harry thought.)

A good time was had by all, though, as Bill and Charlie entertained everyone with stories of their exploits in cursebreaking and dragon-handling, respectively. The Grangers gave them some limited highlights of their lives, and the rest of the Weasleys had a lot of stories about their childhoods before Hogwarts.

The only spot of trouble came when they learnt that desert was baklava. The dish was so rich and syrupy-sweet that Harry couldn’t finish it and pushed it away. He had to apologise profusely to the offended cook, saying that his food was excellent, but he had a constitutional issue that he couldn’t tolerate something that rich. The Weasleys were even more confused when he snacked on a liquorice wand as a chaser, although Ron gave him a sympathetic look.

After dinner, Bill pulled Harry aside into a private room for a chat. Harry considered bringing his family in on it, or at least Hermione, but Bill seemed pretty insistent that it be one-on-one.

“Harry, I already heard the story from Ginny,” he said, “but I wanted to hear it from you, too. There was something off about the way she talked about that diary. Even for dark artifacts like that, possession is unusual. I was hoping that you could tell me _exactly_ what happened in the Chamber of Secrets and what you observed about the diary.”

Harry nodded and began to speak, beginning from when he first woke up in the Chamber. As Bill had expected, he was able to fill in a lot of details of what happened when Ginny was possessed and still more when she was unconscious. He asked a lot of very detailed questions about the shade of Riddle: how it looked, what it said, how fast it became solid, its physical effects on Ginny, and so on. When he mentioned that it was draining her life force to come back to life, Bill turned pale and, as one question led to another, went back to the encounter with Quirrellmort the year before, which led to a whole new set of questions. When Harry was finally done, Bill looked shaken. He knew the diary must have been bad, but he didn’t think it was _that_ bad.

“Harry, I think I know what that diary was,” he said slowly. “Did Dumbledore say anything about it?”

“Not much,” Harry thought back. “He told Sirius and Remus that it was a “you-know-what.” And they didn’t say it, but I think on that mission earlier this summer where Sirius got hurt, they were looking for another one.”

Bill turned white and clutched a hand to his chest. “Merlin’s bollocks!” he gasped. “More than one?”

“Er, yeah…Is that bad?”

“Harry, _please_ tell me they got all of them.”

He shook his head sadly. “Dumbledore said there’s at least one more ‘item’ out there.”

Bill sat down and buried his face in his hands. Harry couldn’t understand what was so horrifying that it would make a cursebreaker sink into despair. “I hoped it was over,” he muttered more than once. After a couple of minutes and told Harry, “I hesitate to tell you what that _thing_ was, but it could be very important to you in the future—”

Harry held up his hand: “I don’t think you should. Dumbledore said he’d tell us in the fall, but he wants us to finish our Occlumency training first.”

“Occlumency…? Bill said, then, when he got over his surprise, “Of course, Occlumency. That would be good. Okay, I’ll let Dumbledore tell you. I just want you to know that if that diary was what I think it was…well, this is beyond my expertise, but I _think_ that if Riddle had…if he had finished that ritual, then it wouldn’t have been the real You-Know-Who. I think it would have been…a copy, basically, of his sixteen-year-old self—still very dangerous, but the _most_ dangerous thing is that he could have gone and found the _real_ You-Know-Who and helped him.

Harry finally understood at least part of what was so horrifying: “Oh, bugger! There would’ve been two of them!”

“Yes, and that danger is still there until Dumbledore gets rid of those other “items,” so we all need to keep an eye out.”

“Definitely,” Harry agreed.

* * *

Two days later, Remus Lupin lay on his bed in Twelve Grimmauld Place, wracked with pain. Sirius would be getting out of St. Mungo’s on Friday, for all the good it did him, and he still needed Dobby to do a lot for him until then, despite Vicky’s frequent visits. The elf had stopped by that morning to bring Remus a breakfast tray and pain potions and to check if he needed anything else. As stubborn as he was, Remus assured him he was fine and sent him back to Sirius. He downed the pain potions, but barely touched the breakfast. He couldn’t stomach much right now. He flopped face-down and tried to sleep some more.

DONG!

The doorbell. Who would be showing up at the door on a day like today? He ignored it and hoped whoever it was would go away. It was a whole minute before the sound was repeated.

DONG!

Great. They weren’t going away. In fact, whoever it was seemed to be expecting him to take a long time to answer the door. He growled loudly and wished he could call Dobby. But only a family member could call a bound elf, no matter how close a friend they were.

DONG!

“Alright, alright, I’m coming,” he growled again and pushed himself out of bed, his muscles aching at the effort. Wrapping a sheet around himself, he shuffled out of the room.

Lucky for him, he was in the master bedroom on the second floor, which had been renovated to handle his transformations, as opposed to his usual spot in Regulus’s old room on the fourth floor. But still, descending two flights in his current condition was a painful affair. He very nearly gave up again, still hoping the visitor would leave.

DONG!

No dice. He had to keep going. Suddenly, a horrible thought struck him: what if he’d been exposed? What if the person at the door, who seemed to know his predicament, wasn’t one of the few people who already knew he was a werewolf (and half of them were in no position to be here today)? What if it was an Auror, or a reporter, or anyone else who might have an interest in talking to a werewolf on his most vulnerable day of the month, especially one with a connection to the Boy-Who-Lived?

But it was too late to do anything now. He finally made his way to the front door and opened it far enough to see who was there.

It _was_ an Auror.

Or rather, an Apprentice Auror.

“Dora?” he said blearily.

“Hey there, Remus, how’s it hangin’?” Sirius’s perky cousin was wearing her hair in electric blue curls that were almost painful to the eye and sounded far too cheerful for Remus’s tastes. She must have already had her coffee.

“What’re you doing here?” he said.

“Can’t I visit my friend when he’s sick?” she said indignantly.

“Well, I suppose you can, but—”

“Great.” She pushed her way in the door, grabbed him by the arm and pulled him with her into the entryway.

“Now just one minute, Dora,” he tried to resist her. “What is all this about.”

“Well, Harry asked me to check up on you, obviously.”

Remus stopped and stared. “He—he did?”

“Yeah. Well, technically he asked my mum to check up on you, but I told her I’d do it.”

“Um, that’s very kind of you, but I’m fine here, really.”

She looked him up and down: “You’re stumbling around the house half-asleep in a bed sheet…Got anything underneath it?” she added, winking at him.

“Dora! I—I—Yes, I _have_ ,” he sputtered, blushing, but even so, he pulled the sheet tighter around him.

Dora just grinned: “Come on, Wolfie, you should lie down.” She started to lead him towards the stairs, but she tripped on the bed sheet, and they both fell to the ground, with him landing on top of her. “Er—just ignore that,” she said. Her metamorphmagus ability was not sufficient to suppress her blush. Still, she pushed them both to their feet, draped his arm across her shoulders, and carefully helped his up the stairs. Not returning all the way to the second floor, she laid him on the sofa in the drawing room.

“You really don’t have to do this,” Remus protested.

“Oh, shut up and relax for a while,” she dismissed him. “I would’ve thought you’d be happy to have someone to keep you company today.”

“Don’t you need to work?”

“Nope, took the whole day off. Even Mad-Eye’s required to give me time.”

“You shouldn’t waste it on me, then.”

“I’ll spend my day off any way I want,” Dora snapped. “Merlin, Sirius told me you get like this after every full moon. Come on, you need to—oof—” Dora grunted as she pushed Remus’s head up enough that she could slip in and sit on the sofa, laying his head on her lap. “You need to quit feeling sorry for yourself and live a little.”

“Um…” Remus said.

“Shh…” Dora put a finger to his lips, leaving him to lie very confused in silence as she started stroking his hair.

* * *

The Grangers’ stay in Egypt was excellent. It was exciting seeing all the magical tombs, and they learnt a lot about Ancient Egyptian magic and cursebreaking in general. Fred and George successfully pranked everyone at least once, although Bill quickly let Percy out of the tomb they tried to shut him in.

They had a conversation with Mr. Weasley about the Werewolf Safety Act and what might be done to counter it. They didn’t reach much in the way of conclusions, but they did make sure Ron heard their position that werewolves weren’t so bad. Charlie agreed wholeheartedly, since his attitude towards creatures was a step short of Hagrid’s.

After a week, though, they had to leave the Weasleys in Egypt and return to England. Just before they left, Bill gave Harry an envelope, saying, “Harry, can I trust you to give this to Professor Dumbledore the next time you see him? It concerns what we discussed in private, so only give it directly to his hands.”

“I understand, Bill,” Harry said. “I’ll give it to him as soon as I can.”

Upon their return, they were reunited with Sirius and Remus, each of whom met them with whispered rumours about the other’s love life, which they both steadfastly denied themselves. Remus also revealed that Dumbledore had approached him again for the Defence Professorship, on account of Greyback, but he had declined. “If it were any other position, I might consider it,” he said, “but I’m not going to risk that curse.”

After that, Harry and Hermione still had their hands full. They took time to hang out with their friends, revise their karate skills, prepare for the new school year, and, perhaps most importantly, finish their Occlumency training.

“ _Legilimens_.”

Harry felt the intrusion at once—the slipping control over his own thoughts. It was a unique feeling, but by now a familiar one, and he clamped down on it hard and fast, picturing his image of the Hogwarts grounds. He had begun working on the maze technique and a couple of other tricks and would continue to do so, but this is what would serve him best in an actual attack. Resisting the pressure to think about other things, he focused on painting the details of the scene on his mind, whilst still sparing some brainpower to pay attention to his physical surroundings—something that would be crucial in a fight. The attack wavered, growing stronger and weaker and sometimes coming in sharp blows, but his resistance held firm. After several minutes of pushing and prodding, Mr. Barnett broke it off.

“Excellent, Lord Potter,” he said. “I must say, I did not think someone your age could have made such progress in a year’s time. Professor Dumbledore will have to make the final call, of course, but I believe you are ready to learn whatever secrets he has reserved for you.”

“Thank you, Mr. Barnett,” Harry smiled. He knew this was a major accomplishment. Maxwell Barnett was good at what he did, and his praise was not given lightly. He couldn’t help being proud of himself, even if it was only a gateway to more difficulties for him. Finally, he would be able to learn what the prophecy was and what cursed items Dumbledore was looking for, although from what Bill said, he wasn’t sure he wanted to know now.

Once Mr. Barnett was ready again, he turned his attention to Hermione: “Now for you, Miss Granger. _Legilimens_.”

Hermione also felt the intrusion at once, but her strategy, of course, was different. Almost as a reflex, she shifted the unbidden thoughts over to the entrance of her mental maze, and with each nudge to a protected memory, she redirected it through the stronger associations between the thoughts in her maze. Her parents both found it tiring, but Hermione was sure she could keep it up all day, and indeed, several minutes of sharp prodding from Barnett did not break her concentration.

“Splendid, Miss Granger,” he said when he broke it off. “I have seen few with a memory better than yours, and you are using it well. I believe you are also ready.” A few minutes later, he also pronounced Dan and Emma as passable Occlumens, and they thought they were all ready for what Dumbledore had in store.

“Thank you so much for your help, Mr. Barnett,” Dan told him when they were done.

“Not at all, Mr. Granger. It’s always a pleasure to tutor such dedicated students. Oh, and before I go, I think it is interest you to know that I have had several meetings with the Prime Minister regarding the Fenrir Greyback situation.”

“Oh?” Emma said. “We knew there must be something going on with that. He’s been on the news as a serial killer. What’s the Prime Minister doing?”

“Just small things—bulletins to the muggle police services and so forth. Greyback was sighted at the last full moon, but with the security, he wasn’t able to infect anyone, thank Merlin. I just wanted to let you know that since there’s a full moon the night before the Hogwarts term starts, Mr. Major is going to find an excuse to shut down King’s Cross overnight. It should be cleared up by the time you get there, but now you’ll know if there’s anything off about it.”

“We’ll remember that. Thank you.”

* * *

The one other thing the Grangers had to do before Hermione and Harry returned to school was to buy their new textbooks and school supplies. They would be taking more classes this year, as both of them had selected Ancient Runes, Arithmancy, and Care of Magical Creatures, and thus, they were laden with more books than usual (or what would have been usual last year if it weren’t for Lockhart).

But this year, after thinking about it for the last few months, there was one more thing that Hermione desperately wanted.

“I’d really love to have a cat I can take to school with me,” she told their parents. “I would have liked to take Rowena from the start if we could, and it’s just not the same with Hedwig.”

“Why would you need your own cat when you’ve got me?” Harry said.

Hermione’s fingers glowed blue as she pointed at him, indicating that she was about to throw a Stinging Jinx.

“Okay! Okay!” Harry held up his hands. “I was kidding.” _Mostly._

“You know taking care of a cat full time is a bigger responsibility than an owl,” Emma said. “Hedwig can stay in the Owlery and can hunt on her own, but a cat would have to stay in your dorm.”

“I know, Mum,” Hermione said, “but we’ve dealt with cats for years, and I’ve been thinking I really want one I can build a relationship with at school and keep with me afterwards.”

“Hey, Rowena’s still got some life in her,” Harry protested automatically. _Probably not that much, but still._

Hermione sighed and gave him a sympathetic look. “I’m not trying to replace Rowena, Harry,” she said. “I know you care a lot about her, but that’s just the thing. She’s always been more yours than mine. She belonged to your birth parents, after all.”

“Well…yeah,” he admitted. “Look, Mione, I understand. It’s fine with me if you get a cat. I just hope it gets along with Rowena. She’s too old to deal with a lot of drama.”

“I’m sure you can smooth things out between them if you need to, little brother.”

“Well, if both of you are okay with it, I think we can go to Magical Menagerie and see if they have any you like, Hermione,” Dan said. “We owe you an early birthday present, anyway.”

“Thanks, Dad.”

When they got to the pet shop, they saw all kinds of bizarre magical creatures, but Hermione focused on the cats. Harry sniggered as she cooed over the little fuzzball kittens—that is, until he listened closer to their mewling and became very weirded out.

“Maybe get one a little older,” he whispered.

“Why?”

“They keep saying “Mama!’”

Hermione laughed so hard that she nearly fell over, much to Harry’s annoyance.

“Crookshanks, behave,” a harried-sounding witch said. They looked behind the counter to see the clerk wrestling with a very large orange cat with a squashed face. Harry could immediately tell by looking that it was a kneazle-cross.

“Ooh, what about that one?” Hermione said excitedly. “Excuse me, ma’am. May we see that cat?”

“Well, you can, but I’ll telling you, he’s a menace,” the witch said. “Always causing trouble. Tried to adopt him out three times, and they kept bringing him back.”

“You’re kidding,” Hermione said. “Maybe he just hasn’t found the right family yet.” She reached out a hand to the cat, and he cautiously approached. But soon, with a little coaxing and petting, Crookshanks was sidling up to her and nuzzling her hand.

The clerk’s jaw dropped. “Well, maybe not,” she said. “I don’t believe it, but he actually seems to like you. Never seen that happen before.”

“He knows I have a way with cats,” Hermione said, shooting her brother a grin. “How old is he?”

“I’d say about three years,” Harry said, even as Crookshanks meowed the same answer (though it more literally meant “three warm seasons of hunting”). He was sharp as a tack, too, apparently.

“Th-that’s right, Mister…Eep!” The clerk caught sight of Harry’s scar. Harry turned to Hermione and rolled his eyes.

“Well, come on, Harry, what do you think?”

He sighed and approached the cat. “Hello, Crookshanks. I’m Harry.”

Crookshanks meowed in greeting and gave him a very piercing look. _He knows_ , Harry thought. _He suspects what I am, at least. Of course, he won_ _’t be able to tell anyone._ He glanced up and thankfully saw the clerk helping another customer.

“Well, he seems really smart,” Harry complimented him. “I like the half-kneazle part.” He gave him another look. “To be honest, I’ve never much cared for Persians,” he said quietly.

Crookshanks hissed in protest.

“I didn’t mean it like that. I’m sure your dam is a very nice queen. I’m just saying, whoever’s bright idea it was to _breed_ them into that shape deserves to be _declawed_.”

Crookshanks growled a bit, but even he had to concede that point.


	65. Third Year

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Just because we don’t understand JK Rowling doesn’t mean that Harry Potter doesn’t exist.

The day the Hogwarts Express was due to leave, the muggles of London awoke to a major scare. Several seemingly random victims in the vicinity of King’s Cross had been gruesomely murdered and dismembered by the man the muggle news had dubbed the Werewolf Ripper, after his penchant for striking during the full moon. Two police officers reported arrived at the scene and reported being attacked by a large man in a fur coat, wielding wicked blades, and they firmly believed that it was only because he strangely jumped the gun and attacked before they got out of their car that they survived the encounter. They called for a firearms unit, but the Werewolf fled before they arrived.

The _Daily Prophet_ told a slightly different story. Thanks to some discreet connections with muggle law enforcement (for which Fudge entirely took credit), the DMLE was informed of the emergency call right away. Three Aurors and three Hitwizards apparated to the scene at once and engaged Greyback, narrowly saving the bobbies. Greyback actually bit one of the Hitwizards, but he was wearing a dragon hide, which saved him from infection. Greyback ran away after that. Even without Wolfsbane, the Wolf knew when it was outgunned, and he fled back to whatever hole he had crawled out from.

Harry and Hermione were really just hoping for news about that new _Doctor Who_ special, _Dimensions Of Time_. Another werewolf attack, one that even caused a panic in the muggle world, was a most unwelcome announcement. In any case, most muggles were avoiding King’s Cross this morning.

The two of them made it on board the Hogwarts Express without incident, met up with Neville, and found a compartment. The Weasleys soon tracked them down and said hello, but only Ron stayed with them. Ginny looked like she might, but she panicked and ran out of the room. Ron just shook his head.

“I hope she comes around eventually,” Hermione said. “She was really nice when we actually talked to her.”

“Yeah, I guess,” Ron said. “Hey, did you hear Greyback was here last night?”

They all shuddered. “Of course,” Hermione said. “Sirius and Dora weren’t there, but they know the ones who were. It was a really close call for one of them.”

“He probably wanted to attack one of the early arrivals here this morning,” Harry added. “But he couldn’t have done because the Prime Minister closed down the whole station.”

“The Prime Minister’s involved?” Neville said. “The muggle one?”

“Uh, _yeah_. It’s muggles who keep getting killed. And they’re none too happy about it.”

“I wish they could just get rid of that monster,” Ron spat. “Muggles are getting killed; people are freaking out every full moon—especially Mum.”

Harry and Hermione both winced at the venom in their friend’s voice, although for Greyback in particular, it was well-deserved. “Won’t be easy,” Harry said. “He’s been on the run for twelve years, and they haven’t caught him yet—ever since he lost his safe haven with Voldemort.”

Ron and Neville both flinched. _Seriously?_ Harry thought. _I_ _’ve been living with them for two years._

There was an awkward silence until Ron finally ended up changing the subject: “Hey, guys, check it out. Mum and Dad got me a new wand. Fourteen inches, willow and unicorn hair. Good thing, too. My old one never worked right. A bit of the tip was broken off before Charlie gave it to me.”

“Well, that and the fact that it wasn’t matched to you,” Hermione said. “It wouldn’t have worked right even in perfect condition.”

“I got it to work though,” Ron objected. “It wasn’t like it was busted or anything.”

“Yeah, but you never would’ve done as well with a wand that wasn’t matched to you,” Harry said. “It’s like Ollivander says: the wand chooses the wizard. Here, it’s like this.” He grabbed Ron by his wand arm and felt carefully for the magical energies flowing through both the wand and his body. Years of practising wandless magic had made both him and Hermione very good at it. “I don’t know how much wands have minds of their own, but they do have a…a…”

“A natural frequency?” Hermione suggested.

“Yeah, something like that. And so do we because we have magic. Basically all energy does. And the energy doesn’t…I don’t know, _flow_ right unless the frequencies are the same. If the wand doesn’t fit you, you have to push it harder. I bet your wand work will be loads better with this one.”

“Huh. It doesn’t feel that different—but then, I haven’t really used it yet, either.”

“It’s hard to tell if you’re not used to it. Here, try it with mine.” Harry drew his wand from its holster and placed it in Ron’s hand. Ron froze and his eyes went wide. “It’s no big deal,” Harry insisted. He probed the energies again and felt them clash horribly. “There, you feel that?” he asked. “How it pushes away?”

“I guess so,” Ron said. It was very subtle. He was surprised when he noticed it—and that it came so naturally to Harry.

“See, that’s “cause my wand is all wrong for you. Your new one is…well, there’s a lot of stuff about it I could only start to guess at, but it’s definitely…louder. I think it matches your personality that way.”

Hermione and Neville sniggered. Ron gave him an annoyed look, but he said, “Blimey, Harry—be careful; you’re starting to sound like Ollivander.”

“More like Gregorovitch, actually,” Hermione corrected. Everyone stared at her. “Harry has one of his books in his vault. Gregorovitch takes a more scientific approach than Ollivander.”

“It makes sense, though,” Harry said. “This is probably how Ollivander matches wands to people. And I think a lot of the details about the energies come from your personality and magical skills, too. I’ve heard a good wandmaker can make a perfect custom match for someone on the first try if they know them well.”

“Yes,” Hermione agreed, “in _The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts_ —not the best book, by the way, but it says Ollivander did some of that in the last war—and in Grindelwald’s War, for that matter.”

Neville was amazed. “Wow. I never knew it was so complicated…” he said. “I wish I had my own wand.”

“That one’s not yours?” Hermione said in surprise.

Neville pulled his wand out. “No, it’s my dad’s,” he said. “Gran wanted me to use it—keep him close and uphold his legacy and all that.”

“But she _must_ know you’d do better with your own matched wand,” Hermione insisted. “May I?”

Neville held out his arm, and Hermione lightly ran her fingers over his hand and the wand, her brow furrowed in concentration. Neville blushed at her touch. “Hmm…” she frowned. “This is…honestly, Neville, this isn’t a very good match at all.”

“Aww, man,” Neville said in horror. “I can’t tell Gran that, though. She’s always going on about how I need to do my dad proud and stuff. She wants me to be an Auror like him. What am I gonna do?”

“Neville, it’s okay,” she assured him. “Just because you don’t take after your Dad so much doesn’t mean that you’re not a strong wizard—or that you can’t follow in his footsteps. In fact, getting the grades you are with a match like this, I’d say you _are_ pretty strong. And you fought a _basilisk_ for Merlin’s sake. I’m sure your dad would be very proud—completely freaked out, but proud.” It felt a little odd, knowing Neville’s parents were still alive, the way he usually talked about them in the past tense. Hermione and Harry had still never pressed him on what had happened to them, and he hadn’t told them on his own.

“You think so?” Neville said.

“Definitely. But your Gran needs to learn to let you be your own man. And I really think you should put your foot down the next time you see her and tell her you’d do better with your own wand.”

“I dunno. I think Gran’s tougher than a basilisk.”

“Having met your Gran, you may be right,” Harry quipped. The others laughed.

Neville was more comfortable after that, especially as his friends reminded him of the ways he was already taking control of his own life—little things like working hard in the Duelling Club, sneaking out of the dorm to comfort Harry when Hermione had been petrified, and joining them almost every day by now in their exercise routine. (He had lost most of his baby fat in the past two years, and he definitely looked stronger than he used to be.)

Various people dropped by over the course of the train ride. Oliver Wood told Harry to be ready for the new Quidditch season (“And Granger, Weasley, I told you you should come back for tryouts, and I still mean it,” he added). Ginny dropped by a couple more times. And Luna showed up with her usual antics, like insisting on greeting them in Parseltongue.

“ _See-aachs, Hahlee, Heyini_ _’onee,”_ the little blond girl said. (Oddly, Parseltongue didn’t have R’s in it.)

“ _See-aachs, Loonaah_ ,” Harry replied without thinking. She blinked at him once, slowly, and he blinked in return out of feline habit, even though it probably didn’t mean anything to her. She might not have even noticed it.

“ _See-aachs_ ,” Hermione added.

Ron shuddered, and Neville paled. “Do you have any idea how creepy it is when you do that?” Ron asked.

“Parseltongue is a highly misunderstood language, Ronald,” Luna said. Her voice had lost a bit of its squeak, but it sounded as incongruously serene as ever.

Harry chuckled. “How was your summer, Luna?”

“It was excellent, Harry. Daddy and I went to Iceland, and we finally got good photos of heliopaths.”

“ _Photos_?” Hermione said incredulously.

“Mm hmm.” She pulled a couple of photographs from her bag and showed them to the group. They showed a beautiful, mountainous, icy landscape on a very cold day. The Sun was in the pictures, low in the sky and surrounded by bright spots and arcs of light.

“Um…Luna? Those are sun dogs,” Hermione said. “They’re an atmospheric phenomenon caused by ice crystals…” She looked up into Luna’s cherubic face. “Never mind.”

“What she’s saying is, they look an awful lot like rare types of clouds,” Harry broke it to her gently. “You should show them to Colin Creevey. He can probably interpret them best.”

Luna tilted her head. “I think I will.”

“You know, I’m surprised you travel so much in Scandinavia. That’s supposed to be a pretty dark place.”

“Customs _are_ a bit of a hassle,” she replied, “but Daddy and I are both purebloods, and they seem to see the _Quibbler_ as mostly harmless, even though we expose their nefarious Frost Giant activity, so they don’t give us too much trouble. And besides, we ought to be willing to take risks for the sake of journalism.”

Harry chuckled again. Trust Luna to give a _mostly_ sensible answer.

“Oh, Luna, do you remember? You still need to teach us Gobbledegook,” Hermione spoke up.

Luna gave them a feral grin, doing her best goblin impression, and said, “ _Gorrog blad nochok hrow_.”

“Um…we’ll take that as a yes, then,” Hermione replied, to laughs from the others.

Once Luna had wandered off, Ron said, “Harry, mate, I hate to break it to you, but she’s insane.”

“Yeah, I know,” Harry replied, “but it’s in a good way.”

One of their other visitors was not so pleasant, however, as Draco Malfoy deigned to grace their cabin, flanked, as always, by Crabbe and Goyle.

“I see you came back for more, Mr. Potter, Mr. Longbottom,” the Slytherin said, conspicuously ignoring the non-noble people in the compartment.

“More of what, Mr. Malfoy?” Harry replied coolly. “I’m just hoping to have a normal year.”

“Well, we’ll just see how that goes.”

“Oh, I think it’ll go pretty well, especially considering your father can’t mess around with the school anymore.”

Malfoy bristled at that, but he held his temper down. There was no need to cause trouble so soon, and two good reasons not to—both of whom could use wandless magic. No, his goal, per his father’s instructions, was to keep an eye on Potter’s political positions. Aunt Andromeda had seemed just a little too supportive of werewolves this past summer, and that would need to be drawn out carefully, with taunting in a somewhat different direction. “My father has bigger fish to fry, Mr. Potter,” he said. “He _is_ an important figure in the Wizengamot, you know.”

“Oh, sure,” Harry replied in annoyance. “Picking on a minority of one percent of the wizarding population? Although if he can’t stick it to the ten percent who are muggle-borns, I suppose he’d have to go smaller.”

“And what’s that supposed to mean?” he said.

“It means we don’t like you, Malfoy,” Neville said, suddenly standing up. “And you’d better watch yourself,” he added, lowering his voice. “I think all of us here know where that diary came from.”

Malfoy sneered at him: “The Malfoys would never be caught doing something like that, Longbottom.”

“No, you wouldn’t be _caught_ , would you?”

“Hmph. The fact remains that Father is doing his part to make this country safer. I think after last night, we can agree that’s necessary. I don’t see either of you doing much about it, especially _you_ , Potter. _You_ seem awfully quick to come to those beasts’ defence. Is there something we should know?”

Harry stood and gave Malfoy a feline stare: “Only that I’m muggle-raised, as you’re so fond of pointing out, Malfoy. We eschew discrimination in all forms…And there are other ways of keeping this country safe.”

“Expensive ways, you mean,” Malfoy said, obviously referring to the Wolfsbane Potion. “And ones with their own risks in themselves,” he added, but evidently, Harry had given him something to chew on, because he took his leave: “See you in class, Potter. Longbottom, do try to keep up this year.” He again ignored Ron and Hermione as he and his henchmen left.

“Seriously, is he contractually obligated to annoy us once per train ride?” Harry said.

“Wouldn’t surprise me,” Neville replied. “A least he’s being more political and less jinx-happy this year.”

The rest of the train ride was uneventful, and the Welcome Feast was excellent as usual, although the Great Hall was emptier than ever. It was another small class at the Sorting this year, with only a handful of children from the beginning of the baby boom that followed Voldemort’s downfall, and Hogwarts’s enrolment was at its lowest point in centuries.

Harry and Hermione only knew a few people from the sorting. Nathan Boot and Annabel Entwhistle, their muggle-born acquaintances who had written to them about their wandless magic skills, caught their eyes and waved to them. Nathan became a Ravenclaw and joined his older brother. However, Annabel did not join _her_ brother in Ravenclaw and instead went to Hufflepuff. Astoria Greengrass made a small gesture in their direction before joining her sister at the Slytherin Table. Finally, Professor McGonagall reached the last name on the list, “Vane, Romilda,” a bouncy girl with long, curly, black hair. When the Sorting Hat pronounced her a “GRYFFINDOR!,” she ran to the table and took the nearest available seat to Harry, waving at him eagerly. He waved back in an uncomfortable manner.

During the feast, they tried to work out what was going on with the teachers, since there was one less seat at the High Table this year: Professor Kettleburn was missing. Harry had never really met him, but he liked the look of him—a rugged sort rather like an older and more normal-sized version of Hagrid. He’d had a unique look about him, too, since he’d walked on two wooden legs and had an amazingly complicated mechanical contraption for a left arm. The only new teacher was a middle-aged man with short, black hair and a solemn face. Many people speculated on which class he was teaching. Harry had a suspicion as to what was going on, but he kept it to himself. In the meantime, remembering that his wandless magic was no longer a secret, he served himself partially with wandless Levitation Charms to avoid having to reach across the table (Hermione sighed and joined in) which proved to be a minor spectacle to his house-mates, especially the first years. Nathan and Annabel were receiving similar fascinated attention.

Dumbledore answered the questions about the teachers with his usual announcements at the end of the feast. “Welcome to a new year at Hogwarts,” he said. “I have a few start of term announcements to make: Quidditch tryouts will be held this weekend; information will be posted in your House Common Rooms. Mr. Filch’s revised list of banned items is likewise posted by his office door. The Forbidden Forest is off limits to everyone, regardless of the time of the month, and that bears on my next point. You will no doubt be aware of the tragic events of last night, and the previous two attacks this summer. Fenrir Greyback is indeed on the loose in Britain and is extremely dangerous. However, that fact will have little effect here at Hogwarts. Hogsmeade visits will be scheduled so as not to take place in the three days before the full moon. Also, the Ministry will be providing extra security on the nights of the full moon. I warn you that they have not yet ruled out bringing a contingent of Dementors from Azkaban on those nights.” Horrified whispered broke out around the Hall. “However, if they should do so, you have my assurances that they will not enter the grounds.”

“And finally, I am pleased to announce two new staff appointments. First, please welcome our new Defence Against the Dark Arts Professor, Auror Eric Williamson, whom the Department of Magical Law Enforcement has sent on a one year assignment and who has also graciously agreed to continue the Duelling Club.” There was some vigorous applause at being given an actual Auror to teach Defence. The black-haired man waved to the Hall halfheartedly. It was clear that he really didn’t want to be there.

“Second, I am afraid that Professor Kettleburn has finally decided to take his retirement. However, thanks to efforts of one of our students, our Groundskeeper, Rubeus Hagrid, was recently re-qualified to use a wand, and he has agreed to take on the role of Care of Magical Creatures Professor in addition to his groundskeeping duties.”

The applause was immediate and thunderous, especially from the Gryffindors. Many of them liked Hagrid, as he was always friendly with them, even if he wasn’t close to them. He was also a constant and very visible fixture of the school, and despite his lack of skill with a wand, he was known to be great with animals. A lot of them were very angry to see him arrested last winter, and he still looked slimmed down from his four months in Azkaban. Harry stood up in applause, and Hermione immediately did too and whistled. Hagrid’s new position also explained why the textbooks for that class had tried to bite them. It was going to be an interesting year.

Colin Creevey greeted Harry enthusiastically as they went up to the tower, but he was overshadowed by Romilda Vane, who jumped in front of him, shook his hand vigorously, and batted her eyelashes at him (which looked really wrong on an eleven-year-old, he thought). “Hi, Harry, I’m Romilda,” she said eagerly, leaning towards him.

“Er, hi, Romilda. Pleased to meet you,” Harry replied awkwardly.

“Me too! I’m your biggest fan! Is it true you really killed a giant basilisk single-handed?”

“It wasn’t single-handed,” Harry protested, but Romilda barely listened.

“And you fought a duel with a Slytherin and blasted him across the Great Hall and set him on fire without even using your wand?”

“I didn’t set him on fire!”

“And you faced a whole bunch of bullies to protect some first-year girls, and you glued them to the ceiling?”

“What?! Where did you hear that?!”

“And of course you’ve beat You-Know-Who like three times, now.”

“Well, yes, I beat _Voldemort_ , but that was mostly by accident,” Harry said, trying to turn her off.

But Romilda was so excited she didn’t even flinch. “I think it’s sooo cool how you’re brave enough to say You-Know-Who’s name, Harry,” she said, and she hooked her arm through his and leaned against his side adoringly as they walked.

Harry turned to his sister and mouthed, “Help me!”

Hermione swung around on his other side and gently took the girl’s other arm. “It’s not brave, Romilda. Just common sense,” she said. “I don’t have a problem saying Voldemort’s name either. And I also happen to be better at wandless magic than Harry is.” Actually, that wasn’t so true anymore now that they were getting to more powerful spells, but Harry wasn’t about to object.

“And just who are _you_ ,” Romilda said suspiciously, yanking her arm away.

“I’m Harry’s sister, Hermione. Surely you’ve heard of me. I won an Order of Merlin, Third Class with him two years ago.”

“Oh…oh, yes, I guess so. Well, that’s impressive, too, I guess.”

“You should really stick close to your prefect, you know. You’ll need to be able to find your way around in the morning.”

“I’m sure _Harry_ can help me out,” Romilda said, but as they had now reached the tower, she couldn’t escape Angelina Johnson corralling the first years to give them their instructions.

“Phew, that’s better,” Harry whispered. “God, she’s worse than Ginny and Colin put together.”

“I hate to say it, but I think you’re right,” Hermione said. “Better keep an eye out so she doesn’t go all stalker on you.”

Romilda glanced at Harry again and wiggled her fingers in a wave.

Hermione suddenly realised how tired she was as she climbed the further seven floors to her dorm. Lavender and Parvati were already starting their usual gossip fest, talking about which boys they were hoping would ask them to Hogsmeade now that they could finally go. For herself, Hermione was ready to just change her clothes and crawl into bed.

“Damn, Hermione, when did you get so hot?”

“What?!” she squeaked. She spun around half-dressed to face Lavender, reflexively clutching a sheet to her chest.

“Well, you don’t have to hide it. We’re all girls here,” Lavender said as she and Parvati giggled. “You look really good this year. What happened?”

“Huh? What do you mean, “What happened’?” Hermione said, coming to her senses. “I’ve lived with you for two years. You’ve seen me the whole time.”

“Hmm…maybe. I guess I didn’t notice until I didn’t see you over the summer. What’s your secret?”

“My _secret_?” Hermione said in confusion. “Um…years of training in karate? Playing football in primary school? Daily exercise from the age of six? I don’t think being physically active is a secret.” She supposed she _was_ developing an athletic figure, even more than many Quidditch players did, but she’d never given it much thought.

“Ooh, and Harry’s been doing the same things,” Parvati said with a grin.

“Ooh, yeah. Say, Hermione, how does Harry look without a shirt on?” asked Lavender.

Hermione’s mouth hung open for a minute, and then she said, “I am _not_ having this conversation about my brother. Ask Katie Bell if you’re really interested.”

They giggled again. “And just how well does Katie know Harry?” Parvati said.

Hermione sighed. “No more than teammates, as far as I know. And I think that’s enough of this conversation.” She flopped back on her bed and wandlessly closed the curtains. It _did_ feel good to be able to use that gesture openly.


	66. The Prophecy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: It doesn’t follow that Harry Potter will be anyone very special in Narnia, but as long as JK Rowling knows he’s nobody special, he’ll be a very decent sort of Harry Potter, on the whole.
> 
> Credit to hp4all for catching the HPMoR reference in the last chapter.

“Hippogriffs!” Hagrid roared happily. “Beau’iful, aren’ they?”

Hagrid had apparently wanted to go all out for his first Care of Magical Creatures lesson, which just so happened to be the third year Gryffindors and Slytherins. Harry agreed with Hagrid. The hippogriffs were beautiful creatures: half horse and half eagle, with long, deadly talons, cruel-looking beaks, and sharp, intelligent eyes. Harry had a lot of respect for such majestic predators.

“Now, hippogriffs—they’re very proud creatures,” Hagrid continued. “Easily offended, they are, and yeh don’ wanna insult one, “cause it just may be the last thing you do.”

“Oh, lovely,” Draco Malfoy muttered to his compatriots. “A beast that thinks it’s better than we are. Really, they want _us_ to bow to _them_?”

“Right—now who wants ter meet one o’ them?” Hagrid said.

Harry barely hesitated. “I’ll do it,” he said.

“Good show, Harry,” Hagrid said. “Let’s see how yeh get on with Buckbeak, here.”

Draco watched carefully as Hagrid unchained one of the hippogriffs and led it in front of Potter. That was starting to get reckless already. If he was lucky, maybe it would off him, but probably not.

“Easy, now, Harry. Yeh’ve got to keep eye contact. Hippogriffs don’ trust yeh if yeh blink too much.”

“Wait, what?” Harry said, but it was too late to back out. _Oh, great, it just_ has _to be the opposite of cats_ , he thought _._ A single, slow blink was the gesture of trust for cats, and his feline side bristled at the staring contest, seeing it as a challenge, but he kept it up and bowed to the hippogriff. Buckbeak soon bowed in return in what he couldn’t help but take as a sign of respect to a fellow predator.

“I think he likes yeh,” Hagrid grinned. “Go on, pat his beak…I reckon he might let yeh ride him!”

“Wait, what?” Harry repeated, louder this time, but Hagrid wasn’t slowing down. He bid Harry climb up on Buckbeak’s back and then slapped the creature on the rump.

Buckbeak broke into a run, opened two huge wings, and soared into the air. It was a far rougher ride for Harry than on his broomstick, and he felt like he would be thrown off. He didn’t know where he could get a handhold, like he was used to. The hippogriff didn’t even have a bridle. Everything was feathers! He wanted to lean forward and throw his arms around the beast’s neck for support, but he didn’t think Buckbeak would appreciate that much. What was he to do? Okay, he was basically on a horse’s body, right? He tried to remember if he knew anything about riding horses. One obscure line did come to him, from _The Chronicles of Narnia_ of all places. He and Hermione had worn those books out reading and re-reading them after she received the set at their first Christmas together, but he’d never expected them to be of practical use.

_“You hold on with your knees,” said the Horse. “That’s the secret of good riding. Grip my body between your knees as hard as you like; sit straight up, straight as a poker; keep your elbows in.”_

It worked. Once he took the correct posture, Harry felt like he was on top of the world, like he could go on flying for hours. Buckbeak flew out around the castle and then descended and skimmed the surface of the Lake, and Harry shouted with enthusiasm, but all too soon, they landed back in the paddock, to the adulation of his classmates.

Draco’s jaw dropped. He couldn’t believe even Hagrid would be that mad. A textbook that tried to bite you was stupid, but not egregious. Even petting a hippogriff wasn’t _that_ bad. But riding a hippogriff with no experience and _without a bloody saddle_? Potter was lucky to be alive, and that wasn’t one of his usual exaggerations…at least, he didn’t think so. Draco was seriously toying with the idea of goading one of these brutes to attack him. He didn’t fancy a trip to the hospital wing, but it just might be worth it to get rid of this oaf. Honestly, what was Dumbledore thinking? He was a half-breed—whether he admitted it or not—not even fully-qualified with a wand, none too bright, and had a very messed-up concept of risk. Staging a little accident to get rid of him now might just save his own hide later. The trick would be to time it just right to not get himself killed.

But no, he was a Malfoy. He was smarter than that. Why stick his own neck out there—literally—when he could have somebody else do it?

“Hagrid must’ve given Potter the easy one,” he murmured to the other Slytherins. “I bet even you could do it, Goyle. Why don’t you try it next?”

In a very rare occurrence, Goyle actually stood up him: “I’m not a complete idiot, Malfoy.”

“No, not a _complete_ one,” Draco muttered under his breath. A quick glance showed that none of his other friends was that stupid, either. Ah, well, there was more than one way to skin a kneazle. If Potter had taught him one thing, it was the effectiveness of a good, old-fashioned letter-writing campaign—and he thought Father still had a line on Rita Skeeter, too. In the meantime, he needed to figure out how Potter had done it.

“Potter!” he called. “Were you bluffing us? Where have you ridden a hippogriff before?”

“Never ridden one, Malfoy,” Harry said smugly. “Never even seen one?”

“That’s a load of dragon dung, Potter. You just rode one of those things around the grounds _bareback_.”

“Well I didn’t think it was that hard.”

“Are you crazier than you look?” Draco scoffed. “Honestly, are you this _annoyingly_ good at flying everything, or are you using dark magic.”

Harry scoffed back at him: “I just took a little advice from Mr. C. S. Lewis.”

“Who?” Draco said.

Hermione looked confused for a moment, but then she made the connection. Her eyes grew wide, and she laughed loudly: “Harry, that’s brilliant!” Draco looked lost.

After that, with Harry’s encouragement, Hermione also got a chance to ride a hippogriff and also did well, but no one else was brave enough to try except for Daphne Greengrass and Tracey Davis, who had actually done it before on Daphne’s estate. It looked like the year was off to a good start.

* * *

“Feeling better this morning, Remus?” Sirius asked. He was just about to go in to the DMLE (he stubbornly refused to call it “work” or “the office”) for the day, but he wanted to make sure his best friend was alive and eating first.

“Much better, thank you.” Remus still had some kinks in his back and knots in his muscles, but he was mostly recovered from his post-full moon order. “It’s good the rain stopped. The weather was murder on my joints yesterday.”

“Don’t I know it,” Sirius said. “I’m the one who has to put up with your whinging every time…Although…I don’t think yesterday went _too_ badly?” He wagged his eyebrows at Remus.

Remus looked up, blinked a few times, and narrowed his eyes. “What are you talking about, Padfoot?”

“Well, Dora was here all evening, wasn’t she?”

Remus groaned. “Yes, she was. Again. I don’t know what she was thinking.”

“I should have thought that would be obvious.”

“You can’t be serious,” he said, realising his mistake a second too late.

“I’m always Sirius,” his friend grinned. “Especially now. Two months in a row—you can’t ignore that.”

“It’s completely absurd. What could she possibly see in me?”

Sirius sighed. “Obviously, nothing,” he said. “Nope, no intelligence, defence prowess, fun personality, or dashing good looks there—not as dashing as mine, of course.”

“Dashing good looks?” Remus said. “Have you hit up the Firewhiskey early today? I’m thirteen years older than she is, and my hair’s already going grey, not to mention the scars.”

“Some girls like scars. And Dora’s always been one to walk on the wild side.” Sirius winked.

He turned away: “It doesn’t matter. It’d never work. She’s a bright apprentice Auror with a promising career ahead of her, and I’m—”

“Don’t say it.”

“—a werewolf. And why not? Poor health, unemployed, living off the kindness of friends, and shunned by the magical community—don’t deny it. Even if Umbridge doesn’t pass her bill, people won’t look kindly on an Auror in a relationship with a werewolf, Merlin forbid it ever got out.”

“Dora _does_ know you’re a werewolf, you know. She obviously doesn’t mind. And if you keep putting yourself down about crashing here, so help me, I will hex you. I’ve got more money than I’ll ever need. You can take all you like. Just making my mother roll over in her grave is more than worth the “imposition.” And besides, she’s been reinstated as a daughter of the House of Black for nearly two years. It’s not like she’ll ever want for anything.”

Remus rolled his eyes: “You’re actually going along with this, Padfoot? I’m surprised you haven’t had a talk with her yet. I suppose you think it’s funny watching her carry on like this?”

Sirius walked over slapped him hard in the back of the head.

“Ow!”

“Come on, Moony, do you really think I’d let you near my baby cousin if I didn’t approve? You’re a good man. That’s the important thing. And as for Dora, she can take care of herself. She’s bright, fun, good-looking—and I think those are her natural looks, by the way—and despite your raging inferiority complex, she actually likes you. Maybe you should stop complaining.”

He sighed heavily. “She’s making a mistake.”

“And you’re _definitely_ making a mistake pushing her away.” Sirius said sharply. “And if she is, that’s her mistake to make. Merlin knows I can’t make her behave.”

Remus smirked slightly: “I _have_ heard the stories…It’s hard to believe that girl was a Hufflepuff.”

“Well, you know, the Hufflepuff symbol _is_ a badger, and they’re tough little buggers. And Dora is definitely a badger—fearless, tough as nails, _and_ _…_ she just takes what she wants.”

“Oh, dear.”

* * *

The Tuvan magical community lived in a small village several hundred miles west of Lake Baikal and not far from the muggle capital of Kyzyl. They were one of a number of indigenous magical tribes scattered across Siberia—the Kalmyks, the Komis, the Udmurts, the Yakuts, and so on. They were few in number and distrustful of outsiders because of their troubled past, but they proved very hospitable to those who earned their esteem.

For Edward Grayson, this was something of a detour. He would have to go back down to the Silk Road to continue his world tour, and it had taken him time to win the trust of this people, but they were indeed intrigued by this man with wise, amber eyes and an intimate knowledge of magical songs and chants. Even so, it was only after he had helped them with their farm and healed a few illnesses and injuries that they accepted him into their fold.

The Tuvans were in many ways the antithesis of the way magical cultures operated in Europe. The village consisted of only about a hundred witches and wizards, plus about a hundred and fifty muggle spouses, in-laws, and children. Because the community was so small, marrying muggles was actively encouraged, and magicals and non-magicals lived openly side-by-side in harmony. Not as many of the children were magical as in purer-blooded communities, but the ones who were grew up no weaker or more “diluted” in their magic through the generations, nor did the grandchildren when it skipped a generation. It was the kind of evidence that many in Europe would deny and suppress, but the results were clear for all to see.

Grayson wasn’t here for a demographic study, though. He had another reason. In this village survived one of the world’s most unique magical traditions—one that he had long hoped to learn and with which he felt a kind of kinship: the magical songs of what muggles called _khoomei_ , or Tuvan throat singing. Few cultures ever developed the art of singing two notes at the same time, and the applications to wandless magic were numerous.

The Tuvans jealously guarded their secrets, however, and Grayson, speaking through a translator who spoke both Russian and Chinese, needed considerable effort to convince them to teach him even the basics.

“There was another man, once,” the village elder told him through the translator. “Long ago, he came to us. He was a bright young man, and we were flattered by his interest in our culture. He had travelled all over Siberia, learning the ways of the old tribes. Then, there was a war. We heard little about it here. It was fought in the far east and the far west. But when it was over, that man was enthroned in Leningrad, ruling over magical Russia, and he turned on us. He used our own magic against us and the other tribes. He filled our land with criminals and crushed all those who spoke against him. Ever since, we have been far more careful with our secrets.”

“That man’s name,” Grayson replied. “It was Konstantin Jugashvili.”

“It was,” the elder said venomously.

“My father fought in that war. At the time they were allies against the Dark Lord of Berlin, whom my father judged was even worse—but after the war, he and Jugashvili became enemies. My father worked the rest of his life against the brutality of the Jugashvili regime. I and others followed after him, and Jugashvili is now in exile.”

“We know. Hidden away in the shadows, causing endless mischief in the Caucasus Mountains. We still remain wary of his movements.”

“We have also been watching his movements, Elder. We have been urging intervention should he again become too powerful.”

That did catch the elder’s interest. It took several much longer conversations for Grayson to convince the elder that he meant well and was worthy to learn their secrets, and two whole weeks to coax his voice to make the sounds of _khoomei_ and learn a few simple spells in the songs. But at last, it was time for him to go.

He left in the morning, and despite the cold reception when he had arrived, there were many well-wishers from the village to see him off.

“You will be most welcome should you ever return, Edward Grayson,” the elder told him. “Your aid and insight have been most valuable to us.”

“I appreciate your hospitality, Elder,” Grayson replied in passable Tuvan. (Grayson shared the talent of the late Barty Crouch of being magically gifted at learning languages.) “I do hope to return someday. And I promise you that I will do everything in my power to ensure that Konstantin Jugashvili never troubles you again.”

“You speak boldly, Ambassador. We will hold you to that promise; yet if you keep it, you will greatly honoured throughout Siberia. I wish you well in all your endeavours.”

“May you and your people prosper, Elder. Farewell for now.”

Once he reached the edge of the village, Grayson began to sing _khoomei_ , not a spell _per se_ , but one of the important cultural songs of the people, infused with the elements of songs and dreams that he had learnt in his youth in the Outback. Only by understanding the music and culture of the local people—how they lived, how they used the land, and how the land influenced them in return—could one gain the deep understanding needed to follow the songlines. It was a difficult process, but Grayson was most adept at it, and he made good time.

A couple hundred miles later, his pace slowed as the songline petered out. He was too far out of the Tuvan heartland. But that was no matter. He took up the Mongolian and Uyghur songs that he had sung to reach Tuva from the Silk Road and continued his journey south. By dinner, he was back on the Silk Road and moving fast towards another centre of ancient magical culture, a part of magical Russia now known to the muggles as Kyrgyzstan.

* * *

Friday was surreal for the third-year Gryffindors thanks to their first class of the day: Potions with the Slytherins. By the end of the period, many of them wondered if they had fallen into a parallel universe.

In response to the renewed pressure from the Board of Governors and, worse, the wizarding public, Severus Snape had resigned himself to the inevitable, gone back to his home in Cokeworth, and checked out a muggle chemistry textbook from the local library. It would sound like an unusual move to some, but Snape had been raised in the muggle world and was smart enough to recognise what many muggle-borns knew: the immensely larger muggle population meant that they could turn out much more high-quality material. Perhaps they would have some insight into teaching that he had not encountered before.

It was an open secret that Snape despised teaching, but Dumbledore insisted he keep it up, and Potter was still at school, so he couldn’t very well back down. However, as he began thumbing through the chemistry textbook, skipping over the more scientific parts, something strange began to happen. He actually found it interesting.

Muggles, it seemed, had even stricter rules in the chemistry lab than he did in the potions lab—rules that were normally relevant only for the most difficult potions. However, as he thought about it, the appalling number of accidents that occurred in his classroom suggested that there was some merit in them. And it gave Snape a chance to do something he _did_ enjoy: making rules.

“It has come to my attention,” he began, “that the standards of safety in my classroom are considered…inadequate.” He glared menacingly mostly at the Gryffindors. “This is unacceptable. As several accidents in recent years have resulted in serious injuries to students, it would appear that a review of safety in the potions lab is in order. Most of these rules should be common sense, but that seems to have escaped some of you. Moreover, to further improve classroom safety, there will be several new changes this year.”

He opened a box on the front desk revealing two dozen pairs of plastic glasses. They were cheap—he’d only dropped about a galleon on the set—and they weren’t full goggles that completely covered the eyes, but they would protect his students’ eyes from splashes. He had, of course, bought a much better and more stylish pair for himself. “These are safety glasses. They are to be worn at all times while brewing potions,” he said. Many of the purebloods’ eyebrows rose in surprise; they had barely heard of such a thing before, if ever. The muggle-raised students were equally surprised, but nodded approvingly. “That includes you, Potter,” Snape added sharply. “I am told that they fit over most eyeglasses. The safety glasses are not to be removed from the room, and you will be liable for any that are lost or broken.” He would, of course, bill them for a more expensive pair. Thus, he could trade up to higher-quality goggles over time at no cost to himself.

“Furthermore,” he continued, “hair descending past the neck must be tied back.” Conveniently, Snape had trimmed an inch or two off his hair so as not to suffer the indignity of a ponytail. “And the loose sleeves on your outer robes shall be rolled up, pinned back, or the robes removed and stowed _neatly_. Proper attire will otherwise continue to be required.” That was a good idea, in his estimation. He had never even thought before that the tight sleeves on his own robes might be important to his success. “Dangling necklaces or bracelets must also be removed whilst brewing, and beginning next class, only closed-toe shoes may be worn. I expect _all_ students to obey these rules faithfully.” He looked pointedly at his own Slytherins.

After condescendingly revising some basic standards of ingredient handling, cleaning, and fire safety, Snape went on to the actual brewing process. He had noted with interest that the lab instructions in muggle textbooks were much more precise that he was used to, and they made a point of making sure the students understood what reactions they should see and why. As tedious as he found it, he had little choice but to make the effort.

“In case it wasn’t clear,” he said, “all instructions for brewing should be followed _exactly_. You should see by now that the smallest deviation can produce radically different results. _Mr. Longbottom_ , would you care to explain why the precise method of chopping and preparing ingredients in important?”

Neville tried to resist shaking. “Er, well…I think smaller pieces dissolve and react faster, sir,” he said.

“A correct, if simplistic explanation,” Snape said, surprising the class again by not being outright insulting. “I will expect much more detail on your homework, Mr. Longbottom. Now, the rate at which ingredients dissolve or otherwise react in a potion is proportional to their surface area. Cutting ingredients into smaller pieces produces more surfaces—more surfaces, more surface area, and a faster reaction…”

* * *

“D’you think Snape’s sick or something?” Ron asked on the way to Defence class. “He was almost not acting like a git.”

Harry and Hermione both laughed. “Well, he might be feeling sick, but that’s not why he’s acting funny,” Harry said.

“The Board of Governors told Professor Snape he needs to start teaching better, or else,” Hermione explained.

“Bloody hell, and Snape actually _listened_ to them?” said Ron.

“He’s got to,” Harry said. “They kicked Lucius Malfoy off the Board.”

“Better than that, Harry,” Neville said, “they kicked my Gran _on_. She’s the only person I know who’s scarier than Snape.”

“Well, thank Merlin for Neville’s Gran, then,” Ron said.

Like Potions Class, Defence Class had improved over last year, but that still wasn’t saying much. Auror Eric Williamson, this year’s Defence teacher, had dark hair, dark eyes, and a long, thin face, which was exaggerated by his perpetual sour expression. Clearly, he wasn’t happy about being assigned to job that kicked out every single person who held it within a year, often by death, serious injury, or criminal charges. Snape was well known for his acerbic personality, but Eric Williamson was just a grouch this year. It was unsurprising that his attitude spilt over into his teaching.

“Welcome to third year Defence Against the Dark Arts,” he said half-heartedly when the class began. He looked unprepared, frequently consulting his notes and two books that he laid out on his desk. “According to the official curriculum, by the end of this year, you should be equipped to survive an encounter with any magical creature in Britain of class four-X or lower, in addition to preparing yourselves for advanced defence against ill-meaning wizards. You should have begun learning this last year, but I’ve been told that the pervert who held this post last year taught you absolutely nothing of value. So we will focus on catching up with the creatures in class, and you should attend the Duelling Club for the rest.

“Well, let’s start at the beginning, shall we?” He flipped to the correct page in one of his textbooks. “Flobberworms. Flobberworms are not dangerous. If they ever give you any trouble, just stomp on them.” He got a few laughs for this, even though he wasn’t trying to be funny. “Next: horklumps. Horklumps are only dangerous in how they can ruin a garden. They’re also very bristly, so you’ll want to be careful touching them. The real trouble is that they’re almost unkillable, and kicking them over won’t dig up the roots. Gnomes or streeler venom are the preferred methods for removing an infestation. For more information, see a magical pest removal guide. There, class one-X done.”

There were a few more laughs, but the grumpy look on Williamson’s face didn’t lift.

“We’ll be spending more time on the other classes, obviously. Today, we’ll be studying the first two-X creature in the book, augureys…”

* * *

“Alright, people, same drill as last year,” Oliver Wood ordered when the Quidditch tryouts began on Saturday. “We’re trying out all the positions. I’m not about to lose out on a good player just because we held over someone from last year. That’s how Slytherin does it, and we can do better. And besides, we had several reserves drop, so we’ve got openings there.”

“Does Wood seem more uptight than usual?” Harry muttered as they lined up.

“It’s his last year. The professional recruiters will be looking at him,” Angelina said.

“Everyone line up by position, Chasers first,” Wood called.

Hermione took her place with the Chaser tryouts. At her urging, Ginny Weasley had joined her. Just like last year, Wood sent them out in groups to fly laps around the pitch, quickly weeding out the majority who weren’t used to formation flying. Then, they started running real formations. Harry was impressed with his sister’s flying. She had clearly worked hard to train up in the Flying Club.

“Wow, Sis, that was as good as some of the other teams’ Chasers,” Harry told her. “Wood’d have to be barmy not to put you on the reserves.”

“Thanks, Harry,” she said, “but there’s a lot of competition.”

“If it’s anything like last year, it’s not that much.”

“I don’t know, ickle Gin-Gin might give you a run for your money,” Fred Weasley cut in. “She’s been flying really well this summer.”

“Yeah, I couldn’t believe it when I saw it,” said Ron.

It was soon Ginny’s turn to fly, and Harry was impressed by her, too. She was a natural at flying—probably better than the current starting Chasers were at her age. She would be a force to be reckoned with in a couple years.

“Looking good, there, Ginny,” Wood said. “I gotta ask, have you ever tried flying Seeker? You’ve got the build for it—small and light.”

“Seeker?” she said, wide-eyed. “But you already have Harry.”

“Aye, but we don’t have a reserve, and Potter gets in so much trouble we really need one.”

Ginny looked at Harry uncomfortably, but he just shrugged his shoulders and said, “It’s kinda true.”

“Well, I guess I can. I’ve done it some.”

“Great. Line up with Potter, then. Next up, Beaters!” he called.

“That’s us,” said Fred and George. As always, those two were way ahead of the competition, although Cormac McLaggen was giving it a good try. There was no doubt how those results were going to go.

“Keepers next!” Wood called.

All the Keeper tryouts, including Wood himself, went up against the starting Chasers trying to block as many shots as they could. Just like last year, Wood was unassailable, but there were two others who were also pretty good. Cormac McLaggen, going for a dual position again, made a lot of great saves in his tryout—and smugly bragged about it afterwards. The other challenger was a little more difficult to place: one Ron Weasley.

“Don’t worry, Ronniekins, you’ll be great out there,” Fred said.

“Unless of course you fall off your broom,” George replied.

“Or get hit the face.”

“Or lose your gloves and break your hand.”

“Oh, shut up,” Ginny said as Ron started to turn an unsightly green. “I know you can do it, Ron. I’ve seen you fly.”

“And besides,” Harry added, “you’re on a better broom than you were last year.”

Ron looked down at the Comet 260, a massive improvement over his old Shooting Star, and he smiled. “Yeah, thanks, Harry,” he said, and he took to the air.

Ron didn’t look at smooth and practised as Wood or McLaggen, but more frantic, racing from one hoop to the next. Even so, he made some really amazing saves, including a couple by the tips of his gloves, but there was one episode where he missed several goals in a row very badly, and it seemed to be only by luck that he started saving them again. He looked disappointed when he went back down to the pitch.

“Seekers up!” Wood called. Harry and Ginny took to the air. Ginny clearly looked nervous about going up against Harry, but he managed to push her, and she did some impressive flying, following after the Snitch. Harry still beat her; he probably could have beat her in his sleep with him on a Nimbus and her on a Comet, but it was still impressive.

After double-checking his list, Wood lined up the candidates. “Alright, we’re keeping the same starting lineup this year,” he said, to a few groans. “Me, Johnson, Spinnet, Bell, Fred, George, and Potter…Granger, you’re reserve Chaser.”

Hermione’s and Harry’s eyes grew wide, and they both broke into broad smiles. Finally, they would both be on the team, even if not starting.

“McLaggen, you’re reserve Beater. Ron…congratulations, you’re reserve Keeper.”

“What? Really?” Ron said incredulously.

“Yes, you are, but I want you practising. Got it?”

“Yes, sir, got it.”

“And Ginny, you’re another reserve Chaser and, _thank Merlin_ , reserve Seeker. Your flying’s great. Potter, would you mind loaning her your broom if she has to play?”

“Huh? Uh, sure.”

“Excellent. First practice is Monday night, and I want everyone there, including reserves.”

Harry excitedly hugged his sister when the tryouts broke up. “Hermione, this is great,” he said. “I knew you could make the team. Now we can practice together.”

“Well, it’s only the reserves, but I suppose it’ll be fun,” she replied.

“Potter, Granger, a word?” Wood interrupted. They followed him in confusion as he led them a short distance away. “I’ll be honest, you two, I’m taking a chance on your friend, Ron,” he told them.

“What do you mean?” asked Hermione.

“I put him on the team “cause I’m hoping he’ll get better—and because McLaggen’s an arse, frankly. Ron’s good. When he’s on his game, he’s almost as good as I am—definitely better than McLaggen, even if he doesn’t look it. But when he’s _off_ his game, he’s _really_ off it. He chokes too easily. He could lose a whole game if he gets like he did in the middle. His siblings might be too close to be objective, so I want _you two_ to make sure he practises and gets more consistent. And I also want him on my broom if he has to play. Can you handle that?”

“I can,” Hermione said. “I was helping him with that all last year. He _has_ improved.”

“Good. If he’s gonna take over for me next year, he’s gonna need a lot of work. Let’s head back.”

The three of them started walking back to the castle following a little behind the rest of the group.

“Hey, Wood,” Harry said, “I saw Marcus Flint’s awful teeth roaming around the castle. I thought he graduated.”

“Nah, he flunked his N.E.W.T.s,” Wood said. “Wants to retake them. Though personally, I think he did it on purpose just so he could have one more swipe at me.”

“It figures he’d subject us to those teeth for another year,” Hermione complained.

Harry nodded: “As a child of dentists, I declare those teeth are a crime against humanity.”

Wood had only a vague idea what a dentist was, but he laughed along with Hermione.

“Say, Wood,” she changed the subject, “have you had a class with Professor Williamson, yet?”

“Aye. Was alright. I’ve had worse teachers.”

“Well, sure, it’s hard to get worse than Lockhart,” she said, “but honestly, he’s not that good. He doesn’t really know _how_ to teach, and he doesn’t even want to be here.”

“True,” Wood agreed, “but it’s Defence. I’d say he’s average out of the teachers I’ve had. At least he knows his stuff. We’ll learn _some_ real defence this way.”

Harry and Hermione could appreciate that, but it still wasn’t an ideal solution. There would just never be consistently good Defence education at Hogwarts until they got rid of Voldemort for good and lifted the curse. Just one more thing Voldemort was screwing up.

* * *

Harry was a little surprised when Professor Dumbledore summoned him to his office that night through a note passed through Colin Creevey, and significantly more surprised that it said in no uncertain terms that he should come alone.

“Thank you for coming, Harry. Please, sit,” the Headmaster said when he entered the office.

Harry glanced around at the many strange silver instruments, waved hello to Fawkes, and sat in one of the comfortable chairs across the desk from him. “Is there a problem, Professor?” he asked.

“No, Harry, no problem at the moment. Or rather no more than we already have. I have heard that you have now become proficient in Occlumency.”

 _Ah,_ that’s _what that is,_ Harry thought. “That’s what Mr. Barnett said, sir.”

“Yes, and while I do not know him as well as I should like, I have found him to be trustworthy. Given the sensitive nature of the information I wish to tell you, however, would you permit me to test your skills for myself?”

Harry hesitated a little. Professor Dumbledore was a step up from Mr. Barnett, but of course, this was what he had been working towards all along. “Yes, sir,” he said.

Dumbledore moved in not more strongly, perhaps, but he was definitely more subtle than Barnett. Harry was naively readying himself for a spoken incantation, but of course, Dumbledore could do Legilimency wandlessly and wordlessly. The only clue was when the twinkling in his eyes intensified, and Harry felt his mind go out of focus.

He caught the probe, however, and clamped down on it hard, picturing his detailed image of the castle. Dumbledore tried to use the image to his advantage, nudging his mind to move into the castle to try to go off the mental map, but Harry possessed the Marauder’s Map in real life. He knew the castle inside and out. As a last ditch attempt, Dumbledore tried to nudge him to the Chamber of Secrets to try to provoke an emotional reaction, but Harry evaded that trap and pushed the mental image back outside the castle.

Dumbledore broke off the probe. “Very impressive progress for your age, my boy,” he said. “It must have taken a long time to build an image that detailed.”

“I like flying, sir,” he replied calmly. “I didn’t need an excuse to fly around the castle all the time.”

“Of course not. Well, I believe that you are ready…” Dumbledore sighed. “A little over a year ago, Harry, I told you that a prophecy had been made about you, and that should you successfully learn Occlumency, you would be ready to hear it…Even now, you are still very young. I had hoped that I could give you a normal childhood—”

Suddenly, Harry surprised Dumbledore by bursting out laughing. “A normal childhood?” he said in disbelief once he caught his breath. “Professor, I did _not_ have a normal childhood. I was never _going_ to have a normal childhood. I am not a normal child.” With a few tears coming to his eyes, he added, “I had a _happy_ childhood, sir…but that was more in spite of your actions than because of them…Professor, after the past two years, it’s pretty clear Voldemort’s not gonna leave me alone, so I need to learn as much as I can, and now’s the time to start.”

Dumbledore smiled wistfully. “So like your parents, Harry,” he said. “They also refused to shy away from the fight…Very well. I know that you will likely share this with your family, but I asked you to come alone tonight to give you the option of how much to tell them. Needless to say, you should tell none of this to anyone who is not proficient with Occlumency.”

“I understand,” Harry said.

“Good. Then it is time for you to hear the full prophecy.” Dumbledore rose from his seat solemnly, unlocked a cabinet, and withdrew and ornate stone basin carved all over with runes. “This is a Pensieve—a particularly ancient and powerful device belonging to the school. I believe you are familiar with one from your godfather’s trial.”

Harry remembered the ghostly image of Peter Pettigrew rising from a similar basin and testifying in the middle of the Wizengamot Chamber. “Yes, sir.”

“We will be using it in a similar capacity tonight. At later meetings, we may use its more immersive capability.” He placed his wand to his temple, drew a long, silvery thread from his head, and placed it in the basin. “The event you are about to see,” he said, “I witnessed in the winter of 1980, roughly five months before you were born. I was interviewing a young woman for the position of Divination Professor in the Hog’s Head. At the time, I was of a mind to drop the subject entirely. It is of little use to the large majority of witches and wizards who do not have the Sight. However, the applicant was the great-great-granddaughter of a highly gifted Seer named Cassandra Trelawney, and I thought that if she had inherited her ancestor’s gift, she might be able to salvage the class. Sadly, Sybill Trelawney showed no native talent for divination, and I was about to dismiss her, when she suddenly fell into a trance—a trance of true prophecy. That decided matters. When I realised that she was a true Seer, albeit a sporadic one, I had little choice but to offer her the job to protect her from Voldemort.”

“Hold up,” Harry interrupted. “That means that’s _two_ classes that you’re actively maintaining at a substandard quality for reasons related to the war, not to mention the curse on Defence.”

Dumbledore frowned: “Surely you realise how dangerous it would be should Voldemort gain access to Professor Trelawney. While she does not remember giving the prophecy, it could be recovered from her mind by standard memory restoration techniques—or torture. It was imperative that I protect her.”

“But did you have to bring her to the castle?” Harry pressed. “If you dropped Divination, you could offer something more useful, like, I don’t know, World Magic, or something.”

“I thought it the best and least attention-getting option at the time. And it is not relevant to our present conversation.”

“Fine, but I’ll be sure to mention that to my parents, sir,” he replied. “I expect we’ll discuss that later. And don’t think we’ve forgotten about History or Muggle Studies, either.”

“I understand Harry,” Dumbledore said with a sigh. “However, the important thing is that Professor Trelawney made a prophecy relevant to the war, and it is that which I wish to show you tonight. This is the prophecy that she made that night…”

He touched a sequence of runes on the basin, and the ghostly image of Sybill Trelawney’s head rose from the surface. With her thick glasses, thin frame, wild hair, and many shawls, the woman looked like a praying mantis wrapped in cotton wool. In the throes of the trance, she spoke in a hollow, grating voice, and her eyes nearly rolled back in her head. She said, “ _The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches...born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies.._.”

She froze as Dumbledore paused the recording. “This much of the prophecy Voldemort knows,” he said. “We were unfortunate enough to be overheard by a young Death Eater before he was caught and thrown out of the pub.”

Harry wondered how Dumbledore knew that and who the Death Eater was, but he set that aside in favour of the more immediate issue: “That doesn’t sound like it has to apply to me, sir.”

“No, indeed. There were two children born at the end of the following July to parents who had fought Voldemort three times together—both boys, as the rest of the prophecy specified.”

The pieces fell into place easily. Harry had one friend whose parents’ history he roughly knew and whose birthday was the day before his. “ _Neville_?” he asked, his eyes wide.

“Very good, Harry. The prophecy initially could have applied to either you or your friend, Neville, and I urged both of your families to go into hiding as soon as you were born. However, there was more to the prophecy, and after the events of Halloween, 1981, that part could only apply to you. Please listen.”

He tapped a rune to restart the memory, and Trelawney resumed speaking: “ _and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not...and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives...the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies_ …”

Harry shivered as he heard the words. “‘Mark him as his equal…’” he muttered to himself, rubbing his forehead. “My scar?”

“Yes. Prophecies are woolly to interpret, but that is by far the most obvious interpretation.”

The boy began shivering much more violently as he turned over the rest of the words in his mind: “‘And either must die at the hand of the other…” So…so that means…one of us has to kill the other…in the end?”

“ _Has_ to?” Dumbledore said. “That part is even woollier. You always have a choice in your actions, as does Voldemort. But you are correct in saying that Voldemort will not leave you alone. Even from the part he knows already, you are a great threat to him—indeed, the _greatest_ threat to him, and Voldemort will not tolerate such a threat. While you both live, he will continue to try to kill you. You will at least need to learn to fight back and protect yourself.”

Harry took several deep breaths and clenched his hands into fists to keep them from shaking. When he mentioned the prophecy in his first year, Dumbledore had only said “vanquish,” but he thought a part of him had always known it would be a fight to the death. Still, it wasn’t the kind of thing you wanted to hear when you were thirteen. “And “neither can live while the other survives?’” he said. “I’m not sure I get that—I mean, we’re both technically alive.”

“I’m not sure ‘alive’ accurately describes Voldemort at the moment. And in any case, ‘live’ may be metaphorical.”

“Well, okay, but…Professor…” he said shakily, “she said I’d have a power Voldemort knows not. But what could I have that he doesn’t? He knows wandless magic. The spirit of Riddle in the Chamber used it. Is it just that I’m an animagus?”

“Alas, as to that I do not know,” Dumbledore said. “It cannot be purely that you are an animagus. The prophecy does not say a power Voldemort _has_ not, but a power he _knows_ not. Of course, he _knows_ about animagi, even if he never pursued the art himself. The fact that you are a _child_ animagus could be a possibility, both because he will not understand the how of it and because he will not be expecting it. It may also be some other power that you have not yet discovered in yourself. However, if I were to make a guess—and my guesses are usually good ones—then I would say that your power is a capacity you have in abundance, but that Voldemort, while he “knows’ about it in a weak sense, is incapable of understanding.”

“What’s that, sir?”

“ _Love_ , of course.”

Harry stared for a minute. “ _Love_?” he said. “How’s love gonna help me defeat Voldemort.”

“My dear boy, love is the most powerful magic in the world. Was it not your love for your sister that led you to face Riddle in the Chamber of Secrets and defeat the basilisk?”

“Um…not really, sir. I mean, that’s _why_ I did it, but it didn’t help me win.”

Dumbledore didn’t seem fazed: “And was it not also love for your sister that led you to pursue Professor Quirrell when he kidnapped her, allowing you to defeat him in a way the Aurors never could? Defeat him,” he added, “by the protection laid down by your mother’s love for you?”

“Okay, I’ve got my Mum’s protection on me. I guess that helps, but is that really enough? I mean, Voldemort’s almost on your level, and I’m…just above average.”

“Better than above average, Harry. You have learnt skills in your youth that most wizards never learn. Your marks have always been good and have improved over the past two years as you incorporated them into your school learning. Soon, I suspect that Hermione will be the only student in your year who can surpass you. And that is only in a purely academic arena, making no consideration for strength of character or quality of convictions.”

Harry raised an eyebrow. That still wasn’t sounding very convincing to him.

“I am very sorry to lay this burden on you, my boy. However, Fate makes playthings of us all, to turn a phrase. I promise you that I am doing everything I can to make sure you are ready for this, and in your own work to prepare yourself thus far, you have performed beyond my expectations. I remain confident that you will win this fight.”

Harry was still shaking a little. “Thanks, Professor,” he muttered. “That makes one of us.”

The old wizard just nodded. “I have much more to tell you, but we can examine it in the coming weeks. Go back to your friends, rest, and speak to your family as you see fit. Try not to worry about the future. Focus on making the most of today.”

The boy nodded absently and rose from his seat. He left the Headmaster’s office without another word.

Dumbledore sighed and slumped in his seat when Harry left. If he was right about the boy and his scar, he had a long way to go to figure out how Harry could survive the fight ahead of him.

Hermione was sitting in the Common Room, waiting nervously for Harry to return from Dumbledore’s office. She suspected what this was about, and she was worried about how he would react. When he finally climbed through the portrait hole, her worst fears seemed to be confirmed: Harry was crying.

She immediately rose from her seat and rushed over to him, hoping to intercept him before he could attract too much attention. But as she did, her brother grabbed her and hugged her like he never wanted to let go, crying silently into her shoulder.

“Harry?” she whispered. “Harry, are you okay? What’s wrong?”

He didn’t explain, but only whispered back to her: “We need to talk to Mum and Dad. Get your mirror.”


	67. Memories

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The way you got the time on the island was to find JK Rowling, and then stay near her till the clock struck.

Harry calmed down after a good night’s sleep, but he still seemed lost in thought for much of the following week. Hermione was getting worried he was brooding, but his his mind, he was actually thinking things through very carefully. If his muggle upbringing had taught him anything, it was that you have to be very careful in interpreting prophecies and consider all possible alternate interpretations. He worked through the words in his mind again and again, searching for loopholes, metaphors, and double meanings.

It took him several days to catch the obvious loophole in the subject of the prophecy, and that deeply unsettled him all over again.

“Hermione,” he caught up with his sister later that day. “We need to talk.”

A few minutes later, ensconced in the privacy of an empty classroom on the upper floors, Harry said what was on his mind: “I think we should tell Neville the prophecy.”

“Harry! You can’t!” she said. “You heard Professor Dumbledore. Neville doesn’t—”

“He doesn’t know Occlumency, I know,” Harry finished for her. “But I think we should ask him to learn.”

“But—but why? Why ask him to worry about that?”

“I’ve been thinking a lot about the prophecy. There’s a lot of different ways you can interpret parts of it, and I realised something today: I’m still not necessarily the subject of the prophecy.”

Hermione turned pale. “Not the subject? But—but you can’t mean Neville,” she said fearfully. “What about “mark him as his equal’? Neville’s not marked like that.”

Harry shook his head: “Hermione, you know it’s not that simple. Remember _Macbeth_? If you blindly take a prophecy at face value, it can backfire hard. I’m marked by Voldemort _now_ , but there’s nothing to stop him from marking Neville in the future, and then he would meet all the requirements, the same as I do.”

The facts clicked in her mind, and a look of horror crossed her face. “What about all the other stuff, though?” she said. “What about your wand sharing a core with his, or your mother’s protection that keeps him from touching you.”

“I know. I know it fits me better, but we can’t rule it out. Technically, we don’t even know that Voldemort is the ‘Dark Lord’ in the prophecy, but I think we can safely assume that it was at least _relevant_ to the time and place it was given. If Neville is a…a spare, I want him to be ready.”

“Don’t talk like that, Harry—”

“We can’t ignore it, Hermione. This is war we’re talking about. I don’t like the idea of…of Neville having to…having to take over for me, either, but we can’t just ignore it if we want to win.”

“Oh, Harry.” She lunged forward and hugged him tearfully.

“It’ll be okay, Mione,” he whispered, patting her on the back. “Whatever happens, we’re in this together.”

* * *

_Lord Harry James Potter, Head of the Noble House of Potter, to Maxwell Barnett, Royal Court Magician to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II._

_Dear Mr. Barnett,_

_I want to thank you again for teaching Occlumency to myself and my family. Professor Dumbledore has determined that our Occlumency is good enough to protect the secrets he needed to share with us, and we appreciate the quality of your teaching._

_Now, it has come to my attention that another of my friends has need to learn Occlumency. This is Neville Longbottom, Heir to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Longbottom, and also a third-year student at Hogwarts. Mr. Longbottom has shown proficiency with magic and diligence in his studies, and I believe he has the mental discipline to learn this art._

_As such, I would ask you to meet with us during our upcoming visit to Hogsmeade on Halloween in order to evaluate Mr. Longbottom and begin teaching him. Should you accept, I will arrange a private lunch at The Three Broomsticks for this purpose, and you will be compensated the same fee you were paid to teach myself and my family. Should Mr. Longbottom prove amenable to training, I will want to arrange sessions for him during each Hogsmeade visit and during school breaks. Thank you for your consideration._

_Sincerely,_

_Lord Harry James Potter_

* * *

Lucius Malfoy’s current work was too sensitive for a letter—not his son’s pet crusade against that oaf, Hagrid; he had more important work to do—so he instead arranged an in-person meeting at a familiar location in Knockturn Alley that he had utilised a year and a half before.

“Good evening, Mr. Malfoy,” an overly-sweet voice said.

“Good evening, Ms. Skeeter,” Malfoy replied. Rita Skeeter was eyeing him with a hungry, predatory look compared with the last time they had met here. She smelled blood in the water. Directing her attention somewhere else would be a critical play in itself.

“I hear you’re having a bit harder time of things lately, Mr. Malfoy,” Skeeter said. “Off the Hogwarts Board of Governors, and a bit of a falling out at the Ministry, according to some. Would you care to comment on that?”

“I have nothing to say about that that I haven’t already said publicly,” he replied carefully. “I asked you to come because I have a new business proposition for you.”

“A business proposition?” she said with interest.

“Yes. I was pleased with your efforts to investigate Harry Potter’s past last year, and I think that your unique talents could be useful again.”

Skeeter raised an eyebrow: “What did you have in mind?”

“Ever since the Werewolf Safety Act was introduced in the Wizengamot, Potter has shown himself to be unusually supportive of werewolves, despite the recent attacks by Greyback. My son was recently able to speak to him on the subject, and Potter cited a general anti-prejudice stance of his muggle family to explain his position. However, his actions have nonetheless been suspicious. I would like you to undertake a careful investigation into Potter’s contacts to search for any werewolf connections.”

Skeeter’s eyes widened, and then that predatory look returned. “Ooh, if Potter has werewolf connections, that could make a lot of waves with his supporters, maybe even enough to knock him off his high pedestal.”

“We can only hope,” Malfoy said coolly. “He has stuck his neck out with his…unorthodox views on blood purity in those letters in the _Quibbler_.” Skeeter scoffed at the mention of that rag. “Basest nonsense,” he continued, “and yet, there are a number of people who will listen to _anything_ written by the famous Boy-Who-Lived.”

“Hero worship is _so_ unhealthy,” she agreed as she began taken notes on his comments. “Something needs to be done.”

“I quite agree.” This was a dangerous business, he thought. Rita Skeeter reminded him of a scorpion: dangerous to handle because it was in her nature to sting anyone who got too close so long as she got a story out of it, but she was useful for that very reason if one could point her in the right direction.

“And how long an investigation are you looking for?” she said.

“I am prepared to fund you through the first week of November, long enough to cover the next two full moons—the same rate as before. You may print as you see fit. However, I shall expect a full report at the end of that time, regardless.”

“Well, Mr. Malfoy, that sounds like a very generous offer.”

* * *

Hermione wrote down names on a list as she and Harry sat in the Common Room, while Harry watched Crookshanks warily. Hermione’s cat seemed to be stalking something Harry couldn’t see at the moment.

“What about Mandy Brocklehurst?” Hermione asked.

“Huh? Oh, Mandy?” Harry said. “Well, we can try, but I doubt it. Her family is a bunch of old traditionalists. They care about the closer relationship we had with muggles in the past, but we don’t have any history like that with werewolves.”

Crookshanks pounced and apparently caught his quarry. He walked back to the table, looking pleased with himself, and Harry saw he was chewing on an improbably large spider.

“Ugh. A spider, Crookshanks? Really?” Harry said.

Crookshanks meowed at him.

“Yes, I know they’re high in protein, but there’s no shortage of vertebrates around here.”

_Meow. Rrr-ree-ow._

“Humans are picky eaters?” Harry said indignantly. “Says the cat who turned up his nose at anchovies.”

_Sss-row-oo._

“Too salty? Honestly, they’re fish—”

“ _Ahem_ ,” Hermione cleared her throat. “If you’re _quite_ finished?”

“You just _had_ to get the sassy cat, didn’t you, Mione?”

“Well, how could I not when my standard was you?”

 _Purrrrr_ , Crookshanks laughed at Harry’s expense. He glared at his rival feline.

“Anyway, we need to keep working on our list—” Hermione said.

“Right, right. I’m with you.”

With a new political issue pressing upon them this year, the siblings were making an effort to reestablishing their network with the children of other Wizengamot members, which had fallen by the wayside over the past year. Unfortunately, instead of being potentially swayed by idealism like they were with the Muggle Protection Act, the children were at least as scared as their parents with Greyback on the loose, and most of them weren’t feeling too sympathetic towards werewolves.

“You know we’re gonna have to talk to the Greengrasses,” Hermione insisted.

“Yes, we will, but I doubt we’ll get anything out of them,” Harry countered. “You know that lot aren’t gonna want to do anything to rock the boat. If we can’t find angle that clearly benefits wizarding Britain or them in particular, we’ll get nothing out of them. The same goes for Zacharias Smith, with the added bonus that he doesn’t actually like me.”

“I don’t think he doesn’t like you, Harry. He’s just…”

“A smug git who thinks he’s better than everyone else because he’s descended from the Founders?”

“I wouldn’t have put it _exactly_ that way.”

“Well, anyway, I think we can work over Neville without too much trouble, and it shouldn’t be hard to get Arthur Weasley’s behind-the-scenes manoeuvring in our favour, and since Dumbledore made Penelope Clearwater the Youth Representative, she should be on our side, but our real problem is that Umbridge character is convincing people the Werewolf Safety Act will actually make them safer.”

“I don’t see what’s safer about making werewolves more desperate,” Hermione said.

“Exactly. Me neither, but Mum and Dad always say people don’t think logically in politics,” Harry replied. “Unless we can find an alternative that makes a better case for safety—”

“Of course, that’s it, Harry!”

“Sorry?”

“We need an alternative bill. One that _actually_ makes society safer from werewolves and ideally gives them a few more rights, too.”

“But we barely know anything about that…well, of course, we need to talk to Susan.”

The niece of the Director of Magical Law Enforcement wasn’t hard to find. The two teens caught up with her that afternoon, taking a stroll around the grounds with her friend, Hannah Abbott.

“Hello, Susan, Hannah, mind if we join you?” Harry said.

Hannah jumped and squeaked when she saw who was talking to her, but Susan was pretty calm around Harry by now. “Not at all, Harry, Hermione. Come along,” the redheaded girl said. “Something you wanted to discuss?” she added astutely.

“Well, yes…” Harry said awkwardly.

“Oh, the political game never stops,” Hermione said. “The truth is we have some serious concerns about that Werewolf Safety Act Amos Diggory introduced this summer.”

Susan gave them a twisted sort of smile. “I thought it might be something about that,” she said.

“I can go if you want, Susie,” Hannah whispered.

“It’s okay,” Harry said quickly. “It’s not a secret.”

“Auntie doesn’t want to get involved in the political side of things any more that necessary, Harry,” Susan said. “She’s mostly concerned about doing her job running Law Enforcement.”

“But that _does_ bear on this closely,” Hermione observed. “We were wondering if you could share your aunt’s thoughts on it.”

“Well…” she said nervously, “like I said, she’s trying to stay out of the politics of it, but…well, she’s concerned about enforceability. She says that some of the provisions are so strict that they’ll be really hard-pressed to get everyone to follow them. Of course, it’s not like the Werewolf Registry has all of the werewolves on it, either.”

“That’s what we were thinking,” Hermione said. “And then there’s the reaction to the bill.”

“Sorry?”

“Well, the way the bill’s written, it’ll be almost impossible for werewolves to get jobs legally. And if they can’t do that, what’ll they do? They’ll break the law, turn to crime, or live out in the woods and get worse—become more animal-like, more radical. Isn’t there already concern that talk of such strict rules is pushing more werewolves over to Greyback’s side?”

Hannah paled in horror and let out a soft “Eep,” and Susan looked very nervous. “Oh, Merlin, I hope not,” she said. “Greyback’s scary enough already.”

“It could happen,” Harry said solemnly. “It _has_ happened at times in the muggle world—with other issues. That’s why we’re concerned about both the politics and the public safety parts of the bill, and we don’t especially like either.”

“What about the politics, though?” Hannah spoke up. “I mean, what’s the big deal about keeping a close watch on those things.”

Harry sighed: “Susan, Hannah, you remember how hard I pushed to pass the Muggle Protection Act, right?” Susan nodded. Hannah had to give it a moment’s thought, but she also remembered. “I didn’t do that just because I was raised by muggles—” he said. “Or maybe I kinda did, but it’s complicated. I didn’t just do it for them. I did it because it was the right thing to do. It’s not fair that muggles get treated worse than wizards because they don’t have magic—because of something they can’t control.”

“But what does that have to do with werewolves?” Hannah said.

“Because, Hannah, it’s the same principle,” Harry said with an edge in his voice. “Werewolves have the same problem. They’re discriminated against because of something they can’t control—because they suffer from a dangerous disease. They’re treated like complete outcasts because people are afraid of them, even though they’re not _really_ dangerous most of the time. Yes, there’s a public safety issue, but throwing them out of civilised society isn’t the answer.”

Hannah looked properly castigated, and Susan was showing unmasked surprise. “Wow, Harry, I didn’t know you felt that strongly about it. I mean, that’s, uh, not something you wanna go talking about all over the place.”

“Unfortunately,” Harry muttered.

“Harry just described all the worst episodes of muggle history,” Hermione explained. “With the larger population of muggles, that kind of thing has happened again and again too many times to count. Most civilised people where we come from would be glad to be shot of that kind of prejudice.”

“Look, we’re not trying to overturn society here,” Harry continued. “We want werewolves to have more rights when they’re in human form, and we also want the world to be safer from real monsters like Fenrir Greyback. And we were thinking the best way to do that is not just to fight this bill, but also to propose an alternative bill that would work towards both of those goals. We were hoping that your Aunt might have some better ideas about how to make people safer. We really respect the work she’s doing in the DMLE, and we were wondering if she’d be willing to work with some of my allies on drafting a bill like that.”

Susan stared, even more surprised. “I…I really don’t know, Harry,” she said. “Auntie usually doesn’t get involved in legislation. But…but I’ll write her and…and tell her your concerns, and I’ll ask if she’d be interested.”

Harry smiled. “Thanks a lot, Susan. If she’d help to write it, it would really lend a lot of support.”

“Sure, no problem, Harry.”

* * *

“ _Lumos_.”

_FLASH! CRACK!_

“ _Lumos_.”

_FLASH! CRACK!_

“ _Lumos_!”

_BANG!_

“ _AHHH_!”

A blinding flash lit up the Great Hall in the middle of lunch, and most of those in attendance stopped and stared. Nathan Boot and Annabel Entwhistle were sitting facing each other in the middle of the Hall, trying to get their wands to work properly.

“I think we should do something, Harry,” Hermione said.

“Yeah, probably,” he answered. They got up and headed to intercept the two first-years.

“Hey, hey, slow down, you two,” Harry said, holding back Annabel from trying that charm again. Hermione similarly held back Nathan from waving his wand. “Learning charms is a little different when you already know wandless magic,” Harry explained. “Have you talked with Professor Flitwick about it?”

“Only a little,” Annabel said.

“Well, you should talk to him some more. He helped Hermione and me learn charms right.”

“It’s easier to push magic through a wand,” Hermione said. “It you use too much power on simple spells like this, your wand basically short circuits. You need to focus on using a lighter touch. It doesn’t take very much power to cast a _Lumos_.”

“But how, though?” Nathan said. “I only taught myself to do it the one way. I don’t really get how it’s supposed to be different.”

“It’s not that hard once you know how it’s supposed to feel,” Harry said. “You’ve worked on feeling different magical energies, right?”

“Uh huh,” both first years said.

“Good. You just need to feel what happens when you use smaller amounts of power. Um…here. Have you tried lighting and blowing out candles?”

“Yes.”

“Good.” Harry whispered, “ _Lacarnum Inflamari_ ,” and a ball of blue fire appeared in his hand. Nathan and Annabel drew back and many of their classmates watched in awe. “Here, Annabel, hold out your hand.”

“What?!” She pulled her hand back.

“It’s completely safe, I promise,” Harry said, passing the cold fire from one hand to the other.

At that, Annabel nervously held out her hand, and Harry gently placed the fire in her palm. He rolled up her sleeve so he could feel the magic flowing through her arm. Her eyes widened in surprise as she felt the flames like hot water licking her fingers.

“Now, try to make the flames die down _slowly_ ,” he said. Hermione caught on at once and conjured up a Bluebell Flame for Nathan to try it out. “It’s bigger than a candle, so it should be easier.”

The girl nodded, and Harry felt an uncontrolled pulse of magic in her arm. The flame nearly went out on the spot.

“Whoa! Easy! Easy!” he said.

“Slower, slower,” Hermione instructed Nathan as he tried the same thing.

“It doesn’t take much,” Harry said. “Like lifting a feather.”

Annabel tamped her magic down, forcing it into a slow, if unsteady trickle. The flame began to diminish.

“There, yes, you feel that?”

“I think so,” she said as the flame went slowly out. “It’s really easy to miss.”

“No, that’s good. You just need practice. Now, try to keep that feeling, take your wand, and cast the spell again.”

Annabel picked up her wand and closed her eyes, trying to keep the flow of magic uniform. Finally, she flicked it and whispered, “ _Lumos_.” She heard Harry exclaim, “Brilliant!” followed by a round of applause. She opened her eyes and saw her wand shining, flickering, but otherwise steady. She smiled at her success and watched as Nathan got it to work a minute later.

“Wow!” “Awesome!” “I don’t believe it!” “How did he _do_ that?” “Harry, that was incredible! Can you teach me? _Please_?” (Romilda Vane.) Half the school was looking at Harry in amazement, and to a lesser extent Hermione, but a lot of them still bought into the legend and assumed Harry had taught her. Most of them had never seen a wizard work things out like that, simply by looking and touching, and if they had, it was only from Dumbledore. Even with Nathan and Annabel showing off wandless magic of their own, Harry didn’t realise until after the fact how much of an apparent show of power on his part that was.

Suddenly, they were intercepted by a tiny, white-haired wizard. “Excellent work, Miss Entwhistle and Mr. Boot,” Professor Flitwick said. “Take ten points each. And excellent teaching, Mr. Potter and Miss Granger. You seem to have a talent at it. I had hoped you would be able to help our new wandless magic practitioners. Twenty points to Gryffindor.”

Well, it was definitely helpful for that.

* * *

_Dear Harry and Hermione,_

_We_ _’re still looking for a new pair of communication mirrors, but until then, these letters will have to do. At least you can still talk to your parents._

_Don_ _’t worry about the Wizengamot meeting next week on Saturday. Andi and I can handle it. I know things look bad right now; we don’t have a lot of support for our side, but your idea of a counter-proposal is a good one. Andi and I spoke to Amelia Bones this week. She isn’t helping us write our counter-proposal outright so far, but she did give us some good ideas, like providing safe areas for transformed werewolves to roam on the full moon and incentives to use them, and assistance in providing access to Wolfsbane, and so forth._

_We_ _’re going to need more time to piece a counter-proposal together, but Andi and I can stall any action until next month, at least, even if the supporters try to make a move. We’re planning to introduce our bill next month. We’ll win yet!_

_Remus says hello. Still no luck convincing him to go on a date._

_Like you_ _’re any better about Vicky, Sirius—R._

_At least I acknowledge I like her. I_ _’ve just been out of the game for so long that_

(There was a scribble in the middle of the letter.)

_Are you actually going to use that excuse? Your sixteen-year-old self wants to slap you silly right now—R._

_Anyway, we_ _’re still working on him. Congratulations on both of you making the Quidditch team. I’m so proud. And good work helping those two first years. Harry, you’ve definitely inherited your mother’s charms skills, and we all know how brilliant you are, Hermione._

_And lastly, Harry, don_ _’t worry yourself about that prophecy. We know what it says, but it’s still not your responsibility. And if, Merlin forbid, you ever find yourself up against Voldemort, you’re going to have a lot of good people backing you up. So for now, just study hard, find yourself a girlfriend, and enjoy your life._

_Love,_

_Sirius (and Remus)_

* * *

Dumbledore called another meeting on Sunday night, and this time, Harry didn’t come alone.

“I see that you have chosen to join us, Hermione,” the Headmaster said.

“I’m not letting my brother do this alone, Professor,” she said.

He smiled kindly: “I admire your loyalty. You are, of course, welcome.”

“How did the Wizengamot meeting go yesterday, Professor?” Harry asked.

“As expected, major action was delayed. There is little to worry about until next month. As for us, we have much to discuss.” Dumbledore said. He withdrew his Pensieve from the cabinet again. Hermione gasped in awe and approached it.

“Oh, my goodness, I didn’t think I’d ever see one up close,” she gushed. “The rune work is beautiful. I could spend all year studying it.”

Dumbledore chuckled: “I am sure you could. Unfortunately, we have considerably less time tonight. I have a number of memories to show you regarding Voldemort’s past. I must warn you that I am not all-knowing in these matters. Much of what you will see in these sessions is speculation and guesswork. However, I believe that they will be essential to understanding Voldemort, and through that, understanding how to defeat him.”

Hermione and Harry glanced at each other and nodded, silently reinforcing what they had already decided: take Dumbledore with a grain of salt. After the past two years, they were all too aware that he was fallible.

“Very good. There is little urgency at the moment, but I do intend to show you all I have before Christmas. From there, we will have to, as they say, play it by ear. The first memory I have to show you I obtained from a very old man named Bob Ogden, who, at the time, was the head of the Magical Law Enforcement Patrol. I was very fortunate to track him down—or any living person who had contact with the subjects of this memory—as I doubt he will live much longer.” He unstopped a phial and poured its contents into the Pensieve. “We will be going inside the memory this time. There are far too many important details to see in the projection. You need only touch the surface of the water. Whenever you are ready…”

Hermione and Harry shrugged and touched their fingers to the surface. There was a strange sensation, as if they were being sucked into the basin, then a spinning feeling, rather like travelling by Floo, and then they landed in what looked like a country lane beside a tangled hedgerow.

“Amazing,” Hermione breathed. “It seems so real.” She turned around and saw a short, plump man with thick glasses. “Is this Ogden?”

“He is,” Dumbledore said.

Hermione yelped as the image of Bob Ogden walked forward straight through her, but she soon resumed her questioning: “How can we see what was behind him, sir?”

Dumbledore smiled: “Magic.”

To Harry’s surprise, Hermione actually glared at him.

“Or rather, we can see anything that Ogden saw at any point in the memory,” he clarified, “even if he did not remember it consciously. It is very rare for the human mind to truly lose anything from its memory.”

They felt a nudge from nowhere and were forced to follow Ogden in the memory as he walked into a wooden area. It was then that Hermione noticed the man’s antique attire. “When did this happen?” she asked.

“1925,” Dumbledore replied.

“1925?” Harry said. “Voldemort was already around then?”

“He was not.”

“Then what—?”

“Patience, my boy, and observe carefully.”

They continued to watch as Bob Ogden approached what looked like an abandoned shack that turned out not to be abandoned.

“Professor!” Harry said excitedly. “That shack—Sirius described it to us. That’s the shack you visited this summer, isn’t it?”

“Good eye, Harry; it is, but more on that later. It is the occupants that I wish you to see.”

At that moment, a very ugly man dressed in rags dropped out of a tree and confronted Ogden. He hissed, “ _You_ _’re not welcome_.”

“Eep!” Hermione squeaked. “That was Parseltongue!”

“Correct, Hermione. You will be hearing quite a lot of that.”

The man turned out to be named Morfin Gaunt, and he and his father clearly didn’t like muggles, or anybody else, for that matter. The next time one of them spoke Parseltongue, Hermione said, “That was too fast for me. What did he say?”

“‘Get in the house. Don’t argue,’” Harry answered.

The Gaunts lived in absolute squalor—a three room shack that they didn’t even attempt to clean. Morfin sang disturbing songs in Parseltongue to his pet adder, and his sister, Merope, was trying to cook dinner whilst suffering the abuse of her relatives for her poor magic skills. Harry felt sorry for her. Her family seemed far too much like Uncle Vernon and Dudley were when he was young.

They soon learnt that Morfin was in trouble for hexing some muggles, but he seemed proud about it. Similarly, despite their low estate, the elder Gaunt was fiercely proud of his pureblood heritage (and it was obvious his blood was the purest in the land just by looking at him, he was so inbred), and he showed off two gaudy, but ancient pieces of jewelry that were probably each worth more than the shack and everything in it, including the people—a gold locket with an S on it that apparently belonged to Salazar Slytherin, and ring with a large, black stone that had belonged to the Peverells.

And then, the truth came out: Morfin had hexed a local muggle aristocrat named Tom because Merope was in love with him. They eventually saw the man’s face at the end of the memory, and Harry gasped in horror when he saw it. “That’s him!” he said. “He looks just like Riddle!”

“Yes, Harry,” Dumbledore said as they landed back in his office. “Tom Riddle Sr…Voldemort’s father.”

“And the woman?” Hermione asked, feeling a little sick. “His mother?”

“Correct. Merope Gaunt, daughter of Marvolo Gaunt and mother of Tom Marvolo Riddle.”

“Well, it’s obvious where Voldemort got his looks,” Harry muttered. Hermione looked at him in confusion. “The sixteen-year-old Riddle in the Chamber was handsome,” he explained. “But Marvolo looked like a monkey, and Morfin and Merope looked like a couple of lizards.”

Hermione nodded in understanding. “Like Charles II of Spain,” she said. “They looked like they hadn’t married anyone further than a first cousin for the past two hundred years. I’m surprised Voldemort didn’t turn out to have terrible health…in fact, it’s a little surprising Voldemort was born at all. Merope easily could have been infertile.”

“We should have been spared great hardship, in that case,” Dumbledore said. “But this is an extreme case of the depths to which an old pureblood family can sink. The people you saw were, in fact, the last, pathetic remnants of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Gaunt. In the eleventh century, they were richer and more powerful than the Malfoys, and great allies of the Houses of Slytherin and Peverell.”

“Richer than the Malfoys?” Harry said. “What happened?”

“To begin with, they squandered their wealth down the centuries. As they had less and less to their name besides their pureblood status, they began to guard their purity more and more jealously. As inbreeding in the family became more pervasive, they became more incompetent, accelerating their decline. They withdrew from the Wizengamot in protest in 1811 when the Ministry refused to classify muggles as beasts, and they stopped attending Hogwarts at about the same time, leading to a further decline in their magic. By 1925, the result was what you saw.”

Dumbledore then explained that while the actions of Merope Gaunt could not be accounted for after that day, Marvolo and Morfin were arrested, and it appeared that, freed from their abuse, she proceeded to ensnare Tom Riddle with a love potion. When she became pregnant, she evidently stopped giving it to him because he left her at once. What happened after that was left for another time.

Harry and Hermione were sceptical that this whole exercise was actually relevant to defeating Voldemort, but they decided to give Dumbledore the benefit of the doubt…for now. They were just about to leave when Harry stopped and remembered the notebook he’d brought with him.

“Of, Professor, I almost forgot. I have something to show you.”

Dumbledore’s bushy eyebrows rose. “You do, Harry?”

“Yeah, I, er, I wrote a book—about all our adventures in our first year—the mess with Quirrell and stuff.”

“A book, Harry? Now that is a pleasant surprise. I have met very few writers your age in my time.”

“Well, Remus helped, sir. He said I should show it to you, and maybe you could edit down to what I could safely publish. I think I’d like to publish it. It’d be good to set the record straight about all the stuff people think.”

“Harry, my boy, if you found a way to truly “set the record straight,” you would be a far wiser man than I,” Dumbledore said with a smile, “but I would happy to examine your book and see if I can’t mold it into something safely publishable.”

“That’d be great. Thanks, Professor.”

Dumbledore had a sad smile on his face as Harry left. He had been encouraged by the skills Harry had shown in various areas of magic, but writing was not one he had expected. But maybe it would be useful someday.


	68. The ICW Calls

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: JK Rowling will get you, my pretty, and your little dog, too.

“Daphne, Astoria, Tracey,” Harry said. “Good evening.”

“Harry, Hermione. Likewise.” Daphne Greengrass said coolly as the five students met in the library. She and Tracey Davis looked as aloof as ever to the two Gryffindors, while Astoria Greengrass, being only a first year, just looked eager to be included in the discussion.

“So the rumour is you two have been sticking up for werewolves lately,” Tracey said suspiciously.

“We prefer to think that we’re sticking up for the oppressed,” Harry told the Slytherin girls. “But more relevant to you, we’re concerned that the Werewolf Safety Act will not actually make Britain safer and may even make things worse.”

“Worse?” Astoria said fearfully. “How could it get worse?”

“By driving werewolves underground,” Hermione said. “Making them harder to track and more desperate—more likely to attack.”

“You can’t be proposing maintaining the status quo,” Daphne said. “With Greyback around, that’s clearly not working. I assume you heard what happened last full moon?”

On the morning of the first of October, magical Britain had awakened to the news that Fenrir Greyback had successfully attacked a magical home. A young mother was bitten and later died of her wounds. Her husband was not bitten, but was badly scratched before he managed to drive the werewolf off, and would have to live with the scars for the rest of his life. The only consolation was that their two-year-old son came out of it unscathed.

“Yes, we know,” Harry said sadly. “It’s been clear for a while that the status quo isn’t going to work at this point, even if it was probably the Werewolf Safety Act that drew him back here in the first place. That’s why we wanted to let you know in advance—confidentially, of course—that my allies are working on an alternative bill of our own.”

That surprised all three girls. Apparently, Potter was savvier than they thought.

“An alternative bill?” Daphne said with interest. “What kind of bill are we talking about?”

“We’ve been talking to Amelia Bones about more effective safety measures,” Hermione said. “Ideally, if we can secure that, we’d want to afford werewolves more rights within that framework—it’s just a matter of fairness. The important this is that the new bill will have a lot of financial aspects to it—fees, penalties, incentives, and so on, and we thought your grandfather might be interested in getting an early look at it.”

“And if his ideas are sufficiently compatible with ours,” Harry added, “maybe even a say in writing it.”

Tracey looked very surprised, while Daphne and Astoria shared a calculating look. “Go on…” Daphne said.

* * *

At Harry’s and Hermione’s second meeting with Dumbledore, the ghostly image of Caractacus Burke rose from the Pensieve and proudly explained how he had ripped off a desperate and clearly mentally ill pregnant woman of a priceless locket of Slytherin for only ten galleons. He was certainly a delightful character.

“For most witches and wizards, extreme emotions will lead to bursts of uncontrolled magic,” Dumbledore explained. “However, for some, those same emotions, particularly when associated with depression or similar afflictions, can _suppress_ one’s magic. In any case, with the state she was in, Merope either would not or could not use magic to sustain herself, and she later died shortly after giving birth to her son.

“However, I only learnt this after the fact. This brief interview is merely a bridge—a link between the memory you saw two weeks ago and the one we will watch now.”

The three of them dipped their fingers into the Pensieve, and they found themselves spinning, falling, and landing in a London street next to a fifty-six-year-old, red-haired Albus Dumbledore.

“Your name is Albus, and you were ginger?” Hermione said, giggling slightly.

“Maybe you should’ve traded with Hagrid, sir,” said Harry.

Dumbledore chuckled: “Clever, Harry.”

The younger Dumbledore soon entered an orphanage where he gave a very creepy eleven-year-old Tom Riddle his Hogwarts letter—a Tom Riddle who was already teaching himself wandless magic without even knowing what it was. He had been at the orphanage ever since his mother had showed up on the doorstep on the night of his birth and had been an outcast for most of that time—partly because he was different, but mostly, it was increasingly self-imposed as he started fighting back with his magic.

The young Tom Riddle was cold and withdrawn—or perhaps wary would have been a better term. He seemed emotionally unstable and fearful of being taken away and not in control. He gave commands with a ringing, tingling force that Harry and Hermione could feel even in the memory.

“What was that, Professor?” Harry asked quickly.

“I eventually determined that it was a weak wandless Compulsion Charm, likely performed subconsciously—something barely legal under normal circumstances. Clearly, his self-study of magic was very different from yours, which is a good sign on your part.”

After a strained conversation about magic and Hogwarts, Tom’s made his final comment was that he could speak to snakes. He asked if that was unusual, perhaps hoping he had a power that Dumbledore hadn’t heard of before. But of course, as Dumbledore said, it was unusual, but not unheard of.

“I do hope you’ve changed your procedures since then, Professor,” Hermione said when they landed back in the Headmaster’s office.

“I’m sorry, I’m not sure I understand, Hermione,” Dumbledore said, furrowing his brow.

“Well, any muggle could tell you Tom was showing obvious sociopathic tendencies—technically, he was too young for it to be definite, but honestly, hanging a rabbit from the rafters? That alone should have been worth a visit to a Mind Healer, no matter how much he didn’t want one. I imagine setting his wardrobe on fire to scare him straight didn’t help much, sir.”

“No, in retrospect it didn’t,” Dumbledore admitted. “I _have_ learnt to be more wary about troubled children since I met him. There is much to be said about the psychology of Tom Riddle from this memory, and I suspect that you have already noted the major points. However, there is one detail I wish to point out that is of critical importance: the young Tom’s habit of collecting “trophies’ or “souvenirs’ from his victims. While it may seem of little consequence, his thievery will prove to be of just a great a consequence as his cruelty in time.”

Harry and Hermione mentally rolled their eyes, but accepted this for now.

* * *

“Ahem. _Sor bladvak cherrus praug_.”

Luna giggled. “No, Harry,” she said. “‘Ruby’ is _blidvik_. _Bladvak_ means ‘pick-mattock’.”

“Ah. _Sor blidvik cherrus praug_.”

“ _Gor nochral sorrog_!” Luna snapped in an impression of an impatient goblin. It was hard not to laugh at her when she did that. She was far to cute to pull off the impatient goblin look.

“ _Sor turreqara hraghee_ _…shurak_ ,” Harry replied.

“Very good, Harry,” Luna said brightly. “You’re making very quick progress. My roommates don’t have the patience to learn Gobbledegook.”

“ _Gor nochok hlor nek opchekru Gob_ _’ilnkru blad u hrow_ ,” Hermione countered.

“That is true,” Luna said. “Most of them _don_ _’t_ care very much about Goblins. But that’s so much the better for us. Goblins are usually quite pleasant to wizards who are polite to them over others.”

“All the more reason to learn,” Harry agreed. “If people were actually interested in inter-species cooperation around here, it would solve a lot of problems.”

“One problem at a time Harry,” Hermione said. “It’ll probably take us our whole time in school to fix Hogwarts, not to mention defeating Voldemort.”

“Can’t blame a guy for trying, though. We really do appreciate this, Luna. You’re a good friend,” he said with a smile.

“Thank you, Harry. I rather like having friends,” she said cheerfully.

“Uh…right,” Harry said awkwardly. He didn’t think their quirky friend would ever grow out of her habit of making strange and uncomfortable observations. “Er, come on, Luna, what’s the word for “diamond’?”

* * *

“Tom Riddle’s friends—though I suspected he never truly regarded anyone as what we would call a friend—were a motley collection of the weak seeking protection, the ambitious seeking shared glory, and the thuggish gravitating towards a leader who could teach them more refined forms of cruelty,” Dumbledore explained. “Many of these followers were formed into the Knights of Walpurgis after Riddle left school, later renamed the Death Eaters. And of course, because they were nearly all Slytherins, they adopted the pureblood ideology of their house, even though Riddle himself—though he never admitted it publicly—was a half-blood.

“Very few who knew Riddle in school have been willing to talk to me, even after the end of the war. Indeed, virtually no one who was closer to him than myself or Hagrid would tell me about him, either out of loyalty or fear of retribution. However, I eventually learnt that he became obsessed with his parentage in school, understandably so, as an orphan. It took him five years to convince himself that his father had never set foot in Hogwarts and to track down his mother’s family, the House of Gaunt.”

“That would be right after he killed Myrtle, wouldn’t it?” Harry asked.

“Correct, Harry. Clearly, he was busy in other, more nefarious ways by that point. However, it is his encounter with his family that I wish for the two of you to see tonight.” He poured a memory into the Pensieve.

By now, Morfin Gaunt, the subject of the memory, was the only Gaunt remaining—delirious and living like a wild man, the sixteen-year-old Tom Riddle could only get through to him by speaking entirely in Parseltongue, which Harry had to translate for Hermione because it was too fast for her to follow. The memory lasted only long enough for Riddle to find out the truth of his parentage, and then it went suddenly dark. Morfin had apparently been Obliviated of everything after that.

Dumbledore explained that the next day, Tom Riddle Sr and _his_ parents were found dead from what any wizard would recognise as the Killing Curse. Morfin “remembered” committing the murders and boastfully confessed. He died in Azkaban some years later, shortly after Dumbledore collected his memory.

“You see, Harry, Hermione,” he said, “Voldemort may not, in his mind, care about blood purity, but he certainly believes that magic makes us superior to muggles. Learning of the ignominious circumstances of his birth enraged him and made him hate his muggle family. Both his assumed name and his murders were acts of rejecting them and embracing the noble and ancient magical heritage from which he had come— _and_ of forging a new identity for himself—“Vol de Mort.” The translation is ambiguous, but it seems to most readily mean—”

“Flight from Death,” Hermione finished for him.

Dumbledore nodded.

“Well, he’s certainly done that,” Harry said. “Otherwise he’d be dead by now…One other thing, Professor. That ring, the one that belonged to the Peverells—Marvolo was wearing it before, and Morfin was wearing it just now, but Riddle took it, didn’t he?”

“Correct, Harry,” he said. “You’ve been paying attention. Remember that ring, both of you. You will see the significance of it soon.”

* * *

“We need to talk to Neville about Occlumency,” Harry said. “We’ve been putting it off too long already. We need to make sure it’s all square before Halloween. He’ll need his Gran’s permission, too, remember?”

“Yes, I know, Harry,” Hermione replied with a sigh. “I just wish we didn’t have to worry him about it.”

“Mione, isn’t that exactly what Dumbledore said about telling me?”

She flinched and bit her lip uncomfortably. That hit a little too close to home.

“Sorry,” Harry muttered.

“It’s…it’s much more of a sure thing with you, though,” she said.

“Just the same, I’d wanna know even if I were second in line so I could be ready, and Neville deserves the same.”

“Okay, I get it…” she said. “After our exercise session today. Then we’ll tell him.”

“Sounds good.”

Harry and Hermione were still spending a half hour before dinner every day on physical exercise, and Neville had been joining them more and more in an effort to better himself, to the point where, this year, he was joining them most days. For his benefit, they had made their routine less about karate katas and more about standard aerobic exercises, but they continued to make it more demanding as they grew in order to stay in good shape.

Of course, now that Harry and Hermione were both on the Quidditch team, they were both getting more exercise. Broom flying wasn’t exactly aerobic, but it did require a lot of balance and coordination, and a fair bit of arm and leg strength to turn at high speeds without falling off the brooms. The combination of that with aerobics was, they hoped, good for building up strength and endurance.

As usual, Neville joined them at their usual spot in a disused corridor near Gryffindor Tower. Occasionally someone else would turn up for some karate-related tips, most frequently Su Li or Susan Bones, but that was rare by now. The first years always hung around to see the karate demonstration at the start of the year, but that had died down by mid-October as well.

“Hey guys,” Neville said between sets. “Guess what. Gran sent me a letter; she says she’s really proud of how I’ve got my Potions grade up.”

“That’s great, Neville!” Hermione said. “I know your grades have improved a lot since first year, but that one always seemed to give you trouble.”

“Yeah, well, a lot of it’s Gran’s doing for making Snape not be so mean this year.”

“Hey, don’t forget our Mum,” Harry said. “She’s the only person I’ve ever seen tell Snape off.”

“Yeah,” Neville said, puffing only a little as he ran in place. “You’ll have to thank her for me.”

“You _are_ a good wizard, you know. You just need practice,” Hermione said, looking back at him with a small smile.

Neville glanced at her and shyly gave her a small smile back when their eyes met. “Thanks, Hermione,” he replied. “It’s you two I have to thank for helping me along with that. I never thought I’d get very far before you started helping me.”

“I’m sure you would have done fine, Neville,” she said. “You just needed a little push to get you started.” She flicked her eyes up and down his form. “And I’d say the exercise is doing you a lot of good, too.”

“R-really?” he squeaked. “Uh, thanks…um…you too.”

Harry smirked slightly as both Neville and Hermione were blushing, although that might’ve just been the exercise. Neville _was_ in a lot better shape than when he’d some to Hogwarts, though, when he’d been pudgy and round-faced, and he was a lot more coordinated now, too. He could probably go out for a number of sports in the muggle world. Unfortunately, his biggest weakness at Hogwarts was that he still wasn’t good on a broom.

Once the half hour was up, sweating and out of breath, but feeling pretty good, Harry knew it was time to confront his friend: “Say, Neville, there’s something we’ve been needing to talk to you about.”

The old nervousness and uncertainty washed over Neville’s face at once. “W-what is it, H-Harry?” he said.

“There’s something we want you to do for us, Neville. And there’s someone we want you to meet, and…we can’t really tell you why, but it’s important. We need you to trust us on that.”

Neville stared at Harry with wide eyes. He’d never been asked to take on the kind of responsibility that this seemed to be, even with his Gran’s political work. As much as Harry was his friend, he was still the Boy-Who-Lived, and anything so secret that involved him could be deadly serious. And yet, Neville thought something now that he never would have thought two years ago: this was a chance to prove himself to his friends and maybe even his Gran, too. So he squared his shoulders and said, “O-okay, what is it?”

“Do you know what Occlumency is?” Harry asked.

“I’ve heard of it. Isn’t that some kind of magic you can do to stop people from reading your mind?”

“Sort of,” Hermione said. “Legilimency is a lot more subtle than “mind reading,” and Occlumency isn’t really magic—more like meditation, but yes.”

“You see, here’s the thing,” Harry explained. “Dumbledore has been telling us some of his secrets—stuff about the war and about Voldemort.” Neville flinched, but only a little. “You know that Voldemort’s still out there somewhere. You saw the Diary, and Professor Dumbledore says that wasn’t the only thing he had in reserve. These secrets could be important to getting rid of him once and for all. Now, we’ve talked it over, and we think that you also need to know them.”

“M-me?”

“Yes, and I’m sorry, but we can’t tell you why. Suffice to say you need to know them, but we can’t tell you unless you learn Occlumency, so no one else can get them from you.”

“Y-you want me to learn Occlumency?” he said in shock. “I…I don’t know if I can. I’m always forgetful and stuff. I don’t think my mind’s as strong as yours.”

“I think it can be if you try,” Hermione assured him. “Your body wasn’t very strong when you first came to Hogwarts, and neither was your magic, but you’ve come a long way with both of them. You can do it with your mind, too.”

Neville smiled a little, and Harry continued, “We already learnt Occlumency last year. We asked the person who taught us to come to Hogsmeade when we go there on Halloween to evaluate you. He’s really good, and trustworthy. If you’re willing to do it, and if you get your Gran’s permission, we want you to come with us to meet him.”

Neville’s face fell. “I…I’d do it for you two, Harry,” he said, “but I dunno how Gran’ll feel about it.”

“Write to her and ask her,” Harry said. “Tell her it’s important to you. If you’re firm about it, I think she’ll let you. And if she still gives you trouble, I’ll write her myself and tell her how important it is.” He didn’t mention the full truth, not yet—that this was about the reason Neville’s parents were targeted and attacked—but he would tell Augusta Longbottom if she made him.

“You’d do that for me?” Neville said. Harry and Hermione both nodded. “Wow, that’s…not many people’ll stand up to Gran. Okay, then I’ll do it.”

“Thanks, Neville,” Harry replied. “I’ll feel a lot better knowing you know.”

* * *

Harry and Hermione were surprised to find that their next summons from Professor Dumbledore came on Friday night instead of a Saturday, and they were alarmed when they came to his office to find him packing a number of his books and arcane instruments into a trunk.

“Professor? What’s wrong?” Hermione said worriedly. “Are you leaving?”

“I am sorry, but I must, Hermione,” he answered. “I am afraid that we will not be able to hold our regular meeting this week. However, I remain committed to showing you the remainder of the memories in my collection to you before Christmas.”

“But Professor, where are you going?” Harry asked.

“There is an emergency meeting of the International Confederation of Wizards tomorrow,” the Headmaster said. “I must make my way to their headquarters at once to open it. I thought it was only fair to inform you in person.”

“The ICW Headquarters,” Harry said. “That’s in…”

“Meiringen, Switzerland,” Hermione said.

“Quite.”

“But what happened?” Harry demanded. “Why is there an emergency meeting? Is something happening—?”

“Not here, I assure you. This crisis is overseas.” The old wizard sat at his desk. “I suppose you might as well know now. You will be able to learn some of it from the _Daily Prophet_ and the muggle press. Yesterday, the muggle President of Burundi was assassinated by an extremist faction of his own military. Are you familiar with the politics of the surrounding region?”

Both Hermione and Harry shook their heads.

“Yes, it is fairly obscure. There is an ongoing racial conflict in the region in Burundi, Rwanda, Uganda, and eastern Zaire. This attack appears to be an attack on a leader from the majority Hutu people by a military dominated by ethnic Tutsis. Already, violence between the two groups in Burundi is escalating. Now, as far as the muggles are concerned, this is all there is to it. What they do not know is that the Burundian Minister for Magic was visiting the President and was also assassinated.”

Harry’s and Hermione’s eyes widened. That pointed the finger at wizards, and that would completely change the situation.

“All of the evidence visible to the ICW points to the fact that several of the radical muggle groups in the region have received the backing of a dark wizard—a man named Kinani Ngeze,” Dumbledore confirmed. “Kinani Ngeze is a very powerful wizard, and he has been fomenting conflict in East Africa for many years. I believe he seeks not only to rule the small region in which he maintains his base of operations, but eventually to move west and become the Dark Lord of Kinshasa, and through it, all of Central Africa. He has been especially active in the last few months. This is the first action against a muggle leader, but there have been several assassinations of key figures in magical Burundi and Rwanda, and that is the cause for this meeting. The ICW will be debating this weekend whether to take action in the situation there.”

Both teens stared at the Headmaster for a minute before Harry asked the obvious question: “Sir, did the ICW ever discuss whether to intervene with Voldemort?”

Dumbledore hung his head slightly. “They did, Harry,” he said, “however, Voldemort’s ambitions did not extend significantly beyond the shores of Britain—at least in public—and that was likely by design. ICW intervention would have made things much harder for him. However, as he kept it to an “internal matter,” the entrenched interests were served by _not_ intervening, despite repeated requests.”

“And what about Burundi?” Hermione said with a frown.

“Their prospects may be better. Ngeze operates throughout Burundi, Rwanda, Uganda, and eastern Zaire, which makes this a clear international matter, and like the muggle United Nations, the ICW is duty bound to step in if the conflict continues. I do apologise for the inconvenience. I highly doubt that this meeting will take very long, and I fully intend to be back in time for the full moon and the Halloween feast next weekend, so you need not worry about that.”

“We understand, Professor,” Hermione said. “This sounds important. Good luck.” Harry nodded his agreement.

“Thank you for understanding. I will see you again soon.”

* * *

Edward Grayson was lucky that he was already in Kiev when he received the summons to the ICW. For all his power, international portkeys still made him queasy. He much preferred to walk. Luckily, he knew enough polkas, mazurkas, and other folk songs to hike the last eleven hundred miles to Meiringen along the songlines at a decent pace.

One mark in favour of the ICW headquarters was that it was a lovely setting—an old castle, magically hidden right under the muggles’ noses, overlooking the Reichenbach Falls. It was much smaller than Hogwarts, just large enough for the nearly two hundred ICW representatives to meet, plus sleeping quarters. The footprint of the Great Hall of Hogwarts, and its height from down in the kitchens all the way up to the high rafters, was similar in size.

It was as he stood on one of the many balconies of the castle, humming to himself, that Grayson felt a powerful magical presence approach behind him—one of the few he had ever met whom he could fairly consider his equal. He could identify the man at once just by the feeling of his magic.

“G’Day, Dumbledore,” Grayson said stiffly, a hint of annoyance in his Australian accent.

“Thank you for coming, Ambassador Grayson,” Dumbledore replied congenially.

“I happened to be on the continent,” Grayson replied without turning around.

“Have you had time to review the situation?”

“Of course I have. I do pay attention, you know. But the other representatives won’t go for it. Not for a handful of assassinations.”

“Nonetheless, I fear more trouble on the horizon,” Dumbledore said. “My contacts tell me that there are calls for mass killing of muggle Tutsis in Rwanda. Thousands of muggles have died already in Burundi, and Ngeze is almost certainly pushing the situation further out of balance. One more strike in a sensitive spot could set off a full-scale war that would give him cover to take over. I do not believe this will end without intervention, Edward.”

Grayson snorted. Still not looking, he said, “Are you a Seer, now, Dumbledore? You might want to write old Fan Tong for your predictions instead of trying to do it yourself—unless that pet Seer of yours made another?”

“Sadly, Sibyll has not improved in her predictive ability,” the older man said icily. “If she had, I would have several fewer problems. Can I ask your support to uphold justice in the East African matter?”

“Tsk. I will uphold justice, o Supreme Mugwump. Whether that is in direct support of you or merely as an ally of convenience depends on you.”

“Edward, I know we have had our disagreements in the past, but I hope we can agree that Kinani Ngeze is an evil man who must not be allowed to gain power.”

“Well, on that much we certainly agree. And if you’re willing to do what it takes to achieve that, we should have no problem.”

“Very well. I await you at the meeting.” Dumbledore turned to go.

“Albus.” Grayson turned around to face the white-bearded man for the first time. Dumbledore was still wearing those atrocious purple robes with the gold stars, he noted. His amber eyes locked with Dumbledore’s blue ones, and there was silence for a moment. “I heard about what happened at Hogwarts last spring,” he said in a more friendly tone.

“Ah…” Dumbledore said slowly. “And your opinion?”

“You’re a fool for not thinking of a basilisk months earlier.”

Dumbledore lowered his gaze: “I have had multiple parents tell me the same thing.”

“You know, Albus, that Malfoy character of yours is a bloomin’ arse, from what I hear, but he may be right about something. Maybe you’re getting too old for this.”

Dumbledore sighed and said, “I suspect I have been too old for this for some time, Edward. Unfortunately, “this’ keeps happening.”

“Hmph,” he grunted. “Eh, it’s good to know your limitations, at least. That said, that boy hero of yours definitely caught my attention.”

“Ah, young Harry is a very gifted young man,” the older man said with a smile. “And his sister is an equally gifted young woman.”

“Yes, wandless magic, both of them?” Grayson asked.

“Indeed. Some of the most proficient I have ever seen. I suspected you would take an interest in that.”

“Very interested. I bought a ticket to the World Cup next summer. Maybe I could meet them there?”

“I will put in a good word for you.”

“Thank you, Albus. Also…” Grayson stepped closer to Dumbledore and lowered his voice. “I heard a rumour about a cursed diary that was involved in that little incident.”

Dumbledore nodded knowingly. “There was one,” he said, “which possessed a young girl to do its bidding. Harry was fortunately able to destroy it and save her.”

“That doesn’t sound like just a diary.”

“No. No, it wasn’t.”

“And what was it?” Grayson said, not certain, but suspecting the answer.

The old man hesitated only a moment: “A horcrux.”

He was right. “So it was that Lord Voldemort? He made a horcrux?”

“No,” Dumbledore said. “He made _several_ horcruxes.”

Grayson’s eyes grew very wide, and the colour drained from his face. He thought he caught a brief flicker of smugness from Dumbledore at finally managing to take him by surprise. “I’ve never heard of such a thing,” he said.

“Nor I, but as we have already destroyed three of them, it is most clear that he succeeded. In any case, he is not yet finished…and on that point, there is a matter of some delicacy about which I would like to speak with you after the meeting.”

On this, at least, Grayson could wholeheartedly agree with the Supreme Mugwump. That could be very important. “I’ll be there,” he said.


	69. Demelza Robins

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: It is the unknown we fear when we look upon JK Rowling and Harry Potter, nothing more.

“Yes, we quite agree that werewolves, or at least Fenrir Greyback in particular, pose a serious threat,” Sirius Black addressed the Wizengamot on the thirtieth of October, fittingly enough, the day of the full moon. “I applaud Madam Bones for providing extra security for this meeting today, and I share the concerns of many of my colleagues about the devastating attacks each full moon. However, I am also worried that blindly placing tighter restrictions on werewolves will simply drive them underground and make them harder to track. What this country needs is smarter regulation that is focused on reducing the risk of attacks on nights like tonight. To that end, I wish to introduce for the consideration of the Wizengamot the Lycanthropy Regulation and Management Act as an alternative to the current proposal.”

There was some scattered applause, but most of the people were stone-faced. Most of wizarding Britain only really cared that their families were safe, regardless of how. A few clearly trusted the Ministry’s bill over Sirius’s, or vice versa, and there was a lot of talk as Sirius unpacked the provisions of the LRMA as opposed to the WSA, which did win over a few converts, but it would be an uphill battle.

Probably a more interesting story than Sirius’s move was what didn’t happen: with a Wizengamot meeting scheduled just hours before the full moon, everyone was expecting an attack in the vicinity that night, perhaps going after any stragglers near the Ministry. But no attack materialised. However, only a few people were naive enough to think it was over.

* * *

Even for the night after the full moon, excitement was running high at Hogwarts on Halloween morning. The first and second years awoke to the smell of baking pumpkin pies wafting through the corridors, and the upper years were excited for their belated first Hogsmeade visit of the year. Even Harry and Hermione, for whom Halloween was a solemn occasion, were cheerful that morning. They planned to make a tour of it: Honeydukes, Zonko’s, the Shrieking Shack, and so on, plus seeing if there was any truth to the rumour that Dumbledore’s brother ran the Hog’s Head.

“Remember, Neville, lunch at the Three Broomsticks,” Hermione said as the thestral-pulled carriage made its way the village. “Harry reserved a private room, so just tell Madam Rosmerta you’re with his party.”

“I got it,” Neville said. “I’ll see you for lunch.”

Harry and Hermione had only seen Hogsmeade for their one meeting with Sirius and Remus in the Three Broomsticks two years ago, and it was nice to see the place again. All the buildings looked like little thatched houses from the Middle Ages with high-peaked roofs and tall chimneys, making for a very quaint setting.

Some students met their parents in Hogsmeade. After all, a fifth of the witches and wizards in Britain lived in the village, and the others could easily travel there. But for most, it was a chance to get out of the castle for a few hours and go shopping, go on a date, or just go out for a day on the town. However, the atmosphere in the village was tense this morning when the carriage reached the station, and the place was crawling with Aurors.

“Excuse me, what’s going on?” Harry asked the nearest Auror when they climbed out.

“Didn’t you hear the howls last night?” he said. “We think Greyback was here. No sign of an attack, but we still don’t know what he was up to.”

“Oh my goodness,” Hermione said. “I didn’t think he’d come this close.”

“He goes wherever he wants. We’re trying to figure out where he went from here.”

The Aurors definitely put a damper on things, especially for Harry. “I’ve got a bad feeling about this, Mione,” he said.

“You’re worrying too much,” Hermione said. “The full moon’s over. What could happen?”

Harry groaned: “Isn’t that what they always say before something bad happens?”

“This isn’t a television show, Harry. Come on, let’s just try to have a good time today.”

“Whatever you say, sis.”

Despite Harry’s misgivings, he did enjoy the morning. It was fascinating seeing all the different kinds of sweets in Honeydukes, and since it was Halloween, they both ate a good deal more of them than they probably should have. Zonko’s looked downright dangerous, but they did have a few interesting and useful items. After that, their last stop of the morning was the Shrieking Shack. Not many people were at the Shrieking Shack at this time of the morning. In fact, they happened to be alone at the moment, leaving them room to speak openly about the real truth of the place.

“And to think it’s not really haunted at all,” Harry said. “Just one very cranky student and his friends.”

Hermione giggled: “‘Cranky,” Harry?”

“What? It fits. I’m just surprised that no one noticed it only seemed to be haunted at the full moon.”

“Well, that’s simple,” she replied. “Dumbledore enchanted it to randomly make haunted-sounding noises at other times of the month.”

“Huh. I should’ve thought of that…You know it’s not really that impressive when you know the truth.”

“No, I suppose not. It is part of your family heritage, though.”

“Yeah. More or less.” The two were just about to leave when Harry stopped cold and said, “Did you hear something just now?”

Hermione cupped her hand to her ear. “I don’t hear anything,” she said.

“No, I know I heard—There it is again.”

“I don’t think I heard anything.”

But Harry was not about to dismiss his hearing again, not after last year. “No, I know I heard something. Cover me.”

“Harry!” Hermione cried, but she wasn’t fast enough. Harry dashed behind a tree, looked around to make sure no one was watching, and transformed to cat form.

As Ratsbane, Harry’s hearing was much sharper, and it was only a few seconds before he heard that strangled cry again—what sounded like the cry of a human child. He ran out past Hermione towards the source of the sound, leaving her no choice but to follow.

Several of the houses nearest to the Shrieking Shack were abandoned, since a lot of wizards didn’t even want to live on the same street as a building so “haunted.” It was from one of these houses that the crying was emanating. When he got closer, there was no mistaking it: a child, a girl, was crying in pain. It wasn’t a ghost: he could smell her—a few years younger than he was, he thought. He smelled blood. He listened and smelled in case there were any predators around, but there were none. There was a scent trail from a very large and scary animal, but it was hours old, and there was no indication other than that the child was now alone. Checking around again, he ducked behind another tree and changed back to human form before running into the abandoned house.

“Hello?” he called. “Hello? Is anyone here?”

“ _Help_!” a high, panicked voice cried. “ _Help! Somebody help me_!”

Harry rounded a corner and saw a horrible sight: a little girl of about nine or ten with reddish-brown hair was lying on the floor, clutching her leg and covered in blood.

“Oh, bugger! _Hermione_!” Harry yelled as he rushed to the girl’s side.

With dentists for parents, not to mention the risk of dark wizard attacks, Harry and Hermione had both taken basic first aid courses, which allowed Harry to quickly take stock of the situation. The girl was trying to hold her trousers tight around her leg, which was where the pooling blood seemed to be concentrated. She was pale, sweating, and shivering where she lay. That wasn’t a good sign. She also had a long scratch on her arm and two long, parallel scrapes across her face that looked strangely familiar.

“Harry—? _Oh my God_!” Hermione said. At once, she stepped back and sent up a flare of red sparks with her wand as a distress call. Hopefully, an Auror would be there soon. “I called for help,” she said as she also rushed to the girl’s side. “What happened to her?”

“I don’t know,” Harry said. “I just found her like this. Can you tell me what happened?” he addressed the girl.

The younger girl’s eyes widened when he brushed away his fringe. “Ha-Ha-Harry P-Potter?” she squeaked.

“Yes, I’m Harry Potter, but I need to know what happened,” he said impatiently.

“It was a…a…a…a wolf,” the girl said.

Harry’s face was grim, his fears confirmed. The true wolf was long since extinct in muggle Britain, and there were only a handful in the magical areas. But just to be sure, he asked, “A wolf? Was it bigger than normal with a short snout?”

“M-m-maybe,” she said. “I…I saw the eyes…”

“Eyes?” Harry said.

“The eyes,” she said fearfully. “Blue—and black—blue inside black.”

Harry’s breath caught. Even in wolf form, there could be no doubt about those eyes: “Greyback.”

The girl began crying, and Harry and Hermione stared at each other in wordless horror. Harry knew now where he had seen those scratches on her face before. They were almost identical with the two parallel scars on Remus’s face, almost as if they were the monster’s signature.

“I’m gonna check the wound,” Hermione resolved. “Where are those Aurors?”

“Careful,” Harry said, “the blood—even without the moon…”

“It’s okay, I don’t have to touch it,” she said. The risk of contamination from blood alone rather than a bite was tiny, but better safe than sorry. Hermione wandlessly pulled the ragged strips of cloth away from the girl’s leg, revealing a deep, peculiarly-shaped bite mark. “Oh, God,” she breathed.

The girl started crying even louder and shaking.

“Hey! Hey!” Harry came around and sat beside her, propping her head up on his leg and taking her good hand in his. “It’s gonna be okay. We’re gonna help you. What’s your name?”

“It hurts,” the girl whimpered.

“I know it hurts, but we’re gonna help you. Come on, what’s your name?”

“D-Demelza…Demelza Robins.”

“Good to meet you, Demelza. Don’t worry; it’s gonna be okay.”

“Harry,” Hermione whispered, “we need to close this wound, or she’s gonna bleed to death.”

Harry turned pale. “How, though? It’s a cursed wound. We need silver and dittany to close it.”

“I know, I know. Lemme think…” Hermione bit her lip and paced in thought. “We’ll suture it!” she said. “I need a needle and thread stat, and make sure they’re sterile.”

“A needle and thread? Where am I supposed to get that?”

“Harry, are you a wizard or not?”

“Oh, right.” He glanced around the room and saw a stone about the right size lying on the floor. He wandlessly levitated it to float above his hands. Snapping his fingers (of his left hand so he didn’t activate his wand holster) and pushing his magic into it, it burst into flames, but the flames subsided as soon as the dirt was burnt off, leaving it sterilised. Then, he waved his hand, and it was transfigured into a spool of thread, which he levitated over to Hermione. Then, he pulled a splinter of wood off the exposed frame of the house and repeated the process, making sure it was only singed and not burnt to ash. He quickly transfigured it into a curved surgical needle. Demelza stared at him in awe at his show of wandless magic.

“You do the suturing,” he told his sister. “You’re better at that detail work.”

“I’m on it. I’m sorry, Demelza; this is gonna hurt.”

Demelza screamed and writhed in pain as Hermione began stitching her leg back together. “Hold her!” Hermione yelled as she knelt on the girl’s good leg to keep it still.

Harry kept a firm grip on her hand, and he reached out and wandlessly held down her injured leg. “Demelza!” he said. “Listen to me. Concentrate on me.” She looked up at him with watery eyes. “You’re doing great. This’ll only take a couple minutes. Come on, how old are you?”

“T-t-ten,” she said.

“Good…” Harry started breathing harder from the effort of holding her still. “Do you play Quidditch? Junior league?”

Demelza nodded weakly.

“What position?”

“Ch-Chaser.”

“Great. We’re gonna need some Chasers in a few years. If you’re in Gryffindor, you should try out.”

To Harry’s dismay, his attempt at distraction failed. Demelza began sobbing uncontrollably.

“Harry, do something!” Hermione said as she kept trying to make stitches.

“I’m trying!” he said. “Demelza, what is it? What’s wrong?”

“I…c-c-an’t…” she sobbed. “I can’t ever go to Hogwarts now!”

Harry grasped her hand tighter and increased the pressure on her leg. “What’re you talking about? Of course you can,” he said.

“N-n-no…they’ll never…they’ll never let a w-w-w-wer…” Her voice broke into a loud cry.

“Yes, they will! _Yes, they will, Demelza!_ Listen! Listen to me!” He bent his head closer to her face and whispered, “Do you want to know a secret?” She stared up at him in confusion. “I have a good friend who’s a werewolf.” She gasped at the word. “He was bitten when he was only five years old. He went to Hogwarts for all seven years, and he even made prefect. And that was before the Wolfsbane Potion was invented. You don’t have to be an outcast just because that’s what _He_ wanted. You can still take control of your life.”

Demelza sniffled a couple of times and started crying again, but then, without warning, she reached up with her remaining strength and threw her arms around Harry’s neck.

Harry stiffened at the contact, but he quickly relaxed and patted her on the back. “It’s gonna be okay,” he whispered. “It’s gonna be okay.”

He laid her back on the ground gently, as she seemed near collapse. Then, almost automatically, he drew his wand with a snap of his fingers and cleaned the blood off himself. And it was a good job he had his wand out because at that moment, an Auror finally ran into the abandoned house.

Auror Lutetia Savage was responding to an apparent distress call of red sparks near the Shrieking Shack, and while it was possible it was just some student who got scared by the Shack, she wasn’t about to take chances. It took her a couple of minutes checking the nearby abandoned houses before she heard voices and rushed inside. When she got into the house, she saw a little girl, covered in blood, being forcibly held down by two teenagers, one of whom appeared to be sewing stitches into her leg, and came to the perfectly reasonable conclusion that they were torturing the poor child.

“What the hell are you doing?!” Savage cried. “ _Stupefy_!”

“ _Contego_!”

Her Stunner exploded off the boy’s Simple Block Charm so that he took the brunt of it and was knocked on his arse, delirious. Both girls screamed. Savage was about to cast again, but the boy’s defence bought a few precious seconds for her to get a good look at his face. “Harry Potter?” she said.

But the older girl was already yelling, “Hey! We’re not hurting her! We’re trying to save her life! They do this all the time in the muggle world.”

“What—?”

“She’s been bitten by Greyback. She needs a Healer now!”

“Greyback—oh, Merlin! But what are you—?”

“It’s called a suture,” the bushy-haired girl said. “It’s how muggles do it.”

Unlike some of her colleagues she could name, Lutetia Savage _did_ stop and think before she acted when she had the time to do it. Amelia Bones had ordered a refresher course on werewolves for the entire DMLE when Greyback had returned. She remembered how werewolf bites were very hard to close and as a result often led to the victim bleeding to death. The little girl had a nasty bite on her leg, but with the older one—Granger, she remembered—Potter’s adoptive sister— _sewing_ the skin back together…It was downright barbaric, but it had mostly stopped the bleeding.

“Okay,” she said, making a snap decision. “Stay with her. I’ll get a Healer.” _And I just hexed Harry Potter,_ she thought to herself. _Lovely._

It was a much shorter time before Auror Savage returned with the two Healers who had been sent to Hogsmeade that morning to deal with any injuries that were found. They had hoped that the lack of report meant there had been no attacks last night, but they were dismayed to find they were wrong.

“What happened?” one of the pair said as he rushed to Demelza’s side. Harry, who was dizzily picking himself off the floor, recognised him as Cousin Andi’s friend, Hippocrates Smethwyck.

“Greyback happened,” Hermione said. “We tried to help her—”

“What did you do?” Smethwyck said.

“Stitches—muggle technique. It was the only way to stop the bleeding.”

“That thread’s transfigured,” Harry added, rubbing his head. “You’ll need to pull it out within a couple hours.”

“And what happened to you, Mr. Potter?”

“I…kind of stunned him,” Auror Savage said. “There was a misunderstanding.”

The other Healer waved her wand over Harry, but he pushed her away. “I’m fine,” he said.

“Did either of you touch the blood?” Smethwyck asked.

“I didn’t,” Hermione said.

“A little, but I cleaned it off right away,” Harry said.

“Okay, you should be fine, then. ID on the kid?”

“Demelza Robins, age 10,” Harry told him.

“Okay. You’re going to be okay, Demelza. Auror, we can take it from here. See if you can find her parents.”

“Got it.”

“Auror,” Harry stopped her, “I didn’t get your name.”

The Auror stopped worriedly. It was said casually, but that was still the kind of thing people said before they filed a complaint, and stunning the Boy-Who-Lived wouldn’t look good on her record, but policy said she had to answer. “Lutetia Savage, Mr. Potter,” she said.

“Thank you for your help, Auror Savage,” Harry said. “I’ll be sure to let Director Bones you did a good job.”

Lutetia Savage left the abandoned house feeling relieved, but very confused.

* * *

Harry and Hermione were both feeling very tired and drained by the time they made their way to the Three Broomsticks to meet Neville. The Aurors had needed to get a statement from them after Demelza was taken to St. Mungo’s, and people had quickly caught on that something was happening. They were staring and whispering at them again, mostly about what they thought Harry’s latest feat was.

“I hope Demelza will be okay,” Hermione said quietly. “She looked pretty distraught.”

“I think she will be,” Harry replied. “I’ll talk to Dumbledore about her and ask Moony to pay her a visit. I don’t think there’ll be any problems by next year.”

“Well, I’m just glad that Auror understood the suture thing, even if she did stun you. That could’ve turned bad if she didn’t.”

“I’m actually glad her reactions were that quick. Like I said, it shows she’s good at her job. It must have looked pretty bad when she came in there.”

Hermione frowned. “I suppose so,” she said. “To think Greyback got that close to the castle.”

“Yeah, I should’ve known,” Harry grumbled. “Something bad always seems to happen on Halloween.”

“Coincidence, Harry,” she said dismissively. “We don’t even know for sure that the attack happened on Halloween day. It might’ve been before midnight.”

By the time they got to the Three Broomsticks, Neville and Maxwell Barnett were both waiting there for them.

“Harry, what happened?” Neville said worriedly. “People are saying all kinds of things about you—something about saving a kid?”

“We found a girl who’d been bitten by Greyback, and we helped her,” Harry said. “I’d rather not spread her name around.”

“More than that,” Hermione said. “Harry found her with his feline ears. She’d probably be dead if he hadn’t.”

Neville and Barnett each gave the other a very worried glance.

“It’s okay; he knows,” Harry said, directed at both of them.

“Oh,” Neville said.

“I was just explaining my position in magical and muggle society to Mr. Longbottom,” Barnett said. “As Lord Potter’s Occlumency teacher, I of course know all of his secrets. Lord Potter, is this why you asked your friend to learn Occlumency.”

“No, Mr. Barnett, it was that other secret we discussed,” he replied. “I think it may be relevant to him.”

Mr. Barnett’s eyes widened a fraction. “Very well,” he said formally. “Mr. Longbottom, if you are ready, I would like to evaluate your natural aptitude for Occlumency first…”

It took a few minutes of poking and prodding at Neville’s mind for Mr. Barnett to reach his conclusions. By the end of it, Neville looked dazed and rather uncomfortable.

“It’s okay, Neville,” Hermione said, patting him on the shoulder. “It can be pretty difficult the first time.”

“Hmm…very interesting, Mr. Longbottom,” Barnett said at last.

“Wh-what’s interesting, sir?” Neville said.

“You seem to be under the impression that you have a very poor memory.”

“But I do. I’m always forgetting things.”

“Ah, but forgetting things doesn’t necessarily mean you have a poor memory. I think that what you’re actually suffering from is absent-mindedness.”

“What’s the difference?”

“I saw your Herbology grades, Mr. Longbottom. They’re very good.”

“I guess so,” Neville said.

“He’s right,” Harry told him, “you’re beating _me_ in Herbology, and I’m not making it easy for you.”

“Exactly,” Barnett said. “You have a deep passion for herbology, Mr. Longbottom—so deep that perhaps you haven’t even noticed that the study of herbology requires a lot of memorisation.”

“It does?” Neville said in surprise. “Well…yeah, now that you mention it, I guess it does. I can’t believe I never noticed that before.”

“You see, for the things that excite you, you have a very good memory, and that is a starting point you can use for Occlumency. Focus on reciting lists of plants in your mind, and their properties, and anything else you need to know for that class, and that will be a good first step to shutting intruders out of your mind.”

* * *

Mr. Barnett worked Neville through some basic techniques to practice his Occlumency and scheduled some intensive training sessions over Christmas holidays. The rest of the day went well, and with some encouragement from Neville and Hermione, Harry decided he’d go along with them to the Halloween Feast.

At home, the Grangers had always celebrated Halloween normally and visited Harry’s birth parents’ graves on the Sunday afterwards. Last year, Harry had visited by proxy on Halloween night thanks to Sirius’s communication mirror, but that had only worked because everyone gave the Lord Black a wide berth. This year, Halloween fell on a Sunday, and Sirius’s communication mirror was smashed, so they had to compromise. Dan and Emma would visit Godric’s Hollow tomorrow night with their own communication mirror that was paired with Hermione’s.

Meanwhile, Professor Dumbledore himself was there to greet them when they got back to the castle, back from his trip to Switzerland. “I thought that you would like to know that Demelza Robins is doing well in St. Mungo’s,” he told them. “Unfortunately, the Healers may not be able to fully repair her leg, but she will otherwise make a full recovery, aside from her unfortunate condition.”

“I guess that’s good to hear, Professor,” Harry said. “I assume there won’t be any trouble with her coming here next year?”

“I see no reason to think so in our current position, Harry,” the Headmaster said. “Both of you deserve praise for your actions. Healer Smethwyck said that you almost certainly saved Miss Robins’s life with your muggle techniques. I think fifty points to Gryffindor are in order for this act of heroism and quick-thinking.”

“Thank you, sir,” Hermione and Harry both grinned.

For tonight, Harry was feeling good enough to celebrate, even though his stomach was still sour from that morning. The Great Hall was as festive as ever with hovering pumpkins, live bats, and orange streamers. However, there was an unexpected addition to the decorations as a parliament of owls winged its way into the Hall and began dropping newspapers on the tables. Harry tensed up. The paper only came out in the evening for a special edition. His worst fears were confirmed when he saw the headline.

“Double bugger!”

 

_The Evening Prophet_

_31 October 1993_

_HARRY POTTER CONSORTING WITH KNOWN WEREWOLF!_

_Potter Family Friend Remus Lupin Exposed_

_By Rita Skeeter_

And that was only the front page. When he looked at the back side, it got even worse:

 

_POTTER AND GRANGER SAVE LIFE OF GIRL BITTEN BY GREYBACK!_

_10-Year-Old Demelza Robins Found by Potter in Hogsmeade this Morning_

_By Rita Skeeter_

 

“That bitch!” Harry yelled. “If I ever get my hands on her—!”

“ _Harry_!” Hermione scolded.

Harry looked up and realised that he had accidentally set the roast beef on fire. He quickly tamped down his magic and put out the flames.

“Sorry,” he muttered. “But why’d she have to go and out Demelza like that? She didn’t do anything wrong.”

“Well, neither did Remus, if you recall,” Hermione said dryly. “He even declined that teaching post because he was afraid he’d be outed.”

“Remus has enemies, though,” Harry said. “I don’t like it, but he worked with Dumbledore. He knows people are out to get him. But Demelza’s innocent. Her only crime was getting caught in one of Skeeter’s stupid stories. There’s no reason to print her name. No muggle paper would ever do that to a kid.”

“She’s a gossip columnist, Harry,” Hermione tried to calm him. “It’s what she does.”

“Well, she needs to be stopped,” he growled, looking back over the first article. “Look at this.”

 

_Lord Lucius Malfoy, head of the Conservative faction of the Wizengamot had this to say:_ _“That Dumbledore, the supposed “leader of the light,” would knowingly allow a highly-dangerous dark creature to attend Hogwarts for seven years, much less to become a prefect, is proof positive of his recklessness regarding our children’s safety. The disastrous Chamber of Secrets debacle last year only cements this conclusion further. Moreover, such a move smacks of hypocrisy when viewed alongside Dumbledore’s longstanding opposition to the use of dark magic and other dark creatures such as dementors. I call on both the Wizengamot and the Hogwarts Board of Governors to ensure that such reckless acts are not repeated in the future.”_

“You see?” Harry said. “You know they’re gonna try to keep Demelza out of Hogwarts, now. I am _not_ gonna have that woman make me a liar.”

“Harry, don’t do anything stupid,” Hermione pleaded.

“Who’s doing anything stupid?” he said. “I’m gonna write Sirius and ask him to contact his solicitor for her.”

“Oh…that’s okay, then…You know he’s gonna have his hands full with Remus, though.”

“So he can ask for a two-for-one deal.”

They ate in silence for a while. After the roast beef incident, no one dared ask Harry directly about the story. Even Ron wasn’t foolhardy enough to bring it up, but from the way his friends were talking about it, the whispers quickly got around the Hall that the stories were probably true. The second article _did_ paint the two siblings as real heroes for saving Demelza, and they silently thanked God that Skeeter didn’t seem to have found out about Harry’s animagus ability, but that was small consolation, especially as she speculated about Harry having a “special affinity” to werewolves.

“You know what the most important question is, though?” Hermione said.

“What?”

“How did Rita Skeeter find out all that stuff in the first place?”

That gave Harry some pause. “Which story?” he asked.

“Both of them.”

“I don’t know…” The part about Demelza was the easier one. “I don’t know. This is pretty flowery, but it reads like she had access to our statement to the Aurors. I can’t imagine how she got it, though. Investigations are supposed to be sealed, aren’t they?”

“Yes, definitely, even in the magical world.”

“Right. I don’t get how she even could have got her name. We didn’t tell anyone, and the only other people who knew were the Aurors and Healers, Dumbledore, and her parents…oh, Merlin, she probably thinks _I_ blabbed it!”

“I doubt that,” Hermione said. “Everyone knows you wouldn’t out Remus like that.”

“No, _we_ know that. Nobody else does. The Page 2 article looks like I could’ve given the statement.”

“But you wouldn’t do that—”

“But everybody else thinks I’m a celebrity, Hermione! Who knows what they think I’d tell? Or maybe they’ll think I told Ron or you told Lavender or somebody, and they blabbed it.”

“Excuse me,” Lavender interrupted from down the table.

“Oi, I’m right here,” Ron added.

“Don’t mind him,” Hermione said. “Harry’s a little perturbed right now. You’re worrying too much. Just write Demelza a letter and tell her what happened.”

Harry stopped and sighed: “Yeah, I guess I can.”

“What worries me more is how Skeeter pulled one over on Remus,” Hermione said. “He’s been keeping his secret for decades and never had any trouble.”

“He’s registered, though, isn’t he? Maybe she bribed someone in the Werewolf Registration Office.”

“Hmm…could be…but that would mean she was specifically looking for it.”

“Why not?” Harry said. “It’s the political issue of the year. I’m sure somebody paid good money for this information. Come on, Mione, I’ve got letters to write.”

They left the feast early so that Harry could get to work, but apparently not early enough because Draco Malfoy still managed to find them.

“So it’s true, then?” the Slytherin said. “Harry Potter, friend of werewolves?”

Harry bristled at once, and Hermione gripped his arm, fearing he would go off and do something he regretted. But he kept his wits about him. “Remus Lupin was a good friend of my father’s, Malfoy,” he said, “and I’d take him over any of _your_ father’s friends any day.”

“Clearly, Potter. Just like Dumbledore, the both of you, letting any nasty creatures hang out wherever they want.”

“Don’t call Remus a nasty creature.”

“Oh, really, Potter? Got a soft spot for things that want to eat your face, do you? Oh, of course, you’re friends with Hagrid and all his “pets,” too. I forgot.”

“Keep talking, Malfoy. I already beat your little attack dog in a duel. Do you wanna have a go, too?”

“Harry, don’t,” Hermione hissed.

“Better listen to your sister,” Malfoy said. “I’m just trying to keep this school and wizarding Britain safe for the law-abiding public.”

“Law abiding public my—ow!” Hermione elbowed Harry in the side. He took a deep breath and switched gears: “Don’t you think you’ve done enough damage already? Don’t tell me the article about Remus doesn’t have your father’s fingerprints all over it.”

“So what if it does, Potter?” Malfoy replied smugly. “Where I come from, we call that ‘responsible journalism’.”

Harry seethed. And angry wave of magic poured off him strongly enough that he was surprised Malfoy stood his ground. “And was it responsible journalism to print Demelza’s name?” he snapped. “If I find out you had anything to do with—”

“I don’t know where she got the kid’s name,” Malfoy cut him off, “but I’m not sorry she did. You can’t seriously think anyone would allow _another_ werewolf in this school, especially after Dumbledore covered up the first one.”

That was too much for Harry. He lunged at Malfoy, but Hermione still had a grip on him. “Harry, this isn’t the time or the place,” she told him.

He tried to pull away, but his sister had had years to get used to dealing with him, and she kept her grip. Finally, he snarled, “I’d really like to duel you and have done with it, Malfoy, but I guess I’ll have to settle for beating you on the Quidditch pitch—again.”

“You can try, Potter.”

* * *

_Dear Demelza and Mr. and Mrs. Robins,_

_First off, I swear to you that I had nothing to do with the articles in the paper tonight. I don_ _’t know how Rita Skeeter got your name, but it wasn’t from me. That woman’s already screwed me over enough times that I’d never deal with her._

_I_ _’m well aware of the fact that, given my fame, my being involved in your ordeal probably drew the public attention to you, and for that I apologise. I have contacted a solicitor to see if the Daily Prophet has done anything actionable with regard to either story._

_I know this must be a very difficult time for you, but I_ _’m confident that you can overcome it. Lycanthropy isn’t as difficult to live with as it used to be, and many people with the disease can live mostly normal lives. I’ve asked Remus Lupin, whom you’ll have heard about by now, to come talk to you and help you out. I’m sure he’ll be in a bad mood for the next few days, but he’s a very nice person when he has someone to give him a kick in the pants once in a while._

_Finally, I promise you, Demelza, that I will find a way for you to go to school, if not at Hogwarts, then somewhere else. I have friends in France, Canada, and Egypt, and I can easily make connections elsewhere. I_ _’m not going to let bigotry and paranoia hold anyone back if I have anything to say about it._

_Stay strong for me, Demelza. It_ _’s going to work out in the end._

_Sincerely,_

_Lord Harry James Potter_


	70. Quidditch and a Hailstorm

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The world is dark and JK Rowling is precious. Come closer, dear reader. You must trust me. I am telling you a story.

“Look, Harry, I get how you wanna be fair to everybody, but I didn’t think you’d actually make _friends_ with werewolves,” Ron said.

“Why not, Ron?” Harry demanded. “What’s wrong with them?”

“Well, they’re dangerous, you know? They’re violent criminals. They don’t work; they cause trouble all the time. And they’re all wild and live out in the woods and stuff.”

“Not all werewolves are bad,” Harry said indignantly. “Remus is a perfectly respectable wizard. He’s an upstanding member of society, and the only reason he doesn’t have a job besides managing Sirius’s estate is that no one else will give him one. He’s smart, too. Remus is the one who taught Hermione and me to duel. Remember what I did to Theo Nott last year?”

“You got that from him?” Ron said in surprise. “Well, maybe he’s okay,” he conceded, “but there’s a reason no one wants to hire werewolves. I mean, just look at Greyback.”

“Greyback?” Harry bristled. “Greyback’s a monster, but most other werewolves aren’t. Whose fault is it they have a reputation for being dangerous, unemployed troublemakers? Ordinary wizards are the ones who make them outcasts from society. They’re the ones who spread the myth that werewolves are dangerous any time of the month when every thinking person knows it’s only on the full moon. They’d cause a lot less trouble if we treated them like people instead of monsters. Your dad understands that. That’s why he’s helping us. Maybe you should listen to him more.”

Ron drew back under Harry’s rant. “Whoa, easy, mate,” he said. “I didn’t know it was that important.”

“Remus is a good friend of ours,” Hermione said, trying to calm Harry down. “We don’t want to see him treated unfairly, and it’s not hard to say that about all werewolves, too.”

“He’s more than that,” Harry said more quietly. “He was my birth parents’ friend, too. My dad figured out his secret in second year and stood by him the whole time when he could’ve had him expelled anytime he wanted. I’m following them doing this, just as much as I’m fighting for justice.”

“Wow. I…I’m sorry, Harry. I didn’t know. It’s just, a lot of people aren’t gonna like how you’re sticking up for werewolves like this.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t care. That’s their own problem. Do you have a problem with this, Ginny?” Harry said sharply.

Ginny quailed under his gaze. “I…I don’t know…” she said. “I mean, werewolves are scary—or—or Greyback is really scary,” she added quickly. “But, I mean, I get that they’re victims, and they don’t have a choice in all this stuff, so I guess it’s not really fair making things harder for them.”

“Yes, that’s what we’re thinking,” Hermione agreed before Harry could say anything else. “We want the law to keep people safe, but also to be fairer—and if we can make that happen, probably fewer werewolves would support Greyback, too.”

“Huh, I hadn’t thought about it that way,” Ginny said.

“I guess it kinda makes sense,” Ron admitted. “I dunno how other people are gonna like it, though.”

“Well, just think about it,” Hermione said. “Maybe write your dad. He can probably explain it more.”

It wasn’t a complete victory, but Harry and Hermione hoped the Weasleys would come around before too long—if only Harry could stay civil about the matter.

* * *

“Come on, Wolfie, don’t you dare shut me out.”

“I’m trying to do the right thing by you, Nymphadora,” Remus called wearily through his bedroom door.

“Oh, _that_ _’s it_!” Dora snarled, casting hexes at the barrier. “When I get through this door, you are so gonna get it.”

“Nymphadora, be reasonable,” Remus said. “It’s never going to work between us.”

“You don’t know that, Remus. You can’t say that when we haven’t even tried. For Merlin’s sake, I’m not asking for a ring. I’m only angling for a date. I thought I already made it clear I don’t care about your condition.”

“But other people do,” he snapped. “With the new law, you’d be lucky to keep your job if you associate with me, even if we’re just dating. I’m not going to do that to you.”

“Well, that new law’s not law yet,” she said. “And it’s my choice isn’t it? Look, maybe it’ll work out between us, and maybe it won’t, but I’ll be damned if I let some stupid prejudice decide for us—”

She was interrupted by Sirius putting a hand on her shoulder. “Dora, Dora,” he said, trying to calm her down, “I appreciate what you’re trying to do, but I don’t think this is the time. Moony’s just had a big shock. He’s never had to deal with the public before. And I’ve got a mess on my hands with him _and_ my godchildren. Try talking to him in a few more days when he’s being sensible again.”

Dora sighed. “Alright, alright,” she said. “I’ll leave him alone for now. But I’ll be back. Someone’s gotta give him a kick in the drawers sometime.”

* * *

_Dear Harry and Hermione,_

_It_ _’s good to hear from you. I never got a chance to thank you for stopping the Heir of Slytherin last year. Even though I’m not there anymore, it’s good to know all the other muggle-borns back there are safe. I know I could have come back to Hogwarts this year, but honestly, I just love it so much here at Athabasca. (Plus my parents wouldn’t have appreciated having Greyback roaming around.) I’m learning all sorts of First Nations magic here, and I have friends from as far away as South America. The campus is really beautiful, too. It’s a lot like Hogwarts, but more on a river than on a lake, with waterfalls everywhere._

_I heard about that poor girl from the paper today—it was really an article about you, Harry. Sorry, but they follow you pretty much worldwide. Good job on saving her, though. I talked to the Headmaster here about whether we could take a werewolf student. He said it might be possible, but it would be a hard sell with the Board. He suggested that you might have more luck with the schools in the United States. The U.S. is more dedicated to equality among magicals than most other countries. I_ _’m sorry I can’t be of more help, but that’s all I have._

_Your friend,_

_Sally-Anne Perks_

* * *

_Dear Mr. Potter,_

_We appreciate your request. It is true that Beauxbatons is where the greatest number of nonhuman students go in Europe, and they are more accommodating of students with special needs, like veela, hags, and even vampires. Unfortunately, the inclusion of vampires has long been controversial here, and the prejudice against werewolves is even worse. It_ _’s unfortunate, but we’ve understood how to control vampires a lot longer than werewolves. We can talk to Madame Maxime, but I don’t think you’ll have much better luck here than you will in Britain, especially if Hogwarts has already done it. Good luck._

_Sincerely,_

_The Delacours_

* * *

Despite his difficulties, Harry felt a lot calmer by the day the Quidditch match came. However, the weather was not agreeing with him. The good thing was that the Slytherins were feeling even more uncomfortable as the weather worsened. There was even a rumour they were trying to switch with Hufflepuff in the schedule to avoid it, but nothing came of that.

However, the day of the match looked downright dangerous as a massive autumn storm rolled through Scotland. The school wards would block the lightning, but the wind and the rain were some of the worst conditions Harry had ever flown in and reminded him of the great storm that had trashed the Granger’s neighbourhood in 1987.

He was about to head down to the pitch when he was stopped at the door by a Ravenclaw girl of Chinese ancestry whom he knew by face but couldn’t recall by name. Whoever she was, he was quite sure she hadn’t been that pretty last year.

“Hello, Harry,” the girl said.

Harry was surprised when her voice came out with a thick Scottish accent—not that he had any problem with it, but it seemed out of place. It took him a moment to register what she had said to him. “Erm, hi,” he replied awkwardly.

“I’m Cho Chang, the new Ravenclaw Seeker,” the girl replied.

“Oh. Pleased to meet you.”

“I just wanted to say, I hope you beat Malfoy out there. He’s been a git to all the teams.”

Harry flashed a predatory grin: “Oh, don’t worry, I will. He’s got it coming after insulting my friends.”

Cho Chang smiled very prettily at him, and said, “Thanks, Harry,” which nearly made him stumble, but he walked with confidence out to the pitch, despite his feline side protesting the pounding rain.

When the two teams lined up on the pitch, with Harry facing Malfoy, neither of them spoke. They just glared at each other. Harry was reminded of an old-fashioned showdown in a spaghetti western.

Harry glared at Malfoy.

Malfoy glared at Harry.

Harry reached up and wiped the rain from his glasses so he could see straight.

He glared some more.

Malfoy glared some more.

Harry reached up and wiped off his glasses again.

Malfoy smirked at him.

Harry pulled his glasses off his face, held them tight in his hands, and wandlessly cast “ _Impervius_.” When he put them back on his face, he smirked back at Malfoy.

Malfoy scowled.

Then, the whistle sounded, and they were off. It was Quidditch at its worst. Even with his charmed glasses, Harry could barely see the other players through the rain, nor could he hear the commentary over the wind. In five minutes, the rain soaked through all his layers of clothes, and hypothermia became a real danger in the cold, and he cursed himself for not trying to _Impervius_ his robes, too. In ten minutes, he couldn’t say with certainty what the score was, and by fifteen, he no longer cared. All he wanted to do was find the Snitch as soon as possible and beat Malfoy.

Malfoy wasn’t faring much better. The storm was so bad that he didn’t even have a chance to taunt Harry. His only thought was also finishing the game as fast as possible.

When the lightning started, if it was possible, the storm grew even worse—the clouds thicker and the scene darker, despite being near midday. They would have to be very lucky to see the Snitch in these conditions, and at the rate things were going they could be all the way into the evening before the storm lifted, which would mean hours of flailing in the darkness until they could see again.

This couldn’t go on like this. Harry strained his eyes, searching desperately for the slightest glint of gold, wishing with all his might that he could see better.

Suddenly, he could! He couldn’t believe it. The whole scene looked much brighter now, and he could see everything in the near-darkness, almost like— _No!_ He stopped himself as soon as he made the connection, leaving the implications till later. He wasn’t so desperate as to cheat. He was going to win this fair and square.

Both Seekers flew the length of the pitch again and again, searching for what felt like hours, then after one pass when they found themselves at opposite ends of the pitch, the Snitch made its appearance right in the middle. Harry and Malfoy saw it at the same time. They bolted for it, but the Snitch would not be caught so easily. It swerved not right or left, but straight up, and they both pulled up to follow it.

The Snitch climbed and climbed. Soon, they were three hundred feet in the air and still climbing. It must be malfunctioning, Harry thought. It wasn’t supposed to go that high, but they still climbed after it as they circled around each other. Faster and faster they flew, faster than the brooms were supposed to be able to climb, and the Snitch was still outstripping them. Harry noticed that they had a massive tailwind. They seemed to be caught in an updraught. Higher they flew and still higher. They must be over a thousand feet up by now.

Suddenly, the air grew rapidly colder, but still they climbed, hundreds of feet more. Finally, the Snitch slowed as they lost the tailwind, and they were bombarded with sleet as an icy wind blew down from above.

“Almost there…” Harry groaned, reaching out his hand.

“I’ll get you, Potter!” Malfoy called.

They circled around each other tighter and tighter as they climbed, closer and closer to the Snitch—five feet, three feet, one foot. They grasped with their hands over their heads…

Harry caught it!

Both Seekers back-flipped away from each other and levelled out their brooms, Malfoy uttering some most uncouth words.

But Harry didn’t take the time to gloat. His feline sixth sense was tingling. When he checked his bearings, he saw they must be half a mile above the pitch. At least the enchantments to keep the Snitch within the boundaries had worked, but he couldn’t believe the storm had blown them that far up. All this he noticed in a split second as the sleet intensified. Then, he remembered something he’d learnt long ago in muggle school—something about how thunderstorms worked.

“Hail!” he yelled.

“I will not hail you, Scarhead!” Malfoy yelled back.

Harry pointed above his head and yelled, “Not hail _me!_ _HAAAIL_!”

_Pat. Pat. Patter patter patter. Thunk thunk!_

“ _HAIL_!” Malfoy yelled obviously.

Both boys dove, but the hailstones were hot on their heels. Neither of them had ever dived from anywhere near this height before. They had room to push their brooms to impossible diving speeds, but they wouldn’t know when to pull up. Too early, and the hail could strike and damage their brooms while they were still a hundred feet up. Too late would obviously be worse.

But they had to get away. They turned straight down and sped up until the hailstones hung motionless before their faces, then fell away behind them. The ground rushed up at a terrifying speed. Harry felt like they were caught in a gargantuan press, between the hammer of the descending hailstorm above and the anvil of the earth below. His eyes adjusted themselves again of their own accord so that he could see more clearly how far he had to go and pull up at the right moment.

Malfoy pulled up first, levelling his broom and desperately trying to slow down behind Harry. Harry, with his keener sense of distance and timing, waited longer, but only a second, before he pulled up, too. He tried to shield himself wandlessly from the hail, but his defensive spells couldn’t stand up to that kind of force.

_Thunk. Crackle. Crack!_

The hailstones struck painfully against his back and head, and worse, his broom’s tail. He began losing control at once as the bristles started to break, wobbling and bleeding altitude fast. Automatically, he looked around and spotted Malfoy, spiralling down and down on a broom that looked ready to shake him off.

Harry angled his broom, coaxing as much altitude from it as he could, and made straight for Malfoy. He’d need a free hand for this. Safely stowing the Snitch as quick as he could, he reached out and grabbed the end of Malfoy’s broom handle. Malfoy look disgusted, but he was no dummy. He grabbed the front of Harry’s broom handle, too. Even damaged, two brooms made a more stable platform. And they were able to steady themselves and descend at a safe pace for the moment. The hail was still falling, though. They hunched their shoulders and prayed they could make it to ground before things got any worse.

Their horrified teammates realised what was happening and converged on the Seekers at once. They would need to get to ground too within a few seconds. Anti-Lightning Wards were one thing, but deflecting hail was a lot harder, and it was one of the few things that could derail a match outright. Forming an impromptu human chain of broomsticks, they hit the mud hard, where the older players could shield them properly.

* * *

At Twelve Grimmauld Place in London, and at the Tonks residence, and at the Grangers’ house in Crawley, Harry’s family huddled around the radio worriedly listening to Lee Jordan’s commentary on the Wizarding Wireless.

“I’m sorry, I can’t see anything that’s going on now,” he said. “Gryffindor has the Quaffle—I think. I don’t know where the Bludgers are. Hang on, I see something. Up there! It’s the Seekers! They’re coming down. Oh, Merlin, I’ve never seen anyone dive that fast. That could be one for the record books. Pull up! Pull up!”

Sitting in their living room, Dan and Emma Granger held each other closer on the sofa. Listening to Harry’s matches was always nerve-wracking, but this—they shouldn’t be playing in that weather in the first place.

“Malfoy pulls up! Potter pulls up! Something’s wrong. Their brooms are shaking—oh, bugger, _hail_!”

“Oh, bugger,” Sirius Black repeated. As a former Beater, he knew how bad that could be.

“Potter’s circling. He’s moving. He…he grabs Malfoy’s broom? Yes, they’re descending safely…Both teams are latching on…Almost there…Phew, they’re all on the ground.”

“Thank Merlin, that’s a relief,” Andromeda Tonks said.

“Oh, thank God. Remind me why we let them play that game again,” Emma Granger said.

“It figures Harry would go and help the Malfoy kid,” Remus Lupin said.

“Yeah, that sounds like Harry,” Sirius replied. “But who won?”

* * *

“Did you get it?” Marcus Flint demanded.

“Which one of you got the Snitch?” asked Wood.

Harry spat the Snitch out of his mouth and held it up for the crowd to see.

A roar of applause rose up from the stands. In a rare event, all four houses were cheering. Ginny Weasley and Colin Creevey, who had been standing side by side with twin white-knuckled grips on the railing, hugged each other and jumped up and down before quickly breaking apart, blushing. Cho Chang screamed with delight and whistled at Harry. The third year Hufflepuffs stood agape at their classmate’s flying skills. Even some of the Slytherins were cheering, though mostly because they just wanted to get in out of the storm. The Slytherin team looked unhappy, but hardly anybody else did, and Malfoy didn’t even taunt Harry for his weirdness in holding onto the Snitch with his teeth. Of course, that was partly because he was busy getting chewed out by Flint for losing.

They had just made it off the pitch when Harry was blindsided as a brown-haired missile slammed into him. His sister hugged him till he nearly fell over and then promptly punched him in the arm.

“Harry James Potter! Don’t scare me like that!” Hermione yelled over the pouring rain. “What were you thinking diving like that?”

“I was thinking, ‘Outrun the hail.’ It didn’t work so well.” He held up the tail end of his _Nimbus Two Thousand_ to inspect it. It was a tangle of bent and broken twigs, and there were many nicks in the handle, too. “Aw, man, we’ll have to send it in to the company to get _that_ fixed.”

“Pfft. Honestly, Potter, can’t you just buy a new one?” Malfoy had come to his senses enough to be annoying again. “I thought you were rich.”

“I’m _responsible_ with my money, Malfoy,” Harry replied, “but don’t worry. I’ll be ready to win again next time.”

“Harry, are _you_ okay?” Hermione asked. “You must’ve got banged up as much as the broom.”

“I’m fine— _OW_!” She slapped him lightly on the back.

“That’s it, Hospital Wing, all of you,” Madam Hooch said. “Get checked over. Chop chop.”

Walking under the Shield Charms of the older students and professors until the hail let up, they trudged back to the Hospital Wing. Madam Pomfrey checked over both teams, but only Harry and Malfoy had any injuries bad enough not to just send them on their way. Once the adrenaline wore off, Harry notice that some of his bruises were actually pretty nasty, but they were fixed up quickly, and soon, he, Hermione, Malfoy, and his admirer, Pansy Parkinson, were the only ones in the Hospital Wing, but Malfoy spare no time for the Slytherin girl.

“Pansy, could you give me a minute, please?” he said. “I’d like a word with Mr. Potter alone.” Pansy stood up and eyed Harry suspiciously, but she left. “Granger, do you mind?” he added.

“Anything you say to me you can say to Hermione, too, _Mr._ Malfoy,” Harry told him.

“Fine, _Mr._ Potter. So spill. Why’d you do it?”

“Excuse me?”

“You didn’t have to warn me about the hail, however it was you knew it was coming. And you would’ve been safer grabbing anyone else’s broom but mine. Why’d you help me?”

Harry stared at the blond Slytherin in surprise. He hadn’t seen it as a choice. He couldn’t stand Malfoy as a person, but he had no interest in seeing him die. In the heat of the moment, not warning him or going for anyone else’s broom never even crossed his mind.

Even Hermione was a little surprised. Of course, she would try to save someone who was in trouble herself, but she was surprised to see her brother go out of his way for someone like Malfoy. “Harry, I think you have a saving people thing,” she said.

Harry smirked. “Yeah, that’s it. What can I say? I have a saving people thing.”

“You know, Mr. Malfoy,” Hermione realised with a grin, “if Harry saved you from a hailstorm on a broom when he didn’t have to, does that count as a life debt?”

A flicker of horror crossed Malfoy’s face, and he was silent for several seconds longer than seemed strictly necessary. But then, he sneered and said, “As if, Granger. I could’ve made it down on my own.”

“Whatever you say, Malfoy,” Harry replied. “Whatever you say.”

* * *

A little while later, as Harry and Hermione were climbing back up to Gryffindor Tower, they were met by a certain Scottish Ravenclaw a second time.

“Congratulations, Harry,” Cho said. “That was some amazing flying. I didn’t know a _Nimbus_ could do that.”

“It can’t,” Harry said firmly. “Not unless you make a habit of flying in a hurricane. It was exhilarating, really—but terrifying. I wouldn’t try it again.”

“Wow. Still, I think I’ve got my work cut out for me before the final,” she said.

“Oh, definitely,” Harry grinned. “Don’t expect me to go easy on you, Miss Chang.”

“Don’t worry. I won’t, Mr. Potter. But thanks for beating Malfoy for me.”

“It was my pleasure, Miss Chang.” Harry tipped an imaginary hat, and he went on his way.

He and Hermione were almost to the portrait of the Fat Lady when he stopped short. “Mione, you go get your mirror and tell Mum and Dad I’m alright, but there’s something I need to tell you first. Something happened during the match.”

“What? What do you mean, something happened?”

“Here, look close.” He took his glasses off so she could see better. “Look at my eyes.”

She looked, not sure what she was supposed to see, but then, as she watched, his eyes changed. The emerald irises grew to completely cover the whites, and the pupils changed from circles to vertical lens shapes—his cat eyes.

And then Hermione realised _why_ they must have changed. “ _Harry_!” she hissed. “If you cheated out there—”

“Of course not! I changed them back as soon as I figured out what happened.”

“Oh. But how is that possible?”

“I don’t know. I’ve been trying to do that for four years, and it’s never worked until now. I guess it’s like when I first changed. I was desperate enough that it just happened. Just let Mum and Dad know, and they can ask Sirius about it.”

“Sure…” Hermione said.

They entered the Common Room and joined the party. Winning the match had been mostly luck, but they were celebrating just the same. Hermione soon extricated herself for a quick trip up to her dorm. Unfortunately, that left Harry at the mercy of Romilda Vane.

“Harry, that was incredible flying!” the hyper little first-year said, her black curls bouncing. “I thought you were gonna crash, but then I thought, no you’re not. You’re Harry Potter!”

“Well, er, it wasn’t easy,” Harry said. _Please hurry up, Mione,_ he thought.


	71. The Fight in the Press

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Courage of the heart is very rare. JK Rowling has a power when it’s there.
> 
> Part of this chapter is quoted from Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

_“He dove_ how _far? In_ vhat _veather? I think this Harry Potter vill be one to vatch._ _”_

_“But he’s only fourteen, Viktor.”_

_“Da, but that vill put him in same place I am now for 1998 Vorld Cup.”_

* * *

“Very impressive flying this weekend, Mr. Potter,” Professor McGonagall said on Monday. “I confess I was quite worried about you for a time, but you pulled it off wonderfully.”

“Thanks, Professor,” Harry said. “But there’s something I need to show you, and no, I didn’t use it to cheat.” He leaned closer to her and changed his eyes to cat’s eyes.

McGonagall sputtered in shock. “Mr. Potter,” she said, “that is extremely difficult magic.”

“It is?” Harry said.

“Yes, of course it is. Any state between fully human and fully animal is naturally unstable. That’s why it is so difficult to learn the transformation in the first place. When you perform a partial transformation, your magic is always trying to push you back to human form until you manage to go fully animal. How on earth did you manage to change just your eyes?”

“I was hoping you could tell me, ma’am. I just focused really hard on wanting to be able to see in the rain. D’you think it could have anything to do with how I became an animagus with accidental magic, Professor?”

“I don’t see what else it could be, but I couldn’t say for certain. Once again you have exceeded my expertise, Mr. Potter.”

* * *

Harry’s and Hermione’s sessions with Professor Dumbledore resumed the following weekend, and after some brief pleasantries, the Headmaster got down to business and showed them the next memory in his collection. After graduating from Hogwarts and being turned down for a teaching job, it seemed, the young Tom Riddle started working for Caractacus Burke, the very man who he must have blamed in part for his mother’s death, but Voldemort wasn’t above working with unsavoury types to get what he wanted, so long as he could still hurt them later.

“I collected this memory from an old house-elf named Hokey, who served a very wealthy old maid named Hepzibah Smith, aunt to Wizengamot member Micah Smith,” he explained. “I believe you are familiar with the Smiths. One of them, Zacharias, is in your year. While her nephew dealt with the political affairs of the family, Hepzibah devoted herself to the accumulation of wealth and valuable heirlooms of all sorts. This, as you will see, is what drew Tom Riddle to her. Let us begin.”

Hepzibah Smith, as it turned out, was an extremely fat and gaudily made-up old woman with a tiny and even older house elf. She had enough magical artifacts to run an antique shop, and she was an enormous flirt, which didn’t suit her at all.

And Voldemort brought her flowers.

“That’s the most disturbing thing I’ve seen all year,” Harry said.

“This isn’t what I wanted to see right after supper,” Hermione agreed.

Things only got weirder as Riddle, the dark lord who had terrorised Britain, the arrogant boy Harry had seen in the Chamber of Secrets, played the part of the poor, subservient shopkeeper’s assistant. He was quite an actor, but Harry and Hermione were still surprised he would stoop so low to get what he wanted.

But get what he wanted he did. Hepzibah showed him two priceless artifacts of hers—one a gold cup belonging to her distant ancestor, Helga Hufflepuff, and the other Slytherin’s locket, which Burke had bought from Merope for ten galleons. Unsurprisingly, she died two days later, allegedly because Hokey had accidentally poisoned her cocoa, and the cup and the locket were both gone. And so, for that matter, was Tom Riddle.

“As Hokey had apparently poisoned her mistress only by accident, she was not imprisoned,” Dumbledore said. However, she was of course dismissed. Most elves would simply lie down and die after such an accident, but I happened to hear of the case and took pity on her. I bound her to the castle where she was allowed to clean, though not cook, with the supervision of another elf. I took an interest in the incident with Riddle, and when she was strong enough, I extracted her memory. To my surprise—and at her age, it would have surprised me even if she had been healthy—she lived another five years and died in far better spirits than when she had entered the castle—one of the few happy endings of those touched by Voldemort.”

“So he took the ring, the cup, and the locket,” Hermione observed. “It looks like he was starting a collection of his own.”

“Excellent deduction, Hermione. He was, indeed, collecting artifacts of great magical power and historical value. Can you guess why?”

“Well, if they were powerful, maybe he used them somehow,” Harry said. “Some kind of ritual, maybe.”

“A good idea, Harry. I believe there _was_ a ritual involved. However, contrary to what you may think, I believe it was the historical value of these artifacts that attracted Voldemort to them. But this you will see in good time.”

“Professor, why don’t you just tell us all of it now?” he demanded.

“Because,” Dumbledore sighed, “I do not yet have all of the pieces myself. That is why I am waiting until closer to Christmas. If I cannot acquire the information I need by then, you may be able to help me do so. In the meantime, I ask that you simply remember what you’ve seen.”

Harry nodded reluctantly. He might have pressed the issue, but he admitted there was no hurry at the moment.

“Professor,” Hermione asked a question that was troubling her, “in the memory, when Riddle got…angry, I guess, his eyes glowed red. What was that?”

“That, I suspect was caused by excessive exposure to the Dark Arts. It has long been known that these practises can cause one to lose a certain degree of control over one’s magic—in a very different manner from the accidental magic of youth. The red eyes and the pale, sunken appearance are the first symptom of this malady. The truly unsettling thing is that Voldemort showed these symptoms so young. By the 1970s, Voldemort’s eyes had acquired a permanent red glow, indicating a severe case. There is a reason those arts are not taught in most schools.”

“I understand, sir.” She and Harry both nodded.

* * *

“Does that little twit ever stop,” Harry complained.

Hermione sighed. Her brother had been testy ever since Halloween. She hoped his teenage years wouldn’t all be like this. “What is it, Harry,” she asked.

“Malfoy. He’s started writing letters to the editor now.”

“Well, he has as much right to write letters to the editor as we have.”

“Yeah, but just take a look.” He laid out the editorial page of the _Daily Prophet_ for his friends to see:

 

_MAGICAL CREATURES SHOULD BE TAUGHT BY A PROFESSIONAL_

_A Letter from a Concerned Student_

_I began taking the Care of Magical Creatures course at Hogwarts this year hoping to gain some useful hands-on experience. My family has raised various sorts of exotic magical and mundane creatures for generations, so the subject interested me. However, when I started, I never expected to have a problem with the class being too hands on, to the point of being downright dangerous._

_The fault for this worrying state of affairs rests on the new Magical Creatures teacher, Rubeus Hagrid. Most people probably know Professor Hagrid from his fifty years as Groundskeeper, but I can_ _’t imagine many of them saying he is teaching material. Hogwarts claims to be the best school of magic in the world, and yet Professor Hagrid is not only unqualified in his subject, but has not even passed his O.W.L. exams, having only recently resumed his studies after his acquittal from charges of attacking students last spring._

_In addition to his lack of qualifications, Professor Hagrid has shown poor risk assessment skills, starting from our first lesson, in which he encouraged inexperienced students to ride hippogriffs bareback. It was only by luck that there were no injuries. The remainder of our lessons have been less_ _“exciting,” but there has been a consistent lack of caution towards bites and scratches, and one wonders if this could cause serious injury when working with other uniquely hazardous creatures such as malaclaws or streelers. For example, I recently heard Professor Hagrid boasting about getting permission to import a bale of fire crabs from Fiji._

_While this cavalier attitude may stem naturally from Professor Hagrid_ _’s large size and wild lifestyle, it is wholly unsuitable for students. He may be able to fight a troll barehanded, but he too often forgets that_ _ we _ _can_ _’t. Shouldn’t the world’s premier magical school have a premier teaching staff? Shouldn’t Care of Magical Creatures be taught with appropriate safety standards? If Mr. Hagrid wishes to teach, he should graduate first and prove he is capable of doing it well, and in the meantime, Professor Dumbledore should hold to his own standards and hire a fully-qualified professor to fill the vacancy._

_Draco Malfoy_

_Heir of House Malfoy_

_Third Year, Hogwarts_

 

“Since when can he write like that?” Harry demanded.

“Ghostwriter,” Neville said casually. “He rants to one of his father’s advisers and has them write it up, or he just pays off an older Ravenclaw to write it. Or if he’s being _really_ smart, he’s taking lessons from someone to do it himself.”

“So now he’s going after Hagrid,” Harry grumbled.

“I hate to admit it, Harry, but he’s kind of right about Hagrid,” Hermione said. “I do like him,” she added quickly, “but he can be off-putting sometimes, the way he does his lessons, and Professor Dumbledore _is_ being extremely lenient about his qualifications.”

“ _Hey_ , he’s still a better teacher than Snape, even with Snape cleaning up his act. And he doesn’t need an exam. He’s got loads of practical experience. _You_ don’t want to get rid of him, do you?”

“Of course not. I’m just saying Malfoy’s being surprisingly sensible about it: pointing out real criticisms, not being condescending, avoiding taking digs at Dumbledore…”

“I’m not surprised, Hermione,” Neville said. “How d’you think the Malfoys have always been major political players for the last nine hundred years?” Neville said. “They’re brilliant at convincing people they’re on their side like that. You can always write a response letter.”

Hermione and Harry both shook their heads. “It’s not that easy, Neville,” Hermione said. “We could, but we’re already leveraging most of our influence on the werewolf bill.”

“Yeah, Cousin Andi’s been warning me about overextending myself,” Harry agreed. “It’d be better if we had someone respected in the field to respond, but we don’t know that many magical creatures experts, unless you count the Lovegoods.”

“You _did_ say “respected’?” Hermione said.

“Yeah, I know,” he admitted.

“What about Charlie Weasley?”

“Hmm, yeah, that could work. Ron? Oi, Ron!”

“Whassup?” Ron said, turning around from his conversation about Quidditch.

“D’you think Charlie would have some good things to say about Hagrid teaching?” Harry showed him the letter.

“Malfoy? That git,” Ron growled. “Yeah, Charlie might do something. I’ll write him and ask.”

“Great. Thanks, Ron. That’ll be start, at least.”

“Sorry, Harry, but that’s politics,” Neville said calmly.

“Yeah, I think I might prefer the troll,” Harry griped.

“I don’t think I would. But hey, I bet _you_ could fight a troll barehanded, what with the wandless magic and all.”

“Don’t tempt him, Neville,” Hermione said. “It’s hard enough to make him behave already.”

“Yeah, it’s like herding cats, isn’t it?”

Both of them laughed while Harry sputtered, and everyone else around them just looked confused.

“Good one, Neville,” Hermione said, smiling at him.

After class that day, Harry decided they really needed to go and check up on Hagrid, so Ron and Neville tagged along, and they walked down the hill to his hut. When they got there, they were glad they had come because Hagrid had clearly started drinking, and no good ever came of that.

“‘S all my fault,” Hagrid groaned. “Shoulda known I wouldn’ make no good teacher. Messin’ with hippogriffs the firs’ day. Jus’ wanted ter make an excitin’ firs’ lesson. Didn’t think nothin’ o’ it.”

“Nonsense, Hagrid,” Harry said. “I think your a great teacher. We’re learning lots.”

“Yeah,” Ron agreed. “Malfoy’s just being a git.”

“He’s right, though,” Hagrid said. “I ain’t qualified. Only jus’ passed my third year exams. Got no O.W.L.s or N.E.W.T.s.”

“You don’t need them,” Harry insisted. “You’ve got decades of hands-on experience. It’s like Professor Williamson hasn’t got any teaching experience either, but he’s an Auror—okay, so he’s not the best example since he does really want to be here. Or Professor Trelawney’s a real Seer—of course, she’s a rubbish teacher, too. Wow, this is harder than I thought.”

“There’s Professor Snape,” Hermione suggested.

“Snape?!” Ron and Neville yelled.

“Yes, he’s a brilliant Potions Master.”

“He’s the worst teacher in school,” Ron argued.

“No, Professor Binns is the worst teacher in school. People learn more from Professor Snape and even Professor Trelawney than him. And my point is, at least Snape is improving. You can, too, Hagrid. I think Harry’s on to something. Hands-on experience _can_ be better. Maybe all you really need is someone reliable to review your lesson plans for safety.”

“I’m sure the Magical Creatures Department at the Ministry has guidelines for handling all kinds of creatures,” Neville said.

“Yes, that’s an idea,” Hermione agreed.

“So long as Amos Diggory didn’t write them,” Harry added.

Hermione rolled her eyes: “I’m sure they were written by committee, Harry. Everything in government is.”

“Huh,” Hagrid said. “I hadn’t thought o’ that. Maybe I’ll take a look.”

“You know,” Harry mused, “that’s Potions, History, Defence, Divination, Muggle Studies, and if you _do_ count Magical Creatures—no offence, Hagrid—that’s fully half of the classes that have serious issues with their teaching. And we’re supposed to be the best magical school in the world.”

“Wow, you’re right,” Hermione said. “Harry, are you starting to get the idea that maybe Professor Dumbledore isn’t the best Headmaster?”

“Horsefeathers!” Hagrid roared. “Now, I’ve had some differences with Dumbledore, but he’s still a great man. Best Headmaster Hogwarts has ever had.”

“Sorry, Hagrid,” Harry replied, “but you can be a great man and even a great teacher and still not be a great headmaster.”

“He was probably even a great Headmaster once, but once the war started, I think he was trying to do too many things at once,” Hermione said. Plus, you have to admit, he’s getting old. How else do you explain his lapses in judgement, like sending Harry to his aunt and uncle? And the less said about the Philosopher’s Stone debacle, the better.”

“Hmm…well, I admit he ain’t gettin’ no younger,” Hagrid mused.

“D’you think he’s always been like that?” Harry asked. “I mean, he still seems pretty smart. It’s just that it’s hard to get him to accept help or talk to anybody else about what he’s doing. At least to hear Sirius tell it.”

“Maybe. Of course, he’s been on top for so long, maybe it took him a while to realise he’s slipping a bit…You know, we really need to do something about Professor Binns,” she continued. “No one ever learns anything from his classes. Even if they don’t sleep through it—” She sent a sharp look at Ron and Neville. “—we don’t get anything from them that we don’t from the course book, and he doesn’t change the assignments from year to year either. A lot of people cheat and copy off the older years. You’d think the Board would have fired him ages ago.”

“They tried,” Hagrid informed them. “Back when he died, but the Ghost Council protested. Said it were discrim’nat’ry ter fire him jus’ cause he was dead.”

“But they wouldn’t be firing him because he was dead. They’d be firing him because he’s a terrible teacher.”

“Oh, he was like that before. I had him when he was alive, and he was still boring as a flobberworm. Trouble is, he’s bin teachin’ like tha’ so long now there ain’t anybody qualified ter replace him.”

“Wow, talk about job security,” Neville quipped.

“Yeah. Heh. Yeh know, funny thing about Binns. Yeh’d think a ghost would be great at teachin’ history. He’s seen more o’ it.”

“You _would_ think that, wouldn’t you,” Hermione said. “If only he could remember it. I think he must have had some kind of magical memory loss when he died—Harry?” She stopped when she saw her brother staring off into space, wide-eyed. “Harry, are you alright?”

“Hagrid…that’s _brilliant_!” he exclaimed.

“Huh? What?” Ron and Neville said.

“Well, o’ course it is,” Hagrid chuckled. “Erm, what’d I say?”

“Having a ghost teach history class.”

Hermione looked at him like he’d gone mad: “Harry, we just established that’s not working.”

“It’s not working with _Binns_ ,” he countered. “There’s about twenty other ghosts in the castle. We could have one from every century.”

Hermione’s eyes went wide: “Hagrid, that’s brilliant!”

“Whoa, learn it from people who were actually there?” Ron said. “That’d be wicked. Even I’d pay attention to that.”

Hermione rolled her eyes at him. “That could really work,” she said. “You’d probably need a live human to organise it but they wouldn’t have to be qualified in the subject. Neville, you should write your Gran about it.”

“And a letter to the editor,” Harry suggested. “That sounds like something you could work on.”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“And that’ll get some of the attention off you, too, Hagrid.”

“Thanks, Harry. Thank yeh for lookin’ out for me. Blimey, yeh’ve really been shakin’ up the school, haven’t yeh?”

“Well, the way things are, someone’s gotta do it.”

* * *

“Tonight, we will be observing another of my memories,” Dumbledore said. “Ten years separate this memory from the one you saw last week, ten years in which no confirmed trace of Voldemort can be found even by my best efforts—ten years in which he was presumably assembling his network of supporters and researching the darkest aspects of magic both here and abroad. This occurred not long after his first public appearance in Britain as Lord Voldemort.”

They dived into the memory and landed back in Dumbledore’s office, but now, it was his office of nearly forty years ago. The seventy-six-year-old Dumbledore’s hair and beard were no longer auburn, but a lightening grey, and there not so many whirring instruments, but the rest of the office was the same. Fawkes was even sleeping on his perch. The younger Dumbledore seemed to be waiting for something.

And then Voldemort walked into the office.

Harry and Hermione had never seen Voldemort at his height, only as a face on the back of Quirrell’s head, and as the boy Tom Riddle, but this man was clearly no longer Riddle, but Voldemort. His eyes were not glowing, but were permanently bloodshot. He’d grown thin, and his skin pale and waxen, and he wore a long, black cloak with a hood.

“Oh my God, he looks like Emperor Palpatine,” Harry said.

“Holy cricket, he does,” Hermione agreed.

“If Lucius Malfoy ever says he’s my father, I’ll hex him into next week,” Harry said.

“Ah, muggle art,” Dumbledore said with a chuckle. “Charming, but please do pay attention.”

Voldemort—for he called himself that openly now—had a simple request: to be the Defence Against the Dark Arts Professor, even though he clearly cared no more for teaching than Snape, and it was obvious Dumbledore would say no. That left his true purpose most unclear.

“Was that when he cursed the Defence Professor job?” Hermione asked.

“It was,” the old wizard replied. “To most people, the curse is a mere rumour, but I have seen it—woven so deep into the wards that I could not remove it without leaving the castle vulnerable. Professor Langley, the Defence Professor at the time, died of a heart attack—an uncommon death for a wizard—shortly before the end of that school year. The professor I hired the following year became seriously ill; the one the year after that assaulted several students; and so on. I have long wondered whether that was Voldemort’s only purpose here that night. There is some evidence to suggest that it was.”

“There is?” Harry said.

“Yes. You will recall that Voldemort waited thirteen years after that night to begin his campaign of terror. Thirteen—a magically significant number, but also a practical one. Thirteen years is precisely long enough to graduate all seven classes who had studied under Professor Langley and to pass an entire new class through the halls of Hogwarts. By 1970, a whole generation had been raised with an insufficient education in the art of defence, and that may well have been an end in itself.”

“So he made all of Britain a softer target?”

“Precisely, Harry. However, I do not believe that was his only motivation that night. Whether he succeeded in any other task he had set for himself, I do not know. I do know that he was not here for long. However, you will need to see the final memory I am still trying to collect before you can understand any more.”

* * *

There _were_ advantages to being the titular head of a Noble House, the Grangers thought. On the last Friday in November, Harry and Hermione were both permitted to leave the castle to spend the night at Twelve Grimmauld Place and prepare for the Wizengamot the next day. After greeting their family enthusiastically, they got down to business.

“Alright, so where do we stand, Andi?” Harry asked.

“Better than I would’ve expected after Halloween,” said Andromeda Tonks. The attack on the Robins girl forced all of the neutrals to pick a side. Basically no one is content with the status quo anymore, so in that respect, our proposal was perfectly timed. They all flocked to either our bill or Diggory’s, which gave us some windfall votes. We almost look like a viable alternative now.”

Harry frowned: “Almost?”

“That’s my fault,” Remus said sadly from where he lay the sofa—and that wasn’t because of the full moon, which was two nights away. From what Sirius had said, he’d been faithfully fulfilling his duties—managing his finances, going to visit Demelza, and so on—but he’d been moping around a lot more the rest of the time.

“It’s not your fault, Moony,” Sirius insisted. “Unfortunately since we associate with a known werewolf, _some people_ take this as a sign that our bill is part of a secret plot for werewolves to gain power, so we need to tell them where to shove it.”

“ _Politely_ ,” Andi emphasised.

“What she said.”

“So…what? We tell a heartfelt story about how wonderful Remus is?” Harry asked.

“I’m afraid it’s not that simple, cub,” Sirius said. “That’s going to be a harder sell with a werewolf than it was with muggles, and honestly, it also would’ve gone down better with a cute, innocent eleven-year-old than a thirteen-year-old with a reputation for shows of power, and a voice that keeps breaking—no offence.”

“Oh, _that_ _’s_ nice,” Harry grumbled.

“So what do we do, then?” Dan Granger asked.

“What Harry and I do is talk about James and Lily and how they befriended Remus when they were young. Most people still admire them as war heroes. Mention James’s parents, too. They were well-respected, and they knew about him and supported him, too.”

“That’s the first part,” Andi confirmed. “The second part is to remind everyone how we got neutral parties to help write the bill. Play on people’s respect for Amelia Bones. Throw another bone to Adrian Greengrass—no offence, Sirius.”

“Har har.”

“The other good thing is that Sunday night is the full moon again. That’s good because everyone’s always wanting to ‘wait and see’ what happens on the full moon with it being so soon afterwards.”

“That’ll be switched in January and then we’ll be out from under it completely in April,” Remus told them.

“January will be the dangerous one,” Andi said. “People will be reacting then, and they might try to push ahead. Once April comes, we’ll be in a better position to make our own move, so in that sense, the calendar works in our favour.”

“So what do we actually have in our bill?” Dan asked for clarification.

“There are a few things,” Sirius said. “One is deterrence. For legal purposes, being infected with lycanthropy is basically being equated with death, which isn’t exactly fair, but it is what it is. Deliberately trying to infect someone gets a penalty of life in Azkaban. They’re debating whether to bring back the death penalty for a repeat offender like Greyback. Accidentally infecting someone whilst taking Wolfsbane is treated the same as involuntary manslaughter: five years unless there are mitigating circumstances. Another one is enforcement. We’re trying very hard to make sure that werewolves have complete freedom of movement under normal circumstances. However, the DMLE will have the right to limit their movements for various minor offences—work restrictions, residency restrictions, and so forth. Failure to register and any kind of close call on the full moon will be dealt with harshly. We think that’s a good balance between maintaining public safety and not driving werewolves into hiding.”

“Well, _I_ think it is,” Remus clarified, “but then, I’m not the average werewolf. I wrote to a few others I know for their thoughts, but I haven’t heard much back from them.”

Sirius nodded. “The last part is the hardest sell. We want to provide greater services to werewolves. We’re looking at maintaining three forested areas around Britain free of humans for transformed werewolves to roam on the full moon. Those who used them would get discounts on Wolfsbane Potion and other incentives. Also, there would be incentives for taking Wolfsbane, like getting restrictions lifted, and we’re trying to streamline the background check process for it.”

“The problem is that all that costs money,” Andi said. “No one wants to spend that money on werewolves. We’re trying to convince people that it’ll be a net gain if we can get more werewolves buying and taking Wolfsbane because most of those proceeds go to the Ministry already, but then we’re back to the problem of making the background check airtight.”

“Is there a way to provide better access to Wolfsbane directly?” Hermione suggested. “Like giving it out at a clinic, so you can make more of it, but it all stays in Ministry hands?”

“Hmm…that’s clever…but that would also mean having large numbers of werewolves congregating in public, which would also make people uncomfortable. We _are_ looking at ways to make it more available, since that’s know to be the surest way to reduce attacks, but nobody can agree on how.”

“The other thing we _want_ to do is have employment protections,” Sirius concluded. “Sadly, there’s no way we’ll be able to stop people from refusing to hire werewolves, but we want to cut back Umbridge’s schedule of jobs they’re not allowed to do down to things where not being able to work on the full moon would directly prevent them from being able to do their jobs—things like Aurors and emergency Healers who have to be on call all the time, and even going that far is facing a lot of opposition.”

“I’m sure you’ll see the politics play out with every one of those provisions tomorrow,” Andi said. “Right now, we need to work on your speeches.”

* * *

“I hereby call the November Session of the Three Hundred Ninety-First Wizengamot to order,” Dumbledore told the assembled Lords and Ladies. “I remind members that, as the final Saturday of the year falls on Christmas Day, the December session will be postponed to the twenty-sixth. I ask those bringing the regular reports to come forward.”

The uninteresting routine work of the Wizengamot began, but Harry was more interested in the whispers that were circling the gallery. Remus had not been missed when he entered the chamber, surrounded by friends and allies so that he could not be directly harassed. A lot of people were giving him a wide berth. He had suggested to stay home himself, but Sirius wanted him there to make a statement. It was definitely getting attention. Amos Diggory and several of the more conservative members like Lucius Malfoy were glaring at him.

Harry’s eyes zeroed in on Minister Fudge. There was a woman standing beside him, seemingly as an aide. He didn’t like the look of her at all. She wore a hideous pink jumper, had a wide mouth like a toad, and a ridiculous black bow perched atop her head like a giant fly. She whispered something in Fudge’s ear, and the Minister immediately stopped the proceedings.

“Chief Warlock,” he said, “apologies for the interruption, but I must object to the presence of a known werewolf in the Wizengamot Hall! That is entirely inappropriate in such a public setting.”

Sirius quickly countered that, saying, “Chief Warlock, Mr. Lupin is here as a guest of the House of Black and of the House of Potter, and at the discretion of the Chair, I believe. Mr. Lupin has also visited the Wizengamot before without incident, and most importantly, there is no rule against a werewolf being in the Wizengamot Chamber. I checked. Now, if you’d like to put it to a vote…”

They didn’t. No one ever suggested that unless they were certain how the vote would go. Remus would stay. Harry’s speech, however, would wait till a little later, after they started discussing the bill. They were counting on one of the supporters of Umbridge’s bill to start ranting about Remus, thus giving him an opening. In fact, it was Amos Diggory himself who made it an issue:

“The proponents of this bill, the Lycanthropy Regulation and Management Act, consider it a _victory_ that a dangerous beast attended Hogwarts for seven years, not only confined in the castle with hundreds of children, but even given power over them as a prefect. In fact they have as good as said they want to revive the practice this coming fall! It seems to be one of Lord Black’s infamous, oh-so-amusing pranks to continue to keep this beast as a pet and to attempt to train the Boy-Who-Lived as a werewolf tamer—at least, we can only hope that’s what he’s up to and not something more sinister. And again, the proponents of this bill think nothing of bringing this same beast into the Wizengamot Chamber itself, only twenty-four hours before the full moon. I ask you, good Lords and Ladies, why we tolerate such rank cavalierness amongst our numbers, especially when it comes to the Saviour of the Wizarding World?”

Harry sat patiently through this rant and then rose up to defend himself and his family. “Mr. Diggory,” he said as calmly as he could, “my _father_ , then Heir to the House of Potter, and my godfather, then Heir to the House of Black, deduced that Mr. Remus Lupin suffered from lycanthropy during their second year at Hogwarts. Instead of rejecting him, they befriended him. They did not see a “dangerous beast,” as you say. They saw a lonely boy who needed some friends, and they were happy to overlook the prejudice that pervades the wizarding world to help him. My grandparents, the Lord and Lady Potter—and I’ll note that my grandmother was also a Black in good standing with her family—also knew that Mr. Lupin suffered this condition, and they not only approved of his friendship, but also allowed him to stay at their house when he needed to.

“In all the years since, Mr. Lupin has been nothing but kind and considerate to my family. He is intelligent and trustworthy, as evidenced by the fact that he became a prefect at Hogwarts and later earned a mastery in defence. He has always been extremely careful about his transformations. During his seven years at Hogwarts, and before and afterwards, he has never hurt anyone during the full moon—most of that time without the help of the Wolfsbane Potion. He is living proof that werewolves are not all bad, that they can make a better life for themselves, and I am proud to call him my friend.”

Harry sat down as scattered applause broke out around the Hall—more than he was expecting at least, though that might have been because he was a celebrity and not because he had that much support. Remus was blushing as he spoke.

Of course, Harry’s reputation wasn’t unassailable. It was Lucius Malfoy who stood next to speak in his usual unctuous tone, “I think we all know that Lord Potter can give an emotional speech. One might say he has a talent for it. However, we should also remember that he is young and idealistic, not to mention raised by _muggles_ , and unfamiliar with the harsh realities of our world. Even leaving aside the current question, we can see this clearly in Lord Potter’s, frankly, laughable claims in several of his open letters over the past year. To wit, Lord Potter has claimed that most muggle-born witches and wizards likely have magical ancestors within a few generations, that all of them are likely descended from Noble and Most Ancient Houses in the thirtieth or fortieth generation, even the House of Slytherin, which no longer has _any_ confirmed descendants, that most pureblooded witches and wizards have muggle ancestry, and that even _they_ may be descended from Noble and Most Ancient Houses through these muggle ancestors. Now, I don’t mean to give Lord Potter grief over the…naivety of his views, nor do I mean to make this a discussion about blood or heritage. I merely mean to illustrate that his views are not as well thought out as they seem. I ask you, Lords and Ladies, is it any wonder that these letters were published in the _Quibbler_?”

Laughter broke out around the Hall. Harry looked over to the press section, where he saw Xenophilius Lovegood roll his eyes. Angered more on behalf of Luna and her father than himself, Harry stood up again: “Lord Malfoy, on this matter, my age and upbringing are irrelevant, as is the _supposed_ quality of that publication, everything you need is in the letters themselves, and I publicly challenge any qualified arithmancer to refute my claims.” That was risky. A good arithmancer could probably disappear most of the mixed ancestries in the statistics with a “careful study” of intermarriage rates, but Harry had at least raised the bar, and that was enough to shut Lord Malfoy up for now. But he wasn’t done yet: “And as for my muggle family, attitudes towards werewolves in the muggle world are similar to the magical world. There are very few sympathetic depictions of werewolves in muggle literature. They are reviled and distrusted on general principle in fiction, and if muggles knew that werewolves really existed, most of them would fear them just as most wizards do. So when I say that my adopted family never had a second thought about befriending Mr. Lupin, knowing he was a werewolf from the first, you will grasp my full meaning. We understand that it’s a disease that he can’t help having, and that it’s perfectly safe for twenty-nine days out of the month. To both wizards and muggles, that should make it clear that the discrimination against werewolves is unfounded.”

That got another round of applause and undercut the strongest parts of Malfoy’s argument, though it probably didn’t win them much. After that, Sirius and Andi went through the provisions of the bill one by one, pointing out how respected neutral parties had given their advice on many of them and asking some of the people involved to speak personally. The debate continued for a while longer, but little seemed to be done. (Typical politics, the Grangers thought.)

In the end, it was hard to tell how much progress had been made. The past month had done little besides polarise the Wizengamot into the two camps, and prejudices were hard to overcome, even with a speech like that, but the odds didn’t seem insurmountable anymore, so they were pleased about that.

* * *

On Sunday evening, the night of the full moon, Sirius was given permission to skip his Hitwizard Patrol in order to deal with another, more personal werewolf-related issue. Hogsmeade was on high alert in case Greyback should show again, especially to make a second pass at the Robinses, which was where he was now with Remus to help the family through the night.

“There’s not much we can do about supper,” Remus told Mr. and Mrs. Robins. “It gets dark so early this time of year. With the stress of the transformation, I usually just sleep through the night under the potion, but Demelza’s a lot younger than I am, so she might well be up all night. We brought some steaks for snacks if we need them; you can go get something for yourself if you want.”

Mr. and Mrs. Robins nodded and looked around worriedly at their cellar. They had cleared out a large enough space for two wolves and a large dog and had laid blankets over the floor. Their daughter was sitting against the wall, her knees drawn up to her chest and not speaking. Demelza was a fighter, especially with encouragement from Harry Potter himself, but the prospect of facing her first full moon and being cursed to transform into a dangerous animal was enough to frighten anyone. She already looked paler and thinner than before. Sirius had paid for a course of Wolfsbane Potion for her (which tasted so disgusting she could barely choke it down), but even with a human mind, this night was a grim prospect.

“It’ll be fine,” Sirius assured them. “I’ll be here in dog form the whole time in case anything happens.” Under the present circumstances, Sirius had decided it was time to come out and register as an animagus. “And if there’s an emergency, I can change back and do the Homorphous Charm, but it’s better to let it go through the night.”

“We understand,” Mr. Robins said.

“Demelza, are you going to be okay with Lord Black and Mr. Lupin?” Mrs. Robins asked.

The girl looked up and nodded weakly: “I…I think so, Mum.”

An enchanted timer chimed. “That’s five minutes,” Remus said. “We should get ready. As we mentioned before, we’re going to have to ask you two to stay back the entire time, especially during the change. It takes time to get used to the Wolf’s body, and it’s too dangerous to get careless with the teeth and claws.” Mrs. Robins had tears in her eyes as she and her husband nodded their understanding. Remus moved to sit in the middle of the blankets. “Demelza, you’ll need to come out here, please.”

Demelza slowly staggered to her feet. She had mostly healed, but the bite out of her leg had been a bad one. She still walked with a limp, and the Healers weren’t sure it would ever go away. She hated it, along with the two thin scratch marks that stretched across her face.

Mrs. Robins took a few moments to hug her daughter tightly. “We’ll be watching the whole time, Demelza,” she said. “It’s going to be okay.”

Soon afterwards, the timer chimed the one-minute warning, and Remus motioned for the girl to lie face-down on the blankets; that was the easiest position to transform in. Remus himself lay down a short distance away to give both of them space, and Sirius changed to Padfoot and nuzzled in beside her.

It was a strange sight, her parents thought, but they didn’t have time to ponder it as the timer chimed moonrise. They watched as Demelza went rigid. Her limbs began to shake, and she thrashed and screamed in pain. Mrs. Robins instinctively stepped forward to help, but Padfoot barked at her and shook his head whilst laying his foreleg across Demelza’s shoulders to hold her down. Remus was clearly going through similar trouble, but he was a lot less conspicuous about it. He was used to it by now.

Demelza’s head lengthened, and her screams became a dog-like whine of pain. Her body stretched longer, and her whining rose in pitch. Fur sprouted from her face, and her hands curled into clawed paws. Then, in a few more seconds, it was over, and before them was a large, bedraggled-looking wolf cub, looking almost like a normal wolf, except for the short snout and the tufted tail.

Demelza pushed herself up partway and shook herself like a dog. Then, in what was probably the equivalent of a groan of relief, she opened her jaws and began to howl, “ _Ow-ooo-Erk_!”

Padfoot shoved her snout down with his paw. He turned his head and cocked one ear as if to say _Listen_ , and then, a haunting sound echoed through Hogsmeade.

_Aaarrrhhh-OOOOO-ooooo-OOOOO-ooooo._

Greyback was in the village again. Demelza shivered and nuzzled close to padfoot like a frightened puppy. Moony got up from where he lay, looking a good deal more like an old, arthritic wolf under the potion than his thirty-three years would suggest, and also lay close to her.

Mr. and Mrs. Robins watched the scene in silence, pained that they could not come closer and comfort their daughter, no matter what she looked like at the moment. It would have disturbed them greatly, seeing their ten-year-old daughter sleeping with two grown men, but nothing about this situation was normal anymore. It was a long night.

They later learnt that Greyback had shown up somewhere around the Shrieking Shack again and had led the Aurors and Hitwizards on a merry chase around the forest, which ended in a standoff when the werewolf regrouped with his pack. With the werewolves unable to advance across a _de facto_ no man’s land without being bombarded by curses and the wizards unable to approach them safely without being attacked with tooth and claw, they were stuck in a loose skirmish until reinforcements arrived, at which the werewolves fled into the mountains. Being faster on rough terrain, they quickly lost their pursuers there.

* * *

A certain pair of Seekers’ positions were reversed for the next Quidditch match between Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff as Harry Potter met Cho Chang on her way down to the pitch.

“Hey, Cho, good luck out there,” Harry said.

“Oh, hi! Thanks, Harry,” Cho replied, smiling. “At least the weather’s good. I shouldn’t get pummelled by a hailstorm.”

“Yeah, there’s that,” Harry agreed. “Listen, will you do me a favour?”

“Um…” Cho said, surprised that Harry Potter was asking her for a favour.

“Go out there and beat Diggory for me. Show him who’s boss.” Harry knew he shouldn’t blame Cedric for his father’s politics, but it would be so satisfying to see, especially seeing him beaten by a pretty girl like Cho.

Cho, who had only a passing knowledge of the political situation between them, just smiled again and said, “Don’t worry, Harry, I will.” Harry grinned as he watched her go.

“Someone has a crush,” a low, sing-song voice whispered behind him.

Harry jumped about a foot in the air and spun around to see who had spoken. “Merlin, Hermione! Don’t do that to me!” he said.

Hermione giggled. “But it was just too easy. So what do you think? Cho’s very pretty, isn’t she?”

“Well…well…yes, she is. And hopefully a good Quidditch player, too.”

“Well, I think you’ve definitely got her attention,” Hermione said.

Harry stumbled. “You—you think so?” he said, his voice breaking.

“Harry, you got _everyone_ _’s_ attention with your flying in the last match, and that’s not even accounting for the fact that you’re Harry Freakin’ Potter. Didn’t you see how she smiled at you? If you want some sisterly advice, I think you should try talking to her.”

“Isn’t that what I just did?”

“I mean _really_ talking to her. For more than half a minute.”

“Huh. Maybe. I’ll think about it,” Harry said, taken a little by surprise. He hadn’t really expected Hermione to come in with that kind of advice. He must have been doing something right, though. Ravenclaw flattened Hufflepuff in the match.

* * *

“I have but one final memory for you to watch before you can fully understand what you have seen these past few months,” Dumbledore said.

Harry and Hermione were eager to get the answers they’d been waiting for. “Whose memory is it, Professor?” Hermione asked.

“My old friend, Horace Slughorn’s. You should recall that he was Professor Snape’s predecessor as Potions Master and Head of Slytherin House. His career at Hogwarts reached back many years, even to when Tom Riddle was a student here. It is to that time that we will be returning tonight, and it was for this very reason that I introduced Professor Slughorn to you last year at your godfather’s party. Now, let us observe…”

Even the young Horace Slughorn looked like a walrus. Actually, with his large stomach and thick moustache, Harry thought he looked disturbingly like a nicer version of his Uncle Vernon, with an even greater taste for luxury. Harry didn’t think he liked him much. Riddle, however, seemed to think he was useful, buttering the man up with bribes and flattery, but there was something…wrong with the memory.

_“Sir, I wondered what you know about ... about horcruxes?”_

_And it happened all over again: The dense fog filled the room so that Harry could not see Slughorn or Voldemort at all; only Dumbledore, smiling serenely beside him. Then Slughorn_ _’s voice boomed out again, just as it had done before._

_“I don’t know anything about horcruxes and wouldn’t tell you if I did! Now_ _get out of here at once and don_ _’t let me catch you_ _mentioning them again!_ _”_

_“Well, that’s that,” said Dumbledore placidly. “Time to go.”_

“That didn’t look right,” Harry said. “What was wrong with it?”

“Simple: that memory has been tampered with.”

“Tampered with? By whom? Why?”

“By Professor Slughorn himself, for shame of what said.”

“But Professor,” Hermione asked, “what _are_ horcruxes?”

“Ahh, that is very dark magic, Hermione, and no, you will not find mention of them in the school library. I can explain it to you if need be, but that is not why I called you here tonight.”

“It’s not? Then why—?”

“My intent,” Dumbledore said, “if all goes well, is that the three of us should meet with Professor Slughorn again on New Year’s Eve. This is very important. It may be the key to defeating Voldemort. It is vital that we find out precisely what Professor Slughorn told Tom Riddle about horcruxes, and I was hoping that you could help me convince him to tell us.”

“Us?” Harry said incredulously. “How are _we_ going to convince him?”

“My dear boy,” Dumbledore smiled as he played Harry’s trump card back on him: “You’re Harry Potter.”


	72. Helping the Longbottoms

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: When Harry Potter had a problem, JK Rowling would tell him to look at it another way.
> 
> This is one of those chapters I’ve been waiting to write practically from the beginning of the story. Not all of my plans survive contact with the plot, but this is one I very much wanted to see come to fruition. Enjoy.

Like any time the kids were home, the holiday season was a busy one for the Grangers. But the first order of business for Harry and Hermione to watch the new _Doctor Who_ special that their parents had recorded: _Dimensions In Time_. However, by the time it was over, they wished they hadn’t.

“That. Was. _Awful_ ,” Hermione said.

“What idiot decided to make it a crossover with _Eastenders_?” Harry demanded.

“I don’t know, but it’s the thirtieth anniversary. That was just insulting. That was worse than _The Twin Dilemma_.”

“No way. _Nothing_ is worse than _The Twin Dilemma_ …but that came pretty close.”

“I hate to say it, Harry, but I think _Doctor Who_ is dead.”

“Well, if it is, that thing killed it,’” he griped. “D’you think a dark wizard Confunded the writers, Mione?”

“Normally I’d say no, but with something that bad, I’d believe anything.”

* * *

In the week before Christmas, they visited Grimmauld Place again so that Harry and Hermione could show their parents what they had learnt in school and some of what they had learnt in the Duelling Club (Professor Williamson was less grumpy and more interesting there than he was in class), but more importantly, Hermione had another project that she was ready to complete.

“Two years of work, and you’re already set to try the animagus transformation,” Sirius said, impressed. “You are truly the brightest witch of your generation.”

Dan and Emma didn’t look as thrilled with the situation. They didn’t much appreciate their daughter undertaking such a risky course of study, which was normally only supposed to be done as an adult, even if their son could already do it. “And you can fix it if anything goes wrong?” Emma asked.

“Don’t worry, Emma,” Sirius said. “If we could work the Rat through this, it’ll be cake for Hermione.”

“It’s really a good thing she’s learning it now,” Remus agreed. “If, Merlin forbid, she ever runs into Greyback, she’ll be able to transform to avoid infection.”

“Yes, you see? It _can_ be useful,” Hermione said optimistically.

“That’s the spirit,” Sirius said. He sat across from her and tried to lead her through the final meditation. He said it might take several tries, but from the way she could already make fur sprout from her skin and from her natural giftedness, he thought she might be able to do it on the first try.

In the end, she didn’t quite do it in one try, but she did do it in one session. Multiple times that afternoon, Hermione grew fur, and her body began to change shape, but each time, she shifted back to human with a snap. Professor McGonagall was right: there was a lot of resistance that she had to push through. It seemed a Sisyphean endeavour, but just as Sirius was about to give up for the day, it happened. Her body shrank down to about fifteen pounds and before the Grangers stood a young female Eurasian river otter, looking disoriented for a moment and then very pleased with herself. The only difference from a regular otter was that instead of a cream-coloured belly, her coat was solid brown.

“Hermione?” Emma said.

The otter nodded her head and made a sound that was surprisingly like a meow, but squeakier. Then, she began cavorting around the room. Harry immediately changed to Ratsbane and followed her, with Padfoot close behind.

“Our daughter is an otter,” Emma said. “Our son is a cat, and their godfather is a dog. Remind me again how we wound up in this situation.”

“Adopt a stray kitten, and you never know what’ll happen, I guess,” Dan said.

Sirius changed back and corralled Hermione to get her to change as well. Changing back to human was supposed to be easier, but it could still need helping along. With his guidance, though, she made the change after a couple of tries.

“Congratulations, Hermione,” Dan said once she was back to normal. “How do you feel?”

“Pretty good,” she said with a smile. “Except I have a sudden craving for freshwater fish.”

Sirius and Harry both laughed at her expense. “Welcome to my world,” Harry said.

“Well, I’m so proud of you for learning it so fast, Kitten,” Sirius said. “We’ll keep practising it over the break, and then you should be safe to change at school with just Harry’s supervision if you need to. And of course, McGonagall can fix it if something goes wrong.”

“Have you thought of a Marauder name, Hermione?” Remus asked.

“Miss Fisher, I think. I looked for otter names in literature, but I didn’t find anything good.”

“Fisher it is,” Sirius said. He tapped his wand on her shoulders and said, “By the power vested in me as Senior Marauder, I, Mr. Padfoot, do hereby dub thee Miss Fisher. May you use your power only on those deserving of mischief.”

“We can do without the mischief, thank you,” Emma said ineffectually.

* * *

A few days later, it was Christmas Eve Day, the Grangers were back at home, and Grandma and Grandpa had arrived. Hermione was making good progress with her transformation, although she couldn’t do it with her grandparents around. They knew about magic, but it was safer if they didn’t know about the animagus bit.

“Did you know that otters were considered sacred to the ancient Persians, Harry?” she said as they lounged in Harry’s room.

“No, I didn’t. Well, I guess that makes us even, then,” he said. “I’ll take Egypt, and you’ll take Persia.” As he chuckled to himself, he was surprised to see Cousin Andi’s owl flutter in and start pecking at the window. Harry opened it. “You got something for me, boy?” he asked. The owl stuck out its leg. A moment later, Harry grew pale as he read the note. “Oh, no!” he said, and he ran down the stairs.

“Harry? Harry!” Hermione ran after him.

“Harry, what’s wrong?” Dan asked when he hit the living room.

“Cousin Dora’s in the hospital!”

“What?”

“Oh, no!”

“What happened?”

Harry calmed down enough to read the rest of the note and then relaxed. “Training accident, I guess,” he said. “The letter says Mad-Eye’s been running them through some live fire exercises, and she got hit with a bunch of jinxes that interfered with her metamorphic ability. She says she’ll be fine, but she’ll be in St. Mungo’s for Christmas.”

“Oh, that’s too bad,” Emma said. “We should go visit her tomorrow. We should be able to work it in.”

The rest of the day was very busy between baking, other preparations, and Christmas Eve church. The next morning Sirius and Remus came over to open presents, as usual, but the presents were suspiciously bigger this year.

First, Sirius and Remus gave Harry a new communication mirror linked to theirs. “Try not to get this one smashed,” Sirius said half-jokingly. “They’re not easy to find.”

It was Hermione’s gift, though, that really raised some eyebrows. Carefully stacked and folded inside a large box, which, of course, was bigger on the inside, were a bronze cauldron and an elaborate setup with many flasks, bottles, phials, and ingredients, including some rare ones. “Oh my goodness,” she said, “this is a _professional_ grade portable potions lab. This is incredible, Sirius!”

 _A professional grade lab?_ Dan and Emma thought. That had to have been expensive. They wondered why he would do that, but then they noticed the suspicious long, thin shape of Harry’s last present. There were only a handful of things that could be, and they had a pretty good guess.

Harry opened it and gasped: “Merlin’s pants, it’s a Firebolt! This is the fastest broom in the world. It’s top of the line this year. I can’t believe you got it.”

“A Firebolt?” Dan said in surprise. “Sirius, this is too much. Don’t those cost hundreds of galleons? Harry still has a broom that can be fixed.”

“Yes, he does,” Sirius answered, “but as much as I hate to be as materialistic as the Malfoys, they’re right about one thing: the Nimbus Two Thousand isn’t the best broom on the market anymore. I still have some degree of power over Kreacher, and from him, I learnt that Draco Malfoy is _also_ receiving a Firebolt for Christmas. If Harry wants to keep beating him, he’ll have the best chance if he’s on an equal footing. And then, of course, I had to think, what could I spoil Hermione with? Hence the potions lab.”

“This is amazing, Sirius,” Harry said. “Thank you so much.”

“Only the best for my godkids.”

They cleaned up from unwrapping gifts and ate their Christmas dinner, after which everyone besides Grandma and Grandpa made a special trip to St. Mungo’s Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries to visit the Tonkses. Dora was up on the fourth floor for spell damage, and according to the Healers, she was being really cranky about it. When they got to her ward, they saw why.

Nymphadora Tonks’s preferred spiky pink hair was gone. Instead, her entire head was covered in little spines. She was also bright green.

Everyone, even Dan and Emma, was trying not to snigger at her.

“Oh, right, laugh it up,” she complained.

“That—that was some training accident, huh?” Sirius asked.

“Oh my Lord, she’s a cactus,” Harry whispered.

“Yeah, you think it’s real funny, do you?” Dora said. “They’re on my arms and legs, too. I can’t move without poking myself.”

“Er, sorry,” Harry said.

“Dare I ask what happened, Dora?” Remus ventured cautiously.

“What does it look like? I got hit with a Sea-Urchin Jinx and a Hair-Loss Curse at the same time. Then there was a green Colour-Change Charm that we use to simulate a Killing Curse in training.”

“So you’re dead?” Sirius said.

“Not as dead as you’ll be, fuzzball.”

“And that was enough to land you in the hospital?” Emma interrupted before a fight could start.

“No, Emma, see I _also_ got hit with a Jelly-Legs Jinx, and Jelly-Legs is well known to interfere with hexes that alter cosmetic appearances. The combination knocked out my metamorphic ability so I can’t change myself back. They say I should be back to normal by New Year’s.”

“Great, then you won’t miss the party,” Sirius quipped.

“Yeah, there’s that.”

They sat and talked for a while about how Christmas was going. Dora was very excited to hear about Harry’s new Firebolt and declared that Harry was a shoo-in to lead Gryffindor to the Quidditch Cup this year. (Of course, that was the same as the past two years.) The Grangers also promised to come back later in the week and give highlights of the Diagonal Theatre’s Christmas play. (This year’s show was a historical play about Merlin.) As the afternoon wore on, they decided they needed to go and soon left the ward…

And came face to face with Neville Longbottom.

“ _Neville_?” Hermione said in surprise.

Neville jumped when he saw them, but he waved nervously and said, “Er, hi, Harry. Hi, Hermione. What’re you doing here?”

“Visiting our cousin, the cactus,” Harry replied.

“I heard that!”

“Training accident at the Auror Department,” he clarified.

At that moment, a formidable-looking witch in a green dress and a hat with a stuffed vulture on top came around the corner. “Oh, hello, Lord Potter, Miss Granger,” Augusta Longbottom said betraying only mild surprise. “What a coincidence. I was just bringing Neville in to visit his parents. You’re welcome to come meet them if you like.”

“Er, we wouldn’t want to impose, Madam Longbottom—” Hermione started.

“Oh, not at all, not at all, girl. I’m surprised Neville hasn’t asked you to visit before now.”

Harry and Hermione exchanged a very uncomfortable look with Neville. In fact, he _had_ invited them to visit his parents last year, but they had not wanted to intrude on what was clearly a painful subject for him. His grandmother didn’t seem to share the same sensitivity.

“It’s fine,” he said softly. “You can come.”

“We’ll just be in the tearoom,” Remus said, escorting Sirius away.

Madam Longbottom led the children and Dan and Emma into a closed room labelled the Janus Thickey Ward. It was soon obvious that this served as the long-term psychiatric ward of the Hospital, since only victims of the most intractable mind-altering spells were to be found there. And slowly pacing the length of that room was a white-haired woman in a nightdress. Neville sighed and stepped forward to take her hand.

Alice Longbottom had not uttered an intelligible word in twelve years, although she frequently hummed to herself and spent a lot of her time walking up and down the length of the ward. She was only thirty-six years old, but she looked at least fifty. Her hair was wispy white and plastered to her forehead, and her face was thin and worn, with the slightly leathery appearance of a woman two decades older than her true age. There was a slight tremor to her movements, and she shuffled in unsteady steps. There was no spark of life in her eyes and no glimmer of recognition, although she seemed specially attracted to Neville and stayed close by his side while they visited.

Alice’s husband, Frank, could speak a few words, but what he said always came out as an incoherent babble. He was bedridden, unable to walk, and the Healers had to work with him regularly to make sure his muscles didn’t atrophy. His hands shook when he tried to use them, and he would sometimes smack the Healers if they handled him too roughly.

Frank didn’t really give any acknowledgement to Neville either, but Neville patiently sat and talked to both of them about how his year was going, and he introduced Harry and Hermione to them.

Dan and Emma watched the scene with admiration for Neville’s love and devotion, but also a growing uneasiness about what was actually going on with his parents. “Madam Longbottom,” Dan said hesitantly, “if you don’t mind my asking…what happened to them?”

“What? You don’t _know_?” Madam Longbottom said. “Neville, haven’t you told your friends about your parents?”

“We never asked, ma’am,” Hermione said quickly as she saw Neville become even more uncomfortable.

“Well, that’s no excuse,” she said imperiously. “You should be _proud_ , Neville. _Proud!_ Your parents gave up their health and sanity to protect their son. There’s no need for you to be ashamed of them.”

“I’m not ashamed,” Neville said.

Harry and Hermione were also taking a closer look at Frank and Alice. A sense of something not being quite right started to tingle. A quick look told them their parents were thinking the same thing.

“My son and his wife,” Madam Longbottom said, “were tortured into insanity by You-Know-Who’s followers. They were Aurors, you know—highly gifted, both of them…”

The alarm bells started ringing louder. “Tortured?” Emma said in confusion, interrupting Augusta’s praise for her family. “Forgive me, but pain by itself doesn’t do that.”

“Well, the Cruciatus Curse certainly does.” Augusta clearly wasn’t shy about discussing this in front of the two seemingly-oblivious victims.

“But that doesn’t…Something doesn’t sound right…” Emma trailed off uncertainly.

“I can’t see what the problem is.”

“Who’s the, uh, Healer in charge of this ward?” Dan asked.

“Miriam Strout, sir. How can I help you?” A fussy, motherly-looking woman came up to them. She sounded sweet, but very busy from looking after all the patients.

“Well, my wife and I both have some, er, muggle Healer’s training, and we were just wondering if you could tell us what these two have been diagnosed with.”

“Oh, the Longbottoms?” Strout said. “Poor dears. Extreme Cruciatus exposure. They’re insane—plum out of their minds. We’ve been trying to help, of course, but there’s not much that can be done for a case like that. But they do have such a nice family, visiting every week.”

That response confirmed something was wrong. What Harry and Hermione only vaguely understood, Dan and Emma knew well: Frank and Alice looked like textbook late-stage Alzheimer’s patients with some symptoms of Parkinson’s on the side.

“Yes, I’m afraid there’s not really anything they can do,” Augusta said. “The important thing is that we uphold their legacy. Isn’t that right, Neville?”

Neville didn’t say anything.

“Madam Longbottom,” Emma said, “this may sound like a strange question, but have you ever had them examined by a muggle doctor?”

Both of the other women stopped. “What?” Augusta said. “The ones who cut people up? Why on earth would we do that?”

“No, no, those are _surgeons_ ,” Emma said, feeling rather offended as a dentist who did some of that herself. “Doctors examine the body, try to understand illnesses, and prescribe medicines, much like your Healers.”

“Oh, but I can’t imagine they could do any better than we could, dear,” Strout said.

“You’d be surprised. I think they just might.”

“I’m sorry, Mrs…”

“Granger.”

“Well, Mrs. Granger,” Strout said, turning stern, “I fail to see what muggle Healers could do that we can’t.”

“Well, they could get the diagnosis right, for one.”

Silence filled the ward—as silent as a psych ward ever is, anyway. A fur-faced woman in a nearby bed started barking. Neville stared at Emma with open mouth, shocked at the implication.

“The diagnosis?” Augusta said suspiciously. “Are you suggesting we have their diagnosis _wrong?_ After twelve years?”

The Grangers hesitated, worried that they had gone too far, but slowly, Dan responded, “Madam Longbottom, we don’t mean to cause any further pain for you or Neville. It’s just that we’re concerned about what we’re seeing. In the muggle world, insanity isn’t a diagnosis; it’s a symptom. Now, the Cruciatus Curse may be the underlying cause here, but the fact remains…” he looked to his wife for help.

“The fact remains, ma’am,” Emma continued, “that it should be _obvious_ your son and his wife aren’t suffering from insanity. They’re suffering from _dementia_. Severe memory loss. There are several muggle diseases that can cause it.”

“Memory loss? Oh, Mrs. Granger,” Strout said patronisingly. “I understand if you’re not that familiar with mind healing, but I’ve dealt with cases of accidental total Obliviation before, and they were nothing like the Longbottoms. They could still walk and talk normally, for example—”

“No, ma’am, I think my Mum might be right,” Hermione spoke up suddenly as her mind started working. “That sounds like amnesia, but that’s only one kind of memory. If that’s how Obliviation works, then we know there are other kinds of memory in the brain that Obliviation never touches—like how to walk and talk, or in more severe cases, even how to eat and how to breathe. If the Longbottoms sustained brain damage from the curse, it could have affected those things, too, but unless you have really good diagnostic charms for the brain, we’d need a muggle MRI scan to be sure, right Mum?” He mother nodded.

“An MRI?” Augusta said. “What is that?”

“Oh, it’s a machine that can take pictures of your brain from outside your head,” Harry said.

Augusta and Strout were shocked.

“You can do that?” Strout said.

“Is that safe, Mr. Potter?” Augusta added.

“Sure, our doctors do it all the time. Maybe it could tell us something new.”

“You know, kids, I think that’s a very good idea,” Dan agreed. “Madam Longbottom, I think a muggle MRI it might be able to give you some valuable information.”

If Healer Strout was intimidated by seeing Harry Potter and his family, she didn’t show it. As nice as she usually was, this was her domain. “You mean to tell me,” she said incredulously, “that you want to take two of my patients to these muggle…“doctors,” and put them in a machine that can somehow take pictures of their _brains_ and then you think they could help with their muggle potions?”

“Yes, pretty much,” Harry replied.

Neville looked at his two friends and their parents, still reeling and trying to figure out what was going on. They had come in here for the first time today and within an hour had come up with an alternative explanation for what was wrong with his own parents, all whilst accusing the best Healers in Britain of getting it wrong for the past twelve years. Ordinarily, that screamed, “crackpot,” and his Gran looked about to make that very remark, but he needed to know for sure. He jumped ahead of her and said, “D-do you really think they could help?”

Hermione reached out and laid a comforting hand on his shoulder. He blushed and his eyes flicked to it once, then back to her face. “I don’t know,” she said. “It’s hard to say. They probably can’t do much, to be honest. Muggles don’t know much about reversing brain damage…but there are medicines that are designed to fix abnormal brain function. They could probably at least fix the tremors, and…depending on what else is wrong with them, maybe they could do more.”

Augusta was surprised by this show of interest from her grandson. She’d been about to dismiss the Grangers’ claims out of hand, but something in the back of her mind told her that maybe this was an unfair prejudice that she still held onto. And after all, Harry Potter had done the impossible more than once before. “What are you thinking, Neville?” she asked with genuine curiosity.

Neville’s voice was soft, but it came out firmly: “I…I trust Harry and Hermione, Gran.” He gave Hermione an awkward half hug, somewhat to her surprise, and broke away and faced her. “I think we should try it like they say. It can’t hurt, can it?”

“Well, Neville…” Augusta said, unsure of where to go from here, “I admire your interest in your parents’ well-being, but I’m quite leery to trust these muggle machines.”

Neville’s face rapidly turned downcast. His grandmother was not an easy woman to convince. Harry wished he could do more for his friend when he got an idea. “Madam Longbottom?” he said. “What if I did it first?”

* * *

Harry didn’t realise how big of an impression he must have made on the Healers. He, Harry Potter, volunteered to undergo what they saw as a strange new medical procedure on a whim in order to help out his friend’s family whom he had just met. He didn’t see it that way. The way he saw it, he was just getting a harmless medical scan as a favour to one of his best friends. He would be out a fair bit of money, but even that Neville was trying to convince his Gran to pay for him.

In any case, the word of Harry Potter could move mountains…of paperwork. A few days later, he was at a muggle hospital inside an MRI machine, which was comfortable enough, but very loud, and Madam Longbottom had signed Frank and Alice out of St. Mungo’s to bring them here for evaluation. They could be moved out of the ward for short periods at any time, but there had never really been any need before.

To be honest, Harry wasn’t sure what the doctors would find. Was there anything different about a magical brain? Maybe, but somehow he doubted it. Wizards and muggles just thought too much alike. And besides, muggle-borns must occasionally get MRIs before they found out about magic, right? Anything weird would show up right away. So he didn’t expect the scans to come out and the neurologist to say, “What the hell is _that_?”

“Excuse me?” Harry said.

“What’s wrong?” Dan and Emma said in unison.

“This is…I’ve never seen anything…” The doctor trailed off and had Harry pulled out of the machine. Once he was able to look at him directly, he said, “That scar on your forehead—how did you get it?”

“Um…in a…car crash?” Harry said worriedly. He didn’t like where this was going at all. “Is there something wrong?”

“Well, I don’t know about wrong, but it _does_ look…odd. Have you ever had your head x-rayed?”

“No.”

“I think maybe you should.”

Fifteen minutes later, the doctor had both and x-ray and an MRI scan for Harry. He showed his family the x-ray first. There, plain as day above the right eye socket, was a thin, dark grey line in the shape of a lightning bolt.

“My scar in in my skull?” Harry said.

“That’s no ordinary cut on your forehead, Mr. Potter. That’s for sure,” the doctor said. “This goes clean through the bone. I’ve never seen a car crash do that…It looks like it was cut with a _jigsaw_ , but with the MRI…”

That was strange enough already. The Grangers had never had a reason to think Harry’s scar was more than skin deep, but then, they’d never bother to try to get it cosmetically altered or anything either. “What about it?” Emma pressed.

“Well, it’s his brain that’s the really strange part.” The doctor showed them a front view of Harry’s brain, and they gasped. The various grooves in the brain’s surface varied from person to person, but they were usually pretty close to symmetrical. These weren’t. Right there in the right frontal lobe was a groove that looked deeper than the rest—a groove in the shape of a lightning bolt.

“It’s in my _brain_?” Harry said worriedly, touching his forehead.

“How is that possible?” Dan asked.

“I have no idea,” the doctor replied. “As near as I can tell, that sulcus goes all the way through his frontal lobe, the grey matter and the white matter, and it’s lined up perfectly with the scar on his skin, but they can’t possibly be from the same cause.”

“Why not?”

“Because, Mr. Granger, the area around the scar in the skull looks like actual scar tissue. It was definitely cut by _something_. But this groove in his brain looks like healthy brain tissue. It looks like his brain _grew_ that way.”

“Well…well, is it a problem?” Emma asked.

“I wouldn’t think so. If it hasn’t affected his development yet, I doubt it will in the future. I just don’t see how it can be there in the first place.”

Emma sighed: “Thank you, Doctor. We were actually hear for our friends, the Longbottoms, though?”

“That’s right…” He switched files. “The…terrorist victims?” he said suspiciously. Without any muggle records it was hard to come up with a plausible story. “Well, I don’t have any more to say on your son’s scan. Just that you might want to get him another MRI every couple years. Let’s go get your friends prepped.”

When the Grangers came out into the waiting room, Neville immediately jumped from his seat. “Harry,” he said, “what took so long? Did something go wrong?”

“No, no, Neville,” he said. “I just found out my scar goes all the way into my brain.”

“What? H-h-how?”

“No idea. I’ll have to ask Professor Dumbledore about it. Anyway, they’re ready for you parents.”

Frank and Alice Longbottom showed obvious discomfort at being placed in the loud and cramped MRI machine, but they otherwise suffered no ill effects. Afterwards, the doctor met with Augusta and Neville and explained the situation.

“Just to look at it, I’d say this looks like severe seizure damage,” he said. That wasn’t surprising, since that’s essentially how the Cruciatus Curse worked. What _was_ surprising was that the St. Mungo’s Healers had failed to articulate that finding for so long. “Now, the good news is that there is surprisingly little atrophy of the brain tissue. The bad news is that there’s really no way we know of to repair the damage. There are a few things we can try that _might_ do something. We can give them L-DOPA for the tremors. That should almost certainly work, although the side effects can be a bit harsh. As for their memories, we can _try_ putting them on tacrine and memantine. Those are the leading Alzheimer’s drugs. They might help them clear their heads a bit; they might even help them form and retain new memories better, but it’s frankly a long shot to get back anything that they’ve lost. I’m sorry, but that’s the best I can do.

Augusta talked the matter over with the Grangers and with Neville. Upon hearing the options, the Grangers were in favour of trying it, and Neville’s answer remained the same as before: “I trust Harry and Hermione.”

* * *

The Grangers sincerely hoped the muggle treatments would be able to help the Longbottoms, but it was a long-shot. Still, they decided to make a courtesy visit to Longbottom Manor on New Year’s Eve before Sirius’s party in order to see how things were going.

“Well, I must say,” Augusta Longbottom said, “it was a good thing you warned us about those “side effects’ or we would’ve stopped those muggle potions faster than you can say “bloody quacks.” As it was, it took quite a lot of effort to convince the Healers that we weren’t poisoning Frank and Alice. Do all muggle potions do that?”

“Usually not that bad, but many of them do,” Dan said.

“Such a pity you can’t do things properly. In any case, the Healers are giving them an Anti-Nausea Potion to stop the digestive trouble and a long-term-use Wit-Sharpening Potion to reverse the increased confusion. Of course, the Healers aren’t happy that they’re having to give them five potions a day for permanent use, and those little pills really overcomplicate things, don’t you think?”

“Believe it or not, that’s fairly light for muggles in poor health,” Emma said, feeling insulted. Older, set-in-their-ways witches like Augusta tended to do that to people. “Many muggles take more than that. So how are they doing?”

“Much to the Healers’ surprise, a bit better, which is why they’re still going along with it. Frank’s tremors are nearly gone; Alice is walking more confidently; and they seem to be thinking a bit clearer, although it’s hard to tell.”

Neville spoke up: “We visited again today. I thought my Dad almost made sense. I know they look better. The doctors said it might take months for the memory part to work, if it does at all, but…thank you. I didn’t think I’d ever see any improvement from them.”

“We’re happy to help, Neville,” Hermione said. “We’re just glad we could do something for them, even if it’s only a little.”

Neville smiled.

“Hey, Neville,” Harry jumped in, “while we’re here, we should talk wands.”

“Wands?” Augusta said.

“Yes, ma’am. We know Neville’s been using his dad’s wand at school, and we were thinking he’d do better in class if he had his own wand.”

Augusta looked at her grandson in surprise. “Neville, is there something wrong with your father’s wand?” she said intimidatingly.

Hermione saved him: “I’m sure it’s a perfectly good wand, ma’am, but it just doesn’t suit Neville well. I’m sure you know what Mr. Ollivander always says: the wand chooses the wizard. You know how Harry and I are good at wandless magic, right?” She nodded. “Well, we can sense magical energies, too. Mr. Ollivander told us that heirloom wands never work as well as those that are personally matched, and we can tell just by touching that he’s right.”

Augusta wasn’t swayed. “And why shouldn’t Frank’s wand be a good match for Neville?”

“Even fathers and sons can turn out very different, ma’am,” Harry said. “According to Sirius, my mum thought my dad was an arrogant toerag until sixth year, and I’ve always tried not to be.”

“Actually, I’ve been thinking about that,” Hermione added. “Neville, do you have your mum’s wand?”

“Of course, I’ll go get it.”

A minute later, Neville brought both of his parents’ wands out, and Augusta Longbottom observed a strange sight as Hermione lightly ran her fingers up and down her grandson’s arm.

“Hmm…” Hermione said. “Neville, what was your dad’s best subject in school?”

“Herbology and Transfiguration,” Augusta answered for him. “Frank was very good at both.”

“And what about his Mum, ma’am?”

“Charms, mostly, although she was very gifted, too.”

“Well that explains it,” Hermione said. “I’ve seen you, Neville. You’re better at Charms than Transfiguration. And that means your mum’s wand is a better match for you than your dad’s—still not perfect, though. You’d still do better with your own wand.”

Neville and his Gran both frowned.

“I thought it might be something like that,” Harry said. “You’re like me, Nev. My dad was good at Transfiguration, and my mum was good at Charms, too. And I take more after my mum, with the wandless stuff.”

Neville’s mood visibly improved at being compared with Harry Potter, and Augusta was forced to reconsider him. After so many years of pushing him to be like his father, this was something of a disappointment to Augusta. She loved Alice like her own, of course, but she’d always wanted so much to see Frank in Neville. She’d been pleased that he started working harder and training himself after he made friends with Harry and Hermione in his first year, but even then she had to wonder if she was in denial about how much like Alice he was. “You’re making some bold claims there, Lord Potter,” she said. “I wouldn’t expect one of your age to know so much about wand lore. Now, I admit that Neville has not been doing as well as I had hoped at school, but I do have to wonder how you could possibly demonstrate any of that.”

“Well, Professor Dumbledore will be at the party tonight, ma’am,” Hermione said. “What if we ask him to quiz Neville with both wands?”


	73. Slughorn's Memory

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not JK Rowling?

_“A very interesting proposal, Mr. Bagman. Run it by David Monroe, and if he agrees, I think we can arrange adequate funding. I don’t think Dumbledore will give you any trouble.”_

* * *

The New Year’s Party was as exciting as ever. Everybody who was anybody was at Grimmauld Place, except for people Sirius didn’t like. The Lovegoods were there, doing their best to confuse everyone. What had started as a prank with Stubby Boardman two years ago had turned into a standing invitation, mostly at Harry’s behest.

“Dad thinks Fenrir Greyback is setting up a three-way fight to the finish between his pack, the Rotfang Conspiracy, and the Hitwizards,” Luna told Sirius. “Vampires and werewolves are natural enemies, you know. As soon as the Aurors turn on the Hitwizards, Greyback will make his move and storm the Ministry while it’s vulnerable and finish off the rest from a position of strength.”

“Um…I don’t think so, Luna,” Sirius said, trying to play along on her terms. “He, uh, wouldn’t be able to pull that off unless he had Wolfsbane Potion, and they keep that locked down tighter than a dragon reserve.”

Luna’s eyes grew wider than usual with apparent shock. “Don’t you know?” She said. “Greyback already has an agent in the Ministry. It’s in this month’s issue of the _Quibbler_.”

“An agent in the Ministry?” Remus said. “Who is it?”

“Dolores Umbridge.”

“What?!”

“Oh yes, it’s obvious that she hates werewolves so much because she’s in denial about being one herself. Half of the Magical Creatures Department knows, but they’re covering it up because she’s having an affair with the Minister, and he can have the Department of Mysteries poison anyone who speaks out against him—”

At this point, Harry started coughing because he had snorted punch out of his nose, and Remus started laughing so hard he couldn’t stay on his feet. “Oh, Merlin’s beard!” the werewolf gasped. “Now I can’t unsee it!”

“That may be the most disturbing thing I’ve ever heard,” Sirius said.

“Come on, Luna,” Harry said once he got himself cleaned off. “I think it’s time we taught you about something called Hanlon’s Razor.”

“What’s that, Harry?” she asked.

“Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity. Or in other words, it’s usually the wrackspurts’ fault.” Luna started chuckling at the joke and soon doubled over laughing. Harry couldn’t help but smile. Luna’s laughter was infectious. Probably due to nargles, he thought.

Soon after, they ran into Neville, who was just coming back from his evaluation with Professor Dumbledore. To their surprise, he hugged Hermione and gave Harry a slap on the back. “Great news, guys,” he said. “Dumbledore said you were right. My mum’s wand works better for me than my dad’s. She didn’t say yet, but I think I can convince my Gran to buy me one of my own, now.”

“Oh, that’s great, Neville,” Hermione said. “I’m glad we could help.”

“You really should get a new wand, Neville,” Luna spoke up. “An imperfectly-matched wand can attract Magic Leeches.”

Everyone stopped and stared at her.

“Um, I don’t know about that, Luna,” Harry replied, “but I know he’ll be better at spells with his own wand.”

“I believe that is what I said,” she replied.

However, they didn’t get a chance to try to decipher Luna’s mind because Professor Dumbledore arrived with a large man with a walrus moustache and a fez. “Ah, Harry, Hermione,” the Headmaster said. “I believe you remember my old friend, Horace Slughorn. I was hoping we four might be able to have a private chat.”

“Oh, right, secret business,” Harry said. “We’ll see you guys later.”

 

_The Grangers had discussed Slughorn with Sirius and Remus before the party. There were a number of things they needed to know, like what valuable secrets he might know, and how they could get him to tell them._

_“Well, Slughorn was a pretty good teacher,” Sirius said. “He’s very knowledgeable. He can brew Felix Felicis flawlessly. The thing is, I don’t think it’s ever been just about teaching for him. He ran something called the Slug Club, which was basically a club for the rich and talented kids—anyone who had good connections or whom he thought would be future movers and shakers of the wizarding world. Your mother was in it, Harry.”_

_“She was?”_

_“Well, she_ was _the best in our year,_ _” Remus explained. “Slughorn was maintaining a network—a network of influential people to make sure he always got invited to the best parties, heard the best insider information on everything, and received the best Christmas gifts from his former students.”_

_“That’s a little creepy,” Harry said. “It almost sounds like a more benign version of Voldemort.” He explained how he and Hermione had seen in the memories that Voldemort had built a network of students in school and wanted to teach to recruit from the next generation._

_“Wow, that’s almost too similar,” Sirius said, “but it’s the same Slytherin ambition at work, I guess. Lucky for us, Slughorn’s not evil, just hedonistic. Anyway, I’m sure he’d jump at the chance to befriend Harry Potter. He positively adored your mum—thought she was going to be a brilliant Potions Mistress.” He sighed. “He might’ve been right, too.”_

_“Do you have any idea what he might have told Riddle?” Hermione asked._

_“Not really,” Remus said, “but Slughorn’s very well-read. Almost as well-read as Dumbledore. He knows a lot about the Dark Arts, although I suspect it’s just to show off.”_

_“Yeah, but if Riddle was as brilliant in school as you say, I’m sure he had Slughorn wrapped around his little finger,” Sirius said._

Harry and Hermione hoped that would be enough information to get what they needed out of Slughorn. It certainly helped to have Dumbledore on their side, though, as he described their progress in school to the larger man. It also helped that the indulgent Slughorn already had a few drinks in him.

“I’m sure you’re familiar with young Harry’s career, Horace,” the Headmaster said. “The youngest Seeker in a century at Hogwarts, and as yet undefeated on the pitch, Order of Merlin, Third Class, upgraded to Second Class after defeating the basilisk of Slytherin, exerting a not inconsiderable influence in the Wizengamot and on the Board of Governors, even at his young age. But you have perhaps not heard that he and his sister are even more skilled in wandless magic than Lily was.”

Slughorn’s eyebrows rose. “Truly, Albus?” he asked. “Better than Lily?”

“Indeed. Perhaps you might be able to give Professor Slughorn a small demonstration, Harry?”

Harry kept it (relatively) simple. He drained his glass and then levitated it wandlessly for Slughorn to see. He then applied a Drying Charm, made it dance around the table, deliberately cracked it, and then repaired it.

“Marvellous!” Slughorn said. “Truly marvellous! I haven’t seen that kind of talent in decades.”

It was a lot more hard work than talent, the teens thought, but they kept that to themselves.

“One thing that is _not_ publicly known, Horace, is that Harry and Hermione have also become quite proficient in the skill of Occlumency,” Dumbledore added with a smile.

“Occlumency?” he said in surprise. “So young, Albus?”

“They were highly motivated. And since they have learnt this skill, we have been having a very interesting time examining some old memories in my collection,” the older man said innocently.

Slughorn closed off at once. “Now, see here, Albus,” he said, “I know what this is about. I appreciate the chance to get to know these two fine young people better, but I already told you I have nothing more to say about that memory.”

Harry snorted derisively.

“What? He showed it to you, did he?” he asked the students. They both nodded. “And I suppose he gave you some cock-and-bull story about it being tampered with?”

“Um, honestly, sir, it was kind of obvious,” Hermione said timidly.

“Well, I’m afraid you’re mistaken there, Miss,” he said, barely containing his anger. “I’m an old man, and my memory goes foggy sometimes.”

“Professor Dumbledore showed us memories from people older than you are, and they were fine,” Harry observed.

“Well, not all of us can be so lucky, Harry. I’m telling you, I know nothing— _nothing_ —about horcruxes.”

“And you wouldn’t tell us even if you did?” Harry said.

Slughorn stopped and stared at him nervously. He of course remembered inserting that line in the memory he had given Dumbledore.

“That _does_ seem an odd thing to say, sir,” Hermione said, “at least to a student whom you had no reason to suspect of any nefarious purpose. After all, it’s no secret that Riddle was a favourite until he graduated. He was even Head Boy. It’s not hard to piece together what happened. Riddle asked you about Horcruxes, and since you thought he was a bright and promising student, you told him what you knew. But then he went on to use that knowledge for evil. So really, we already know your secret, Professor.”

“Exactly,” Harry caught her drift. “You weren’t the first or the last person Voldemort charmed with his lies.” Slughorn flinched at the name.

“Look, it isn’t a question…” he started. “No purpose can be served…”

“It can,” Harry said. “Voldemort’s still out there. I’ve seen him.” Slughorn gasped and covered his mouth with his hand. “Professor Dumbledore’s shown us the memories he collected. We don’t really understand them yet, but we trust him when he says he needs that information to get rid of Voldemort for good. I need…” Harry trailed off before he could mention the prophecy, unsure of how much he could reveal. Slughorn began to give him a queer look, so he improvised. “For…for my parents,” he stammered. “I need to make sure he’s gone for good, for their sake. You liked my mother, didn’t you, Professor?”

“Liked her?” he said, teary-eyed. “I don’t think anyone could have met her and not liked her. Very smart, very funny…it was a terrible blow when she…”

Harry sensed an opportunity and rolled with it: “She gave her life for me. Did you know that, sir?”

Slughorn’s breath hitched. “I…I never heard anything about how…”

“Did you hear what happened at the end of my first year at Hogwarts?”

“I…no, what?”

Harry wasn’t sure he could get the words out just right, the way he wanted to say them, but he had an idea. He turned to Dumbledore and asked, “Professor, do you think it would be safe to show Professor Slughorn the unabridged version of my book? You know, so he could get a better idea of the situation?”

“Your book? What book?”

Dumbledore looked thoughtful. “Professor Slughorn _is_ an accomplished Occlumens, Harry, hence the memory,” he said, the twinkle returning to his eye for a moment. “I think we _could_ trust him with an _appropriate_ segment of that information, since he seems to be so good at keeping secrets.” Slughorn winced as Dumbledore twisted the knife. “Unfortunately, your manuscript is still in my office, so we will have to reschedule—”

“Actually, I think Remus still has a copy, Professor,” Harry said. “I’ll go check.” He rushed down the stairs and quickly tracked down Remus, who confirmed that he did still have a copy of Harry’s book in his bedroom. A few minutes later, he came back to Hermione, Slughorn, and Dumbledore. He opened the notebook to the last chapter, when he pursued Quirrellmort down the trap door to save Hermione, carefully skipping over the part that mentioned his animagus ability. “There, Professor,” he said, “I wrote this about how I ran into Voldemort in my first year.”

Over the next few minutes, Slughorn grew increasingly pale as he read about the spirit of Voldemort possessing Professor Quirrell and using Hermione as a hostage, then the fight over the Philosopher’s Stone—how close Voldemort had come to returning to power! And then Harry had seemingly miraculously defeated him, and Dumbledore’s explained the power of his mother’s sacrifice after he woke up.

“Merlin’s beard!” Slughorn gasped when Harry cut him off. “That…all that is true, Harry?” he said worriedly.

“Every word. You see, my mum gave her life for me, and when she did, she gave me a weapon to fight him. All I need from you is a memory, sir. That’ll help me fight him, too. Will you do it for her, sir? Will you do it for my mother?”

Slughorn stared at Harry nervously for a very long time. An average thirteen-year-old might have given up, but Harry was a cat at heart. He could fix a stare better than anyone, except perhaps McGonagall, and Dumbledore and Hermione wisely didn’t break it. Harry kept his unblinking stare on Slughorn for a long time, forcing him to be the first to respond. To him, it was a contest of dominance, and Slughorn, though older and wiser, was soft from a life of luxury, drunk, and in a delicate emotional state at the moment. It took a while, but the outcome was never in question.

Finally, Slughorn cracked. He extended a hand to Dumbledore and whispered, “Albus?”

Dumbledore drew a crystal phial from his robes and placed it in Slughorn’s hand. Then, Slughorn placed his wand to his temple and, with a pained expression, drew out a long, silvery thread of memory. “I am ashamed of what this memory shows,” he whispered. “I hope you don’t think too poorly of me when you see it.”

“Like Hermione said, Professor,” Harry said, “we can already guess most of it. Thank you very much.”

“You’re a good boy. You have her eyes…” The man glanced at Hermione, thinking of how Harry had charged after Voldemort himself to protect his sister. “…and her heart.”

* * *

“Why Sibyll, fancy meeting you down here,” Minerva McGonagall said as she patrolled the quiet halls of Hogwarts. “Have you decided to join the staff for the midnight celebration?”

“Perhaps, Minerva,” Sibyll Trelawney said airily. “I was feeling uncharacteristically stuffy in the North Tower this evening, and I decided to take a walk to clear my aura.”

Minerva suppressed the urge to roll her eyes. Sibyll needed _something_ cleared alright, in her opinion. “Well, enjoy your walk, Sibyll,” she said. “I daresay it will do you some good.”

They passed each other and began to walk away, when a strange, raspy voice rang out behind her: “ _It will happen tonight_!”

“What?” Minerva whirled around to see Sibyll staring at her, glassy-eyed behind her thick spectacles. She knew that look by description. She had a bad feeling about this.

“ _The Dark Lord lies alone and friendless, but his followers have not abandoned him. Even now, they seek him. Tonight, before midnight, master and servants shall be united once more. The Dark Lord will rise again by the magic of a distant land, greater and more terrible than ever he was, bringing horrors from all corners of the world. Tonight, before midnight, master and servants will be reunited and begin their quest_!”

Sibyll staggered as she snapped out of her trance. She looked like she might fall over, and Minerva rushed to support her.

“Ah, terribly sorry, Minerva dear. I think my aura needs more cleaning out than I thought. What was I saying?”

“Um, oh, you know, Sibyll,” Minerva replied uneasily, “just your usual impending doom for the coming year.”

“Oh, yes, of course.”

“Perhaps you should go and sit down. You’re looking a bit peaky tonight.” _And I should, too,_ Minerva thought. _I_ _’m going to need more than a wee dram tonight. Albus isn’t going to like this._

* * *

Months of searching the Balkans had brought the three Death Eaters to the deepest, darkest forests of Albania. Surprisingly, they hadn’t killed each other yet, but it was a near thing.

“It’s bloody New Year’s Eve,” Amycus Carrow complained. “Can’t we give it a rest for tonight?”

“No,” hissed the young Barty Crouch. “We’re close this time. Can’t you feel it?”

“All I feel is the bloody cold.”

“Ah, shut up and quit yer whingin’,” Alecto Carrow said, smacking her brother in the back of the head. “We’re livin’ loads better than we were last winter—warmer climate, and we got an elf for cookin’.”

“Yeah, well maybe if Barty would let us send her for snacks—”

“Not now!” Barty said. “We need to present our full number to the Dark Lord when we find him. Winky, keep up.”

Winky whimpered softly and picked up the pace. The elf was looking dirty and ragged, and her bare feet were in terrible condition. Barty Junior wasn’t particularly abusive, but they were living hard off the land, and she had been despairing for months at being forced to serve the dark wizards her former master had spent his whole life fighting, so she wasn’t taking good care of herself.

Barty could sense that the Dark Lord was close by the tingling in his Dark Mark. As the evening wore on, they had crept ever closer without seeing him. The silence in this stretch of forest was deeper than the rest. It was overgrown; a shadow seemed to lie over it, and the animals avoided it.

“If he’s here, then where is he?” Amycus growled. “We’ve been lookin’ up and down Albania—”

“Quiet!” Barty hissed.

It was then that they noticed it: a dark mist, darker than the night, flitted about through the branches, and whispers of evil murmurings were carried with it. It turned suddenly and approached them, rushing past them like a dusty wind. But then, it retreated into the forest. The Death Eaters stared at each other in confusion. Suddenly they heard the yelps of a wounded animal. Amycus and Alecto jumped, and Winky squeaked and hid behind Barty’s legs.

A rustling sound came towards them. They drew their wands and pointed them into the brush, and finally _something_ came out before them.

An aura of evil radiated from it. It was as big as a medium-sized dog, but lean and wrinkled, with only scattered tufts of hair on its body. It had a pointed head with large ears set on an unusually long neck that swivelled, serpentine-like, back and forth. Its jaws were lined with yellow teeth. It looked half-dead, but it trotted forward with confidence and sat on its haunches, staring at the Death Eaters with glowing red eyes.

Amycus and Alecto stepped back at this demonic sight, but Barty stood his ground. He recognised the animal. It was, he was quite certain, a mangy, hairless European jackal. As for what the animal signified, his hopes were confirmed soon enough, when the jackal opened its jaws and began to speak with human speech.

“Three of my servants return to me after so many years,” it said. “Amycus Carrow. Alecto Carrow. And Bartemius Crouch Junior. What a…pleasant surprise. Three Death Eaters return to Lord Voldemort at last.”

“Master, we are so joyed to finally find you,” Barty said, falling on his knees before the jackal.

“You are joyed, you say? And yet you have tarried so long,” Voldemort replied mirthlessly. “Can you then give an account of your actions for the past twelve years?”

Barty looked the jackal straight in its red eyes so that his memories would be open to his lord and said, “I can, my Master. My father sentenced me to rot in Azkaban, but broke me out upon the pleas of my mother. For eleven years, he held me captive in my own home, bound under the Imperius Curse. But then I was freed by a happy accident, and as soon as I was free, I killed that bastard and came to seek you. See here, I have also brought our elf, Winky, to help aid you in whatever way we may.” Winky had fallen face-down, trying to hide herself from the terror of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.

“Ah, a faithful servant then,” Voldemort spoke in a way that was probably as close as he ever got to affection. “You have done well, Barty. But Amycus and Alecto, I know that you were not sent to Azkaban. What account can you give?”

“We-we-we were lookin,’” Amycus stammered.

“Yes, Master,” Alecto added quickly. “As soon as we realised you were still…working, we packed our things and started looking for you.”

“And yet you still sat idle for ten years,” the Dark Lord said harshly, deducing the rest of the story. “For ten years, you lost faith and only came looking when you had reason to fear retaliation. Cowards, and lazy—”

“My Lord, we have searched far and wide—” Alecto said.

“Silence! Your crimes deserve severe punishment, but I cannot afford to waste followers now. Repay to me your years of cowardice, and all will be forgiven, just as I will make the cowards who have not yet returned pay as well.”

“What is your bidding, my Lord,” Barty asked. “Surely, you have a way to return to power?”

“That is a complicated matter, my faithful servant, and there is other work to be done first. This animal is too weak to sustain me. I have been holding it captive for weeks, only possessing it when I needed it, but it is still dying. However, now that my Death Eaters have returned, I can do better. A snake may be prepared to serve as a much better host with a very simple ritual requiring the blood of a wizard, a live ashwinder, and the entrails of a warm-blooded predator. This jackal is too weak to serve, but a cat will do, for example.”

* * *

“Professor Dumbledore,” Harry said, when they rejoined his parents. “There’s something else we needed to talk to you about.”

“There was?” the old wizard said.

“Yes, sir. When we were trying to help the Longbottoms this week, I had a brain scan done…”

Dumbledore quickly threw up some privacy charms as the Grangers explained about the x-ray and the MRI scan, putting into terms he could understand just what was strange about Harry’s head. It sounded very worrying to him. He had an inkling of what was going on, but he needed to scan the boy with a certain magical instrument to be sure. He didn’t think he would like the results.

“Well, Harry,” he said at last, “I think the muggle doctor was correct: if your scar has not affected you yet, it is not likely to do so in the future. You are a very bright and well-adjusted boy with or without your scar, and so I think you should not worry yourself.”

If only the lack of influence on his personality could extend to the rest of his life.

* * *

By morning, Voldemort’s spirit was residing comfortably in the body of an enormously engorged meadow viper. In fact, the housing was so comfortable that the thought crossed his mind that he might like to leave a piece of himself here permanently. After all, he wasn’t one to shy away from such experiments so long as he had a backup. But he would worry about that later.

“Muchhh betterrrr,” he hissed, still in human speech. “I will travel muchshh betterrr in thisss form. But thisss isss only a ssstart. I require a ssstill sssuperior form, one that can wield a wand, and then to find a method to return me to my full ssstrength.”

“But surely you know, my Lord,” Barty said.

“Lord Voldemort knowsss many thingssss, but I mussst be cccertain of having the bessst method before I act. Too often, actttionsss done without thinking lead to disssassster, asss Potter ssshows. Sssome monthsss ssstudying necromantic practicccesss around the world will be a sssmall priccce to pay for sssuch cccertainty. Asss for the firssst part, there isss a caccche of writingsss in Sssalzzzburg that containsss the information I require. We will proccceed there at onccce.”

Barty grinned at finally being able to take action. He turned to Amycus, Alecto, and Winky, who were finishing their breakfast and said, “Well, what are you waiting for? You heard him. Allons-y!”

* * *

Hogwarts was a bustle of activity again after the students returned from Christmas holidays. Grades from the midterm examinations were posted, and the competition was tighter than ever for the top three spots in the third year. Or rather, for the second spot. Hermione was still the undisputed top of the class, but the second-in-the-class slot was filled by a name that hadn’t been there before: Harry Potter.

“Hey, Potter! How did you get ahead of me?” said Anthony Goldstein, who had been second in the class since first year, was not particularly happy about this development. He wasn’t exactly the type to make a big fuss about it, but he was a Ravenclaw, and he wanted answers.

“I don’t know,” Harry replied. “What were your exam scores?”

After a couple minutes comparing marks, they found the source of the change. Since Snape was being forced both to teach better and to grade more fairly this year, Harry’s potions grade was significantly higher. That also meant he had been graded low the previous two years, and therefore, he had possibly rightfully been in second place all along.

“You’re joking!” Anthony said. “Well, we’ll just see who gets the better marks at the end of the spring,” he said with a disturbingly Hermione-like gleam in his eye.

“Um, sure, I guess we will,” Harry said.

Other than that, though, things were pretty normal, except that Hermione had suddenly and inexplicably picked up Harry’s carnivorous dietary preferences, with and even stronger affinity for fish. The pair hoped that people would not get too suspicious. Of course, only Professor McGonagall would be likely to notice the signs of a newly-minted animagus, but people started to whisper that Harry’s personality was starting to rub off on Hermione, or that he was controlling her with dark magic, which was silly because no one could control Hermione Granger.

In any case, Dumbledore called Harry and Hermione into his office that weekend to view Slughorn’s memory. They watched the untampered memory carefully as Tom Riddle, speaking with a casual tone and flattering words, wheedled the information he wanted out of Slughorn. A horcrux, the professor explained, was an object containing a piece of the caster’s soul, created by the abominable act of splitting their soul through an act of ritual murder. While the horcrux existed, its creator could not die. If their body was killed, they would go on in spirit form, just like the thing that had possessed Quirrell—or so they suspected.

But Tom Riddle wasn’t content with the idea of one horcrux. He enquired if it wouldn’t be better to have one’s soul divided into seven pieces. To that, Slughorn recoiled in horror and quickly, though politely, ended the conversation. But even so, Riddle looked inordinately happy with the results, even if he didn’t seem to have got everything he wanted. But that was the entirety of the memory.

“The final piece of the puzzle,” Dumbledore said softly. The way the portraits of the former Headmasters were all listening in, more intently than ever before, gave a new meaning to the phrase, “The walls have ears.” “I have been waiting for this evidence for quite some time, as it confirms the theory from which I have been working these past two years.”

“So you think he did it, then?” Harry asked. “He made a horcrux?”

“Or he made six of them?” Hermione said.

Harry paled in horror: “Or seven?”

“No, six. Seven pieces total.”

“Oh, right. Six horcruxes, then?”

“That seems to have been his intent,” Dumbledore confirmed. “And this is what truly sets Voldemort apart from other dark wizards, for never have I ever heard an account of a wizard making more than a single horcrux—of splitting his soul more than once.”

“And they have to be destroyed before Voldemort can die for good?”

“Succinctly put.”

“But…but how? How can we even _find_ them?”

“Ah, as to that, we have been fortunate to make some progress. You see, Harry, you have already destroyed one.”

“What?” Harry and Hermione yelled in unison.

Dumbledore reached into his desk and pulled out a tattered, ink-stained book will a large hole burnt through it as if by acid.

“Riddle’s diary,” Harry gasped.

“The diary was a horcrux?” Hermione said.

“Yes. The signs were clear after the fact. A mere memory does not think for itself and attack students. Nor does it possess a young girl and sap the life out of her. That takes something far more sinister.”

“That’s what Bill Weasley was thinking,” Harry said in understanding. “He recognised it was a horcrux.”

“Indeed. I have begun corresponding with William in case his services are needed in pursuit of this problem, though they have so far not been. In any case, events took a very favourable turn when you were in the Chamber of Secrets, Harry. Horcruxes are nearly indestructible, being protected with powerful dark magic, but one of the few things that can destroy them is basilisk venom. In doing so, you not only saved young Ginevra’s life, but you also destroyed a portion of Voldemort’s soul.”

Harry looked proud and a little queasy at the same time.

“However, this was not what first led me to the theory of horcruxes,” Dumbledore continued, “for just as you have destroyed one, so I have destroyed one.” Here, he took out a twisted, half-melted lump of metal and dropped it on the desk. The two teens didn’t recognise it at first, but he explained, “This _was_ the locket of Salazar Slytherin that you saw in the memory.”

Hermione made the connection at once. “His collection,” she said. All of these strange lessons suddenly fell into place. “He was collecting artifacts to use as horcruxes.”

“Very good, Hermione. Artifacts of great historical and material value, and with great purported magical powers. Voldemort would likely have thought they would be intrinsically strong, and that people would be more reluctant to destroy them. Sadly, we cannot afford such sentimentality in this case.

“I was very lucky to come by this in your first year. As it happens, your godfather found it in Grimmauld Place while he and Remus were cleaning the house and brought it to me. There is a very interesting story as to how it got there, but that is Sirius’s tale to tell. I destroyed it with Fiendfyre, and extremely dangerous spell that I only dared attempt over the open ocean, far from any human habitation. For a brief time after you fought with Professor Quirrell, Harry, I believed that Voldemort was gone for good, but Professor Snape showed me that his Dark Mark had not faded, meaning that he was still alive. That was when I knew that he had made multiple horcruxes.

“And finally, Sirius has also destroyed a horcrux.” Dumbledore placed the Gaunt Family Ring on the desk. The large black stone was cracked down the middle. “As you might suspect, it was hidden in the old Gaunt Shack that we visited last summer. Sirius used the Sword of Gryffindor—the same sword you used to slay the basilisk, Harry. Being goblin made, it absorbed some basilisk venom into the blade.”

“And then Hufflepuff’s Cup must be another one,” Hermione reasoned. “Do you know where it is? Or the other two?”

“Alas, I do not. Voldemort appears to have used significant locations from his life as hiding places—his mother’s home, a cave he visited as a boy, Malfoy Manor. I am examining his life to try to find other likely hiding places, but I have so far come up empty. As for _what_ the other two are, this is where it becomes complicated. You will noticed that Voldemort collected artifacts belonging to two of the Founders of Hogwarts—not just Slytherin, but Hufflepuff as well. Four artifacts from the four Founders would have had a powerful allure to Voldemort, and would have rounded out the required six. However, I have found no indication that any relics of Ravenclaw or Gryffindor are unaccounted for during Voldemort’s lifetime, so that stream has run dry. However there is some good news.”

“What’s that, Professor?” Harry asked.

“I do not believe Voldemort succeeded in making six horcruxes. I believe he only made five.”

Harry was confused: “Why is that, sir?”

“It appears to me that Voldemort reserved his horcruxes to be created from ‘significant’ murders,” Dumbledore lied. He had no reason to think that. His only evidence for this line of thought was from Harry himself. “You, Harry, would have certainly been significant to him—the child prophesied to have the power to defeat him. In killing you to create his final horcrux, he would not only be completing his seven-part soul, but also averting the prophecy. Voldemort is a strong believer in the magic of symbolism. Combining the two acts together to him would have represented to him the ultimate victory. But of course, we know that he failed, which left him with only five horcruxes.” Of course, the real reason for Dumbledore’s theory was that, if he was right about Harry, Voldmort must have made the preparations for the horcrux ritual that night before going to Godric’s Hollow. But so far as Harry needed to know, it came to the same thing.

“Okay, so there are two horcruxes left,” Harry summarised. “We only know _what_ one is, and we don’t know _where_ either of them are.”

“Correct, Harry; however, I am still working on both problems. You need not worry yourself about them at the moment. I have no definite plans, and certainly none that require your presence. But you now know all that I do—” Another lie, but he was going to keep his last secret. “—so you will be prepared should anything come up.”

“Well…thank you for tell us, Professor. We appreciate it,” Harry replied. He still didn’t understand what was supposed to happen. He was the one prophesied to be able to kill Voldemort, but he couldn’t very well do that if there were still horcruxes out there.

“Professor, there’s one thing I still don’t understand,” Hermione said.

“There is?” Dumbledore enquired.

“Something doesn’t make sense about the time line,” she said. “Riddle killed Myrtle at the end of his fifth year. From what Ginny said, it sounds like the diary didn’t go past there. So it seems like it was made a horcrux then.”

“Yes. I came to the same conclusion.”

“But Riddle talked to Professor Slughorn about horcruxes in his sixth year. He already should’ve known all about them by then.”

“Ah, but you should recall that Riddle particularly asked Professor Slughorn about _multiple_ horcruxes. I believe that during the intervening summer, Riddle tracked down and murdered his father and began the preparations for making a second horcrux then, but he hesitated, not knowing what it would do to him. After all, it had never been tried before. Perhaps it would have wrenched the entirety of his remaining soul from his body. And so he resolved to subtly ask Professor for his thoughts on the matter.”

“But Slughorn didn’t answer his question,” Harry protested.

“Didn’t he? I think it was less what he said and more what he did _not_ say that proved important.”

Hermione considered this, going back to the conversation in the memory and running through it in her mind. Dumbledore waited patiently for her (or Harry) to figure it out. Suddenly, she gasped: “He didn’t say it was impossible.”

Dumbledore smiled softly. “Yes, Hermione. He was horrified at the thought of murdering six people, and horrified at the thought of splitting one’s soul into seven pieces, but it never crossed his mind that it might not be possible, and that was good enough for Riddle.

“And now,” the Headmaster said, “it is growing late. Our sessions here are now complete, and I bid you enjoy the remainder of your year.”

The two teens thanked Dumbledore and left. Once they did, he rose from his seat and approached one of the silver instruments on the many spindly tables in his office. He tapped it with his wand, and it sprang to life, puffing out a cloud of smoke that coalesced into the shape of Harry Potter’s head and shoulders.

“In essence divided?” the old wizard asked the machine. The smoke-Harry divided at once into two forms, but the second one did not look like Harry at all. More like a stillborn foetus: bald, wrinkled, and emaciated, with large, red eyes, no nose, small ears, and almost no chin.

Dumbledore dismissed the apparition and sat back down with a heavy sigh, laying his head on his hands. That scan confirmed it: Harry Potter was _definitely_ a horcrux.

It pained him to lie to the boy like that, after he had failed him several times in the past, but if at all possible, he didn’t want to worry Harry or his family about it until he had a solution. He immediately began thinking of how he might be able to remove the horcrux from the boy without killing him. There were only four known ways to destroy a horcrux: basilisk venom, Fiendfyre, the Killing Curse, and a dementor. (Well, also remorse, but that didn’t seem to be in the cards.) Of those, only a dementor could even possibly separate the two souls from each other, and for that, the cost of a mistake would be far too great.

Perhaps if some kind of blood connection could be formed between Harry and Voldemort, it would tie Harry back to Voldemort’s life, but that would require Voldemort to have a restored body—a very unappealing prospect. Still, according to Sibyll’s latest prophecy, it looked like that day was coming, which was worrying enough in itself.

However, it was the muggle scans of Harry’s brain that were most intriguing, and, perhaps, a great stroke of luck. He understood that a piece of Voldemort’s soul had latched onto Harry’s, but what if that had manifested as a physical effect in his brain? What if the horcrux were localised to that scarred area? If so, perhaps it would be possible—he couldn’t believe he was thinking like those barbaric muggle surgeons—but perhaps it might be possible to cut out the affected part of Harry’s brain from his head and destroy it separately. It wouldn’t be hard to do whilst leaving the rest of his brain intact: it would be the only piece that was indestructible, and he could cut as close to it as he liked. But even then, it would be incredibly risky. Heaven only knew what cutting out a piece of Harry’s frontal lobe would do to him, even a diseased one, and that wasn’t even accounting for the bleeding and other complications. No that was something to be tried only as a last resort.

He would keep searching.

* * *

Meanwhile, Harry successfully pushed the matter from his mind. As far as he was concerned, no news was good news, or at least wasn’t bad. He was much more interested in the Quidditch season, and that was getting off to a furious start with the Slytherin versus Ravenclaw game the following weekend. Rumours were flying fast and furious about Draco Malfoy riding on a brand new Firebolt, and most of the school was assuming a Slytherin victory was a foregone conclusion.

Because of that, Harry decided Cho Chang needed some encouragement, so he again met her on the way to the pitch.

“Hey, Cho,” he said, “good luck out there.”

“Thanks, Harry,” she said uneasily. “I think I’m gonna need it. Is it true Malfoy really has a Firebolt?”

“Yeah, I’m afraid so. You know how rich families are,” he replied, trying to walk the line without saying too much about his own secret weapon. “Just do your best out there—and the rest of the team. It doesn’t always come down to the Seekers, you know.”

Cho forced a smile. “Thanks, Harry,” she said. She started off towards the pitch.

 _Come on, Harry, Gryffindor courage,_ he thought. “Cho! Hey, CHO!” he called after her. She stopped and turned back to look at him. “Er…there’s a Hogsmeade visit for Valentine’s weekend next month…d’you wanna come with me?”

Cho’s eyes grew to the size of saucers. Harry was worried he’d short circuited her brain. After all, the biggest celebrity of her generation had just asked her on a date. But suddenly, she let out a squeal: “Ooh! I’d love to Harry!”

“Great,” Harry said, breaking into a smile. “I’ll, uh, see you later.”

Ravenclaw fought valiantly that day, but Cho was just no match for Malfoy’s Firebolt. The blond Slytherin was blindingly fast on the pitch, and he’d always been good enough to give Harry a run for his money. Still it was closer than most expected: Ravenclaw only lost by eighty points, which left them still in the running for the Quidditch Cup. And Harry was in too good a mood even to let Malfoy winning get him down.

* * *

Fenrir Greyback was starting to get frustrated. He and his pack had had to lie low after Christmas. Attacking Hogsmeade two full moons in a row had drawn too much attention. It didn’t pay to stay in one place very long as a wild werewolf. But the information he needed was in Hogsmeade, at least since that Halloween newspaper article.

A werewolf had attended Hogwarts—fittingly one of his own “children.” That made him see things in a whole new light—not his philosophy—that wouldn’t change anytime soon—but the village, and the Shrieking Shack.

Point: everyone “knew” that the Shrieking Shack was a very old building, and the most haunted place in Britain.

Point: no one over the age of forty remembered actually visiting the Shrieking Shack during Hogsmeade weekends when they went to Hogwarts.

Point: there was now known to be a thirty-three-year-old werewolf who had attended Hogwarts.

Point: the hauntings at the Shrieking Shack were covered up by not always happening on the full moon, but the descriptions, particularly from the 1970s, sounded suspiciously like a caged werewolf.

Point: Fenrir Greyback didn’t get where he was by being stupid.

He had a hunch, and more than a hunch, that there was a secret passageway from the Shrieking Shack straight to the Hogwarts grounds, if only he could find it. If he could solve that puzzle, then half of his _coup de gr_ _âce_ would be in place.

As for the other half, well, he couldn’t just try to storm the castle as a dumb animal. He might manage to infect a couple of students, but he wouldn’t live long enough to make a real difference. For that, he needed two things: numbers and Wolfsbane.

That was hard, but he had a plan. One of his betas was secretly in negotiations with one Geri Lyles, trying to sway him to the cause. Geri was a “good werewolf,” and by “good,” he meant “domesticated.” He lived alone, far from other people, and had no family. He dutifully took his Wolfsbane Potion every month, even though he was struggling to make ends meet. He was trying to be a “model citizen,” and to someone like that, the new anti-werewolf bill was a slap in the face. This month, they were reportedly debating whether werewolves should be allowed to attend Hogwarts. That debate would surely raise some hackles all around, which was good for him.

Greyback desperately wanted to get his claws on a course of Wolfsbane Potion, for then, he could set his plan into motion.

In order to render the human mind fully in control, it was necessary to drink a dose of Wolfsbane Potion each day for the seven days before the full moon. But even a single dose had an effect—he hoped enough to bend the Wolf to his will—not enough to control it, but maybe to aim it. Ideally, he would experiment to make sure before carrying out his plan. If Greyback could get one full course of Wolfsbane, he could have a force of seven “aimed” werewolves at his disposal, and _that_ could deal a heavy blow…if he could figure out the Shrieking Shack.

The wizards feared he would create an army of muggle werewolves if he ever got a hold of Wolfsbane. That was an option, but not a good one. Wizards would have far less compunction about slaughtering an army of muggles by daylight, especially if they threatened their world. No, a new pack of school-aged wizards would be much better.

He kept searching the area by day, but he left when the full moon came, instead leading his pack on a wild hunt among the sparse population of a forest far from Scotland. A bit of random terror never hurt.

* * *

The solution to Lord Voldemort’s first problem, acquiring a body that could use a wand, was surprisingly, an exercise in alchemy. It was the great Swiss alchemist Paracelsus who invented the technique, which he had named the homunculus. Paracelsus’ original technique had required three hundred and twenty days to create a miniature living human body, but Voldemort was no slouch. He had taken alchemy in school, and so had Barty, and between them, they developed a number of improvements to shorten the time to just thirty-two days.

The first innovation was to use a human womb as an incubator, magically preserved and cut open for easy access, instead of the _venter equinus_ —a generic alchemical heat source. This was easily acquired from an unfortunate muggle tramp. Voldemort considered using Alecto for it, but he needed her alive, and he wasn’t sure he could modify the process to work _in situ_ without killing her. Next, there were a number of dark rituals to speed up development, easily extrapolated from the original instructions of incubating the body with human blood. They would leave the new body weaker, but with three Death Eaters and a house elf to tend him, Voldemort was not greatly concerned about that, and in any case, he was immortal; he could always try again. Finally, he added two ingredients that normally didn’t work so well together: unicorn blood would bind his soul to the homunculus, and snake venom from his giant meadow viper host (he had decided to name her Nagini) would nourish his taste for dark magic.

And now, after thirty-two days in Salzburg, the process was complete. Lord Voldemort emerged from the incubator twenty inches long, barely five pounds, and unable to stand on his own, but approximately human—human enough to use a wand. Unfortunately, his yew wand was under lock and key at the British Ministry, so he would have to settle for the wand of Barty Crouch Sr for now.

“Your wand, Barty,” the homunculus hissed with a strained voice.

“Yes, my Lord.” Barty placed his father’s wand in the homunculus’s tiny, skeletal hand. He would do with another stolen wand himself for now.

Voldemort raised the wand high, and a lightning bolt shot from it. He let out a sound that must have been a laugh. It is so good to feel in magic in my veins again,” he said. “And now, my followers, we must make up for lost time. Barty, from your research, what are the most promising magical traditions in which to find a ritual of resurrection to return this body to my former glory?”

Barty, being the brains of the operation, had been sent out to do the research for the group while the Carrows and Winky were left to tend to the incubator. After a month of covert reading in Paracelsus’ and other libraries, he had compiled a list of destinations. “The rituals of the Celts we know, my Lord,” he said. “But in Britain, Dumbledore is keeping a close eye out for us. In addition to those, there are the mummification practises of the Egyptians, the Cult of Molech in Lebanon, the funeral sacrifices of the ancient Chinese, the Vodun traditions of West Africa and their derivatives, and the Aztecs and also the Incas of America.”

“Seven choices,” Voldemort replied. “You have done well, Barty. We can reach Egypt most easily from here. From there, we will go to Lebanon and then west until we find a ritual suitably compatible with the homunculus. In a few months, I will be ready to make my triumphant return. As you are so fond of saying, Barty, _Allons-y_!”


	74. Cedric Makes His Own Way

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Everyone is born, but not everyone is born the same. Some will grow to be Aurors, or Quidditch players, or Ministry workers. Some will only be really good at writing insanely popular books. Sadly, I’m not the one who wrote them.

_“I have been reading the signs, Cornelius, and I do not believe another major international event in Britain this year is a wise decision.”_

_“Oh, honestly, Albus, you worry too much. I’ll tell you what. We’ll leave off the final decision until the July meeting. If we haven’t caught Greyback by then, we’ll reconsider.”_

_“I was not speaking of Greyback, Cornelius.”_

* * *

Cedric Diggory was worried. Over the past two and a half years, few people had ever worried that Harry Potter might turn into a dark wizard. There was that silly Heir of Slytherin business last year, but that was mostly some actual Slytherins trying to give him a hard time and leading on some gullible younger Hufflepuffs. Cedric had seen that for what it was fairly quickly. Potter was just too nice and considerate to be evil. He even befriended the Lovegood girl when no one else would give her the time of day except to torment her. And even if he _was_ dark, Cedric was two years ahead of him and at the top of his class, even if he didn’t know wandless magic, so he was sure he could deal with him if he ever tried something.

But the look in Harry Potter’s eyes today scared him. Potter looked like a cat on the prowl, just waiting for the right moment to pounce. That right moment was assuredly going to be the Quidditch match today, and Cedric had a feeling it was going to be a slaughter.

It wasn’t that Potter had walked into the Great Hall with a brand new Firebolt, to much ranting from the other teams and especially Draco Malfoy. It was the way he looked at Cedric in particular, and Cedric had a pretty good idea why. It was all over the newspaper:

 

_DIGGORY: NO WEREWOLVES AT HOGWARTS WHILE I SIT ON BOARD._

 

Cedric had toed his father’s line on the Werewolf Protection Act, but he had never been vocal about it. He wasn’t as interested in politics as Quidditch, and he privately thought his father was being a little too uptight about the whole thing, but his public support was apparently enough for Potter. The Boy-Who-Lived was out for blood.

He continued brooding on the matter during breakfast and on his way out to the pitch. Potter and Granger had saved that poor girl’s life on Halloween—an amazing feat for two third-years, and it was understandable that they felt protective of her. But that girl was scheduled to start at Hogwarts next year, and his father’s pronouncement may as well have be directed at her personally.

Potter thought Cedric had chosen a side, but he honestly hadn’t thought about it that deeply. He’d just parroted his father’s words. To him, Potter’s glare said something else: you’d better choose a side, and soon. He’d have to give it some thought in the coming days.

Unfortunately for the Quidditch game, Potter’s predatory determination seemed to have rubbed off on his teammates. Hufflepuff was defeated by two hundred and fifty points, one of their worst losses in years, and with their only remaining match being against Slytherin, where Draco Malfoy also had a Firebolt, it was clear Hufflepuff was going straight to the bottom of the table. Again.

* * *

“You see, Mr. Lyles?” the contact said. “You see how far the humans will go? No education for werewolves. No education and no jobs. They treat us like animals because we are too weak to resist them and yet strong enough to scare them.”

Geri Lyles sat in silence in his study while the other werewolf, a charismatic beta who gave his name only as Lycaon, expounded the manifesto of his alpha, Fenrir Greyback. Lyles had never held any personal animosity towards Greyback, not having ever been involved with him, but his brutal tactics had always rubbed him the wrong way, to say the least. It was only because of the harsh sanctions now being debated in the Wizengamot that he was even listening to this diatribe. It was still a choice of evils.

“You speak of a poor little girl being denied her dream of going to Hogwarts, Mr. Lycaon, when you conveniently neglect to mention that it was _your_ alpha who bit her in the first place,” Geri replied icily.

“This is about much more than one girl,” Lycaon growled. “This is about the systematic oppression of werewolves everywhere. They categorically refuse to educate us. Without that, the employment restrictions won’t matter. Without education, we are slaves. We are a pack. We must stand together. If we resort to desperate measures to expose that fact to the light of day, then it’s only because _they_ have driven us to it.”

“And if they’ve driven _you_ to it, why is that but that _you_ have attacked them so viciously?” Geri countered.

“This is not about assigning blame. What’s done is done. All we can control is what we do moving forward, and my alpha seeks to build a future for us—for you, too, Mr. Lyles, instead of allowing the humans to slowly pile the wood and light the fire until we are hunted to extinction. If you can’t see that, then we have nothing further to discuss.” With that, visitor got up and made for the door. It was a calculated move, and it paid off.

“Lycaon!” Geri called, still not looking at him.

“Yes, Mr. Lyles?”

“I’m going to ask you a question, and I want an honest answer: if your alpha _had_ Wolfsbane…what would he do with it?”

* * *

Ginny Weasley sighed as she sat on the Clock Tower balcony, watching the older students walk out to the horseless carriages. Harry and Hermione had shown her this place, but they weren’t there today. It was hard seeing the procession the last two times the third-years went off without her, but it was even worse this time: it was Valentine’s Day weekend.

“Alright, Ginny?”

“Eek!” She jumped and spun around to see a small, mousy-haired boy with a camera. “Ah, Merlin, don’t do that, Colin.”

“Sorry, I thought you could hear me,” Colin Creevey said with a frown. “Do you…do you want me to go?”

“No, no, it’s fine. How did you find me?”

“I followed you up here. I wondered what you were doing.”

Ginny turned a little pink. “I was, er, just watching,” she answered.

Colin didn’t answer that directly, but he walked up to the balcony and, after watching for a minute, snapped a picture. “It’s a nice view up here,” he said.

“I guess,” she said.

He set down his camera and sat down opposite her, overlooking the low railing. Neither of them spoke for a minute until Ginny said, “It’s so unfair that we don’t get to go to Hogsmeade until next year.”

“Yeah, it’d be nice to be able to see it,” Colin agreed. “I hear there all kinds of magical stuff that they don’t have anywhere else because it’s the only all-wizard village in the country.”

Ginny, who wasn’t particularly listening, said, “On Valentine’s Day, all the older students get to go on dates and stuff. Like Harry—” She stopped short and turned bright red as she realised she’d said that out loud.

“What about Harry?”

She looked away from him and mumbled so he could barely hear it, “Harry has a date with Cho Chang.”

“Oh, that’s n—” He stopped. He was about to say “nice,” but somehow, he had a feeling that wasn’t what Ginny wanted to hear, since her crush on Harry, though subsided some from last year, was well known. He wondered if that first-year, Romilda Vane, knew about it. Probably not, he decided, since she would’ve made a much bigger fuss than Ginny.

To his surprise, she spoke again: “You only have a younger brother, right, Colin?”

“Uh huh.”

“You’re lucky. I love my brothers, but I’m sick of being the baby in the family. I always get left out…Next year, it’s gonna be different.” She sighed heavily and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear before looking back out at the grounds.

“Hang on. Ginny, brush your hair back again.”

Ginny looked back at Colin and saw he had his camera raised. She snorted and said, “Do you have to do that all the time?”

“I told you, you make a good subject.”

Ginny sighed and rolled her eyes and tried to act annoyed, but she wasn’t succeeding very well. She had to admit, it was nice of him to say. “Oh, alright,” she said. She smiled softly at him and brushed her hair behind her ear.

“Perfect,” Colin said. _Click._

* * *

“I’m sorry, Patricia, I told you I’m busy this morning—personal business,” said Cedric Diggory. “I’ll meet you at the Three Broomsticks for lunch, okay?”

“Of course, Ced.” His date made an exaggerated show of acceptance that didn’t strike him as very sincere. Being a prefect, a starting Quidditch player, and—being honest about it—uncommonly handsome to start with, Cedric was considered quite the catch in Hogwarts. As a result, he had been on several first dates by now, but none of them had really worked out. He was still looking for the right witch, and sadly, he and Patricia Stimpson didn’t seem to be off to such a good start. But he wasn’t going to back down on his task for the morning. He had to do this for his own conscience.

He set off down the streets of the residential quarters of Hogsmeade. It had taken some doing to find this address. Wizards didn’t have a phone directory and were more likely than muggles to want their location not to be widely known. And he also didn’t want to go through anything resembling official channels for this. His solution was to ask housemates whom he knew lived in Hogsmeade. Those being a fifth of the student body, it wasn’t that hard to find an address for someone who lived in the village by asking enough of their neighbours.

The place he was looking for was just another old, thatched house, perhaps a little more unkempt than the others, but nothing too unusual. He admitted he was nervous—not about who was in the house, but how he would be received, and was his father would think. But no Hufflepuff ever got anywhere by taking the easy way out. He walked up and knocked on the door.

A suspicious-looking man answered the door, opening it just enough to poke his head out. “Can I help you?” he said.

“Are you Mr. Robins?” Cedric asked.

That got a moment’s pause. “Who wants to know?”

“My name is Cedric Diggory—”

The man started to close the door.

“Wait! I’m not here for my father.”

Mr. Robins started to open the door again and stared at the tall boy.

“He doesn’t even know I’m here…I was hoping I could talk with you—and your family.”

The suspicion didn’t diminish in the man’s eyes: “Why?”

This was the moment of truth. How much did Cedric want to say? What _could_ he say to get a family like the Robinses to trust him? With the way things must be for them right now, he decided he would need to be pretty open about it. “My father has set himself against some good people lately, including Harry Potter. The usual factions aren’t lining up on his legislation. It’s all mixed up…I want to find out the real story.”

“And you thought you’d learn about it from us, did you?”

“I understand if you don’t want to talk to me, Mr. Robins, but you were the first people I thought of. I didn’t feel comfortable approaching Harry about his friend, Lupin, or with making enquiries at the Ministry. I promise I won’t repeat anything you say without your permission, including to my father. I don’t think he’d appreciate it much if he knew I was here, anyway.”

Mr. Robins continued sizing him up, but whatever it was in his speech, he seemed to deem Cedric sufficiently trustworthy. “Alright, I’m going to hold you to that promise, Mr. Diggory, but I’m going to take a chance and hope you’re willing and able to help us,” he said, making it clear this wasn’t particularly for Cedric’s benefit. “We need all the help we can get. Come inside.”

Cedric came into the house and sat in a chair by the door. Presently, a woman came into the room. “Silvius, who’s this?” she asked.

Mr. Robins pulled his wife aside and held a hurried whispered conversation with her. Cedric couldn’t make it all out, but unsurprisingly, they seemed to be debating whether they should talk to him. After a couple of minutes, Mrs. Robins said, “Well, if you’re sure, I’ll go ask Demelza if she’ll come down.”

She went upstairs, and Mr. Robins sat down across from Cedric, fixing him with an uncomfortable stare. “I do hope you realise what kind of risk we’re taking by talking to you,” he said.

“I understand, Mr. Robins. I’m not too keen about my dad finding out about this either.”

“Alright, well, I’m sure you can guess that it’s been hard for us. And especially hard on Demelza. I don’t know what we would have done if it weren’t for Lord Black and Mr. Lupin.”

“You’ve talked to them?” Cedric said. He wasn’t sure why that surprised him.

“Yes, Lord Potter referred them to us right away.”

Cedric was still pondering this revelation when Mrs. Robins returned to the room leading a young girl by the hand. He immediately tensed up in spite of himself. He had never knowingly met a werewolf before and never thought he would care to until a week ago. Like most people in the wizarding world, his first reaction to meeting one would normally be to politely, but quickly, remove himself from the situation, even though he knew in his head (like most of the wizarding world) that that was completely unnecessary. But now, everything seemed different.

He didn’t know what Demelza had looked like before, but even though it was two weeks from the full moon, he could see the signs of her condition at once. The little girl was thin and pale and had dark circles around her eyes. Her auburn hair hung limp with only a halfhearted attempt to brush it. But more than that, her entire bearing was downtrodden. She shuffled slowly as she walked with a slight limp in one leg and kept her eyes towards the floor.

People in the business liked to talk about two kinds of werewolves. Alphas, of which Fenrir Greyback was an extreme case, were aggressive, while betas, like Demelza, or so it seemed, were submissive. But even people in the business had very little firsthand experience with werewolves, and Cedric couldn’t help but wonder if they’d got it all wrong. Demelza didn’t look submissive. She looked defeated—like one who had been worn down with little hope remaining. And when he got a good look at her, what Cedric felt for her wasn’t fear or loathing. To his surprise, though he wasn’t sure why it should surprise him, it was pity.

He nearly rose, but he leaned forward in his chair instead so as not to alarm her. “Hello, Demelza,” he said. “My name is Cedric.”

She looked up and met his eyes, the parallel scars on her face becoming clearer. “Pleased to meet you, Cedric,” she said without enthusiasm, and she and her mother sat on the sofa.

“Alright, so what do you want to know?” Mr. Robins said impatiently.

The question gave Cedric some pause again. What _did_ he want to know? Why was he here in the first place? “Well…I guess I’ve only really heard your story from the _Daily Prophet_. I mean, you don’t have to talk about that if you don’t want…”

“I think we’d rather not—” Mr. Robins said coldly.

“Mmm…” Demelza interrupted. Both of her parents stopped and stared at her. “I can tell him,” she said in a small voice. Everyone was surprised by that.

“Are you sure, Demelza?” her mother whispered.

“Mm hmm.”

It was certainly unexpected to Cedric’s eyes, but what he didn’t know was that from Demelza’s perspective, he was the first person besides her parents who actually cared, and that was enough to get her to try talking about it. All Cedric knew, though, was that she already sounded like a Gryffindor, in the unlikely event she ever got that far.

He listened as she described briefly how Fenrir Greyback had smashed in through the window, grabbed her leg in his jaws, and dragged her across half the village to that place over near the Shrieking Shack. It wasn’t clear why the werewolf had left her there and fled. Most likely the Aurors were in pursuit, but they must not have come close enough to hear her crying. She’d been left there for dead for hours in the abandoned house and only survived by tying her pyjamas tight around her wounded leg until Harry Potter and Hermione Granger found her, fixed her up with an unconventional application of wandless magic and muggle healing, and made sure she got the help she needed. He hadn’t been sure whether to believe the whole part about Potter until now, but apparently, it was mostly true.

“Thank you, Demelza,” Cedric said. “You were very brave. May I ask how things have been since then?”

Mr. Robins looked grim. He took a deep breath and said, “About how you’d expect. All of Demelza’s friends abandoned her the day after that damn article came out. Every one—well, not all of them personally, but between them and their parents, none of them will talk to her. The Junior Quidditch League kicked her out. A lot of _our_ friends stopped associating with us, too, and a lot of people want us to move out of town. If I were a shopkeeper, we’d probably be ruined by now.”

Mrs. Robins continued, “Oftentimes, it seems like the only people who are trying to help us are Lord Potter and his friends, Lord Black, and Mr. Lupin.”

“So Harry’s still helping you, then?”

“Do you know Harry Potter?” Demelza said excitedly.

“I’m two years above him. I haven’t had much chance to talk to him personally. I do know he’s a demon on a broomstick, especially if he’s got a grudge against you…” He got a faraway look in his eye. “Not to mention killing a basilisk and all that. I don’t think he’s an enemy you want to have.”

“Have you told your father that, then?” Mr. Robins asked.

Cedric gritted his teeth with embarrassment. “Not in so many words,” he said. “My father can be very stubborn.” To be honest, he had lately felt that his father had always played the loyal Hufflepuff more than the fair-minded Hufflepuff. Perhaps it came with the Ministry job, or perhaps it was in his nature, but thinking back, in the times when they didn’t see eye to eye, that had often been the reason. (“But why shouldn’t flying carpets be allowed, Dad? They have an even longer magical heritage than broomsticks, and broomsticks are just as much muggle artifacts as carpets.”) The trouble was that Amos was the kind of wizard who, once he got an idea into his head, had a very hard time getting it out again.

“And, er, where does Lord Black come in?” he said, trying to change the subject.

“He’s been buying Wolfsbane Potion for Demelza. And he and Mr. Lupin have been helping her…well, they’ve been coming here for the full moons.”

Cedric coughed a little. “Here?” he said incredulously. “How…how does that work?”

“We’ve been keeping her right here in our basement,” Mrs. Robins answered. “I’m sure the neighbours wouldn’t like it if they knew, but we equipped the basement for it, and with the Wolfsbane Potion, we haven’t had any problems at all.”

 _No problems at all_ , Cedric thought. _Right here in the basement._ In some very important ways, the world was not the same as the one his dad had grown up in. Would it really be that dangerous to have Demelza at Hogwarts if responsible people made sure she took her potion and was out of the way during the full moon? Harry Potter clearly didn’t think so. True, he was raised by muggles, but he still seemed very savvy.

“Demelza, you said you played Quidditch?” Cedric said, moving on.

At this, the little girl’s face lit up, and she launched into an excited recounting of her games in the Junior Quidditch League. She had been a Chaser, and a pretty good one. Her coach said she would make her house team at Hogwarts for sure. Of course, that was when they thought she would be going. It would be a shame, he thought, to lose this kind of talent. It was on that thought that he asked what was perhaps the most difficult question: “Do you know what you’re going to do next year?”

Mr. and Mrs. Robins shook their heads. “No, we don’t,” Mr. Robins said. “Obviously, with your father on the Board of Governors, Hogwarts will be difficult at best. We don’t really know what other options we have. It’ll probably be hard to even find tutors—well, besides Mr. Lupin, but he’s not qualified in everything. Lord Black says he’ll keep paying for the Wolfsbane Potion, which incredibly generous of him—more than we could repay, at least easily—but we know that won’t be enough for most people.

Suddenly, Demelza said, “I’m not worried, though.” Her parents sighed softly.

“Oh? Why not?” Cedric asked.

She held her head higher with what was probably the first strong and determined expression he had seen on her face all morning: “Because Harry Potter promised he would find a school that would take me.”

That one really floored Cedric. He knew prejudice against werewolves wasn’t much better anywhere else than in Britain. Harry might as well have been promising her the moon as far as he was concerned. And yet, if anyone could do it, it was probably him. Demelza certainly believed it, and it gave her such hope, too. It must mean the world to any eleven-year-old that Harry Potter would take a personal interest in her well-being, let alone an outcast like she had become. He saw then why Harry was so angry at his father. Gryffindor that he was, he would keep his promise come hell or high water, and right now, Amos Diggory was his biggest obstacle. Cedric suddenly felt like he was being put to shame as a Hufflepuff.

It was completely different seeing it through that lens, he thought. Most of the school looked down on Hufflepuff House, and it was true that Hufflepuff turned out fewer Head Boys than Gryffindor, fewer valedictorians than Ravenclaw, and fewer Ministers for Magic than Slytherin (although Cedric could probably manage all three if he tried). But Hufflepuff had its own proud set of values: hard work (where all three of the other houses were mostly based on talent), justice, loyalty, patience, trustworthiness, and one more that wasn’t often mentioned: inclusiveness. Helga Hufflepuff, alone out of the Founders, had taught all who came to her—the rejects of the other three houses, and built them into a house that had stood as their equal for a thousand years. It was the most un-Hufflepuff thing to shut someone out, not if there was any other option. Faced with a visceral fear about the dangers of werewolves, Amos had forgotten that. _Cedric_ had forgotten that. And it took a Gryffindor (and they were by no means without prejudice) to remind him of that.

Not being a rash Gryffindor himself, he wasn’t ready to say anything just yet, but he sure wasn’t getting both sides of the story from his father. At the very least, he thought he needed to take a closer look into the research on the Wolfsbane Potion and work out what the _real_ risks would be of having a werewolf at Hogwarts. If the Robinses were telling the truth (and Potter wasn’t out of his head), then his father’s case was starting to look a lot weaker.

He got up to go at that point. “Thank you for being so open with me, all of you,” he said. “You’ve given me a lot to think about.”

“And since we’ve been so open with you, may _we_ ask what you think of your father’s ideas?” Mr. Robins said.

“I think…” Cedric said carefully, “that my father may be a little behind the times.”

* * *

Cho Chang was waiting for Harry off to the side of the great oaken doors of the castle. And when he saw her there, Harry Potter, who had faced down the largest basilisk ever recorded and lived, was nervous. In the story of his life, the basilisk was almost literally child’s play compared with his first ever date.

He had tried to be especially careful about his appearance. He was wearing some of his nicer weekend clothes and made sure his glasses were clean. Even his hair was not immune. Harry thought he had long since given up trying to make his hair behave. The only real choice he had in the matter was whether to let his bangs cover his scar or not, and it was safer for Quidditch if he combed them back. But now, he found himself trying to flatten it down. According to Sirius, his birth father had thought girls liked his messy hair. But then again, according to Sirius, his birth father had also thought the way to a girl’s heart was to regularly hex her best friend until sixth year, so perhaps James Potter shouldn’t be his first choice for romantic advice.

He saw Cho standing there in a simple striped jumper and skirt, her long hair pulled back in a ponytail, and looking so pretty it seemed effortless. He was suddenly very aware of every clumsy aspect of his gait, and of the fact that he had barely so much as talked to her before, knew almost nothing about her, and had no idea what they would talk _about_ besides Quidditch.

However, when Cho smiled at him, most of his worries vanished from his mind. “Hi,” she said breathlessly.

“Hi…er, you, uh, look nice today,” he replied. _Come on, Harry, you_ _’ve had all those etiquette lessons_ , he thought. _You can do better than that._

“Thanks,” she said. “You do too.”

“Thanks,” Harry replied, trying very hard not to run his hand through his hair self-consciously. “Well…may I escort you, milady?” He offered her his arm.

Cho giggled as she took his arm, and they joined the queue of people waiting to leave. The sight immediately caused a wave of whispers and giggles to spread across the Entrance Hall, along with a few disappointed groans from various girls who had had their eye on the Boy-Who-Lived.

It was a lovely day when they got out of the castle—sunny and a bit breezy. The biggest possible complaint was that it was wet from the melting snow. They walked around the castle to the carriage stand arm in arm, not speaking until they passed the Quidditch pitch.

“You really flattened Cedric last weekend,” she said. “Not many people can fly like that.”

“Like what?”

“You have a really…you know, aggressive style.”

“Predatory,” he muttered under his breath.

“What?”

“Nothing. That’s…I guess that’s just how I naturally fly,” he said, not wanting to bring the political matter of the Diggorys into it.

“It’s not bad,” Cho said. “I mean, you’ve got an eight-and-oh record. You must be doing something right. I’m gonna really need to step up my game to beat your Firebolt, though.”

Harry smiled at her and said, “You can try.”

They were still on the subject of Quidditch as they rode the carriage down to Hogsmeade. Cho revealed that she was going to the World Cup in the summer. Harry hadn’t been following the tournament so closely, but with a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see it in England, he was definitely interested in going himself. Things seemed to be going well, except that when they reached the village, Harry realised that he hadn’t actually, _planned_ their date. He wracked his brain, trying to think of a quick solution to his _faux pas_. In the muggle world, he knew the “traditional” first date was dinner and a movie, but it was mid-morning, and there was no theatre here.

The started off down the main street of the village on foot, and Harry soon felt Cho looking at him expectantly.

“So…Hermione and I pretty must just toured the shops when we came before,” he said. “Uh, you probably know the village better than I do.”

Cho frowned, looking a little disappointed, but she thought it over for a minute and took it as an offering to make a suggestion. “Well, do you want to get a coffee?” she asked.

“I’m saving that for O.W.L. year,” Harry said. It wasn’t a very good joke, and Cho didn’t laugh. “B-but I could go for tea,” he said quickly. “D’you know where—?”

“Oh, Madam Puddifoot’s is just up around the corner. I’ve been wanting to go there. I hear it’s really nice.”

Before Harry could ask Cho why she hadn’t gone on her own, she was dragging him along to a cramped little shop he hadn’t noticed on his previous visits. His unspoken question was answered as soon as he saw the inside. It was probably the frilliest place he had ever seen, and all of the patrons were couples holding hands.

“Oh my gosh, it’s so cute!” Cho said excitedly. “It’s even decorated for Valentine’s Day.”

 _So_ _…much…pink,_ Harry thought. “Er, yeah, great.”

Harry was surprised that Madam Puddifoot could squeeze between the little tables without knocking anyone over. The place was so small—probably deliberately—that everyone had to sit practically on top of each other.

“What can I get you, m’dears?” she asked. “Our house special today is a nice herbal blend with a touch of honey—fennel, lemon balm, and catnip.”

“NO!” Harry cried. Everyone stared at him. “Erm…sorry,” he said, turning red. “I’ll pass on that. I’ll take an Irish breakfast tea, if you have it.”

“Black coffee,” Cho said.

“Coming right up dears.”

“Is something wrong?” Cho asked when she walked away.

“No, it’s fine. It’s just that…” Harry leaned closer to her face and whispered so that the other couples sitting literally two feet away hopefully couldn’t hear. “I’m allergic to catnip,” he lied.

“Really?”

“Yeah. I’d appreciate it if the Slytherins didn’t find out.”

“Of course. Your secret’s safe with me.”

“Thank you, Cho.”

It wasn’t quite true, but it was near enough, he thought. He had tried catnip once when he was seven, and everyone involved agreed that he should never get his paws on it again. Especially Hermione.

“So…uh, after this, we can check out the shops, and then I was thinking lunch at the Three Broomsticks?”

Cho smiled again. “Yes, that sounds nice, Harry.”

“Great. I need to meet Neville there anyway.”

“Oh…you do?” Her smile was gone again, clearly unhappy about not getting him to herself for the whole day.

“Yes, family stuff—very confidential—but that’ll only take a few minutes,” he added, sensing her discomfort.

“Oh—okay, then.”

Harry sipped his tea slowly when it arrived. They sat in silence for a while, having exhausted the obvious topics of conversation. Harry was growing increasingly uncomfortable looking around the shop. Many of the other couples were kissing, and it looked like _all_ of them were holding hands. Harry suspected Cho was expecting him to go at least a little in that direction, but while that sounded like a good idea on paper to his thirteen year old brain, he was finding the actual practice a lot harder.

 _Gryffindor courage, Harry._ With an effort, he reached across the table and lightly took hold of her fingers. He was pleased when she grasped his hand in return. And then, because felt a little odd to do that out of the blue, he asked, “Do you live in Hogsmeade, Cho?”

“No, my family’s in Inverness,” she answered. “It’s mostly muggles there, but we come to Hogsmeade a lot. What about you?”

“Me…? Oh, uh, down in the south. We keep it pretty secret, though. Hardly anyone besides my family knows.”

“That doesn’t seem very fair. What if somebody wants to visit you?”

“We visit them, mostly—or invite them to my godfather’s place.”

Cho didn’t seem particularly pleased with that answer, but she let it go. They traded a few other questions about their lives, and Harry was happy to talk about Sirius and Remus, or the Tonkses, but he continued to be vague about his and Hermione’s life in the muggle world, not giving away any identifying details. Cho also had a lot of questions about his life as the Boy-Who-Lived and his adventures over the past two years, and she was again disappointed when he couldn’t tell her anything beyond what was already public knowledge.

“You really don’t give away much, do you?” she said after a while.

“Sorry,” he answered sheepishly. “It’s the price of being famous. Not even Ron and Neville know where we live or a lot of other things about us.”

Cho seemed to accept that. Harry paid for their coffee and tea, and they left to browse the shops for a while. He bought her a couple of knickknacks she was interested in at Dervish and Banges just because it seemed like the thing to do. Of course, he could afford to spoil her if he wanted, but his parents probably wouldn’t appreciate him spending too much money.

At noon, they headed over to the Three Broomsticks, where Harry broke off to look for his friend. “It’s alright, really. This should only take a few minutes,” he assured Cho and headed off to look for Neville.

But to his surprise, he found Hermione first with a wide grin on her face and carrying an elaborate bouquet of pink, purple, and white flowers.

“Hermione? What’s all this?” he said in surprise.

“Aren’t they wonderful, Harry? Neville gave them to me.”

“N-Neville?” He wondered at the gift. They certainly weren’t the traditional red roses, although he did see some pink ones. “Well, that’s…great. Um, what are—”

“It’s the Language of Flowers, remember Harry? He started studying it after that thing with Snape in first year. It’s a thank you for all the help we’ve given him over the years.”

“Er, it is?”

“Yes, look: agrimony—that’s thank you, pink roses—friendship, snowdrop—hope in adversity, lilac primrose—confidence, cedar flower—strength, ripe cherries—that’s good education. You see? All the things we’ve helped him with.”

“Wow, that’s really thoughtful of him,” Harry said.

“That’s what I said. He’s really becoming quite the gentleman. The only one I wasn’t sure about was cherry blossom. That’s normally beauty, but I think it’s because his new wand is cherry wood.

“I guess that makes sense. And that’s seven kinds of flowers—fitting. Do you know where he went though? I don’t want to keep Cho waiting too long.”

“He’s in the back with Mr. Barnett. How’s the date going?”

“Eh, I guess not too bad considering I have no idea what I’m doing.”

“You’re not that bad, Harry. You’ve at least had the etiquette lessons.”

“Yeah, I guess. I’ll see you later, sis.”

As Harry hurried off to the back. Hermione examined her bouquet again. It was very nicely assembled—a little sloppy perhaps, but she strongly suspected that Neville had assembled it himself. She was rather glad, though, that Harry had bought her story and hadn’t noticed (though he probably wouldn’t have recognised it) that tied to the cherry blossoms was a small cluster of purple lilac.

Harry knocked with the arranged signal, and Mr. Barnett bade him enter the back room. (You couldn’t be too careful with these secret meetings.) Neville also looked to be in a good mood today, which meant that he was probably holding his own against the Occlumency instructor in addition to the high spirits of the day.

“Hey, Neville, how’re you doing?” Harry asked.

“Really good, Harry,” he replied brightly. “Mr. Barnett says I might be a qualified Occlumens by the end of the school year.”

“Really? That fast?” That was faster than he and Hermione had done it.

“With the Hogsmeade visits, Mr. Longbottom had been able to keep up a more regular practice schedule, Lord Potter,” Mr. Barnett explained. “And he is a little older than you and your sister were when you learnt it—also his quieter, more contemplative personality helps.”

“Wow, that’s great, Neville. I was hoping you were coming along. So…any news on your parents?”

Neville frowned. His Gran wrote him weekly, but had especially promised to keep him informed on Hogsmeade weekends, since she could get special permission to take him to St. Mungo’s if she felt it was called for. “Not much,” he said. “Gran says Dad’s not smacking the Healers as much, and it’s getting harder to keep Mum from wandering off.”

Both boys chuckled. “Well, it’s a start,” Harry said. “Don’t worry; they’ve got a few more months to see the full effects of the drugs.”

“Oh, I _am_ grateful,” he said quickly. “It might not sound like much to you, but after this long, any improvement at all is a miracle. Gran says the Healers are kinda freaking out.”

Harry smiled: “We’re happy to help, then. Oh, by the way. I saw the flowers you got Hermione. They’re really nice.”

Neville blushed bright red. “Er, thanks. I…I would’ve got you some, too, but it would’ve been kinda weird.”

Harry laughed loudly. “I’d say go for it just to mess with people, but I have to fend off enough valentines as it is. You know, Luna Lovegood gave me a sprig of radish flowers for some reason, Ginny gave me a handmade card—no poem, thank Merlin, and I got a box that I’m afraid to open because Ron says it’s from Fred and George.”

“Lucky you, mate,” Neville said. “Speaking of which, how’s the date with Cho?” He wagged his eyebrows a little.

“I haven’t crashed and burned yet, so I’m calling it good,” he said. “But I’d better get back to her. See you “round, Nev.”

Harry made it back to Cho before she started to look impatient, and they soon ordered lunch. The conversation was lighter after that, although they were frequently interrupted as classmates came over to say hi. Cho didn’t seem to mind that so much though. In fact, she looked quite pleased to be seen with Harry, which Harry would have been a little uncomfortable about, except that _he_ couldn’t really help but be pleased to be seen with one of the prettiest girls in school.

All in all, the afternoon went surprisingly smoothly—perhaps uneventful, but Harry made no real missteps, so things seemed pretty good. The light was fading as the couple walked up to the front doors of the castle, but just before they reached them, Cho pulled Harry off to the side of the path.

“I had a really nice time today, Harry,” she said.

“Yeah, so did I,” he replied.

“Thank you for taking me.”

“‘Twas my pleasure, milady.” He tipped his hat to her.

Cho giggled, and the two teens stared at each other for a minute. Cho seemed to be waiting for something, but soon enough, she gave up waiting (her date was younger than she was, after all), leaned in, and gave Harry a brief kiss on the lips.

* * *

“That’s my godson! I knew you had it in you. So how was it, Cub?”

Sirius had _demanded_ that Harry mirror-call him right after his date to tell him how it went, which felt even more embarrassing than it sounded. Sirius was more the type of bloke he could hang out with and swap stories about girls than the rest of his family, but he still had no experience with it. His only consolation was that Hermione wasn’t there to either tease him and/or play the protective older sister.

“I dunno,” Harry said. “It was really quick. I guess it was nice, but I didn’t hear angels singing or anything like that. What’s it supposed to be like?”

“ _Well_ , if you’re doing it right—mmph!”

A hand snaked in from outside of the mirror and covered Sirius’s mouth, and Remus’s face popped into view. “Harry, at your age, ‘I guess it was nice’ is just fine. Sometimes you get a spark right away, but more often, it takes time. And it might be with this girl, or it might be another one. Just play it by ear.”

“The real question is, are you gonna ask her on another date?” Sirius said, pushing Remus out of the frame.

Harry thought about that. He’d had an enjoyable enough time—he certainly enjoyed being in the presence of a pretty girl all day—but it didn’t strike him as anything really special. But he could see where Remus was coming from. It might well take some time, and it didn’t seem very fair to Cho (or himself, for that matter) not to give it another shot or two. “Yeah, I think I will,” he answered.

“Alright!” Sirius said. “We’ll make a proper ladies man out of you yet.”

“Harry, you’re talking to a pair of bachelors here,” Remus overrode him. “If you want _real_ dating advice, I suggest you ask your dad.”

“Uh, thanks, Moony. I’ll remember that.”


	75. Travellers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: All Harry Potter is a game. Physics at its most fundamental, the very fabric of our universe, results directly from the interaction of certain fairly simple rules, and JK Rowling.

_Thwack! Thwack! Thwack!_

Cutting his way through the thick foliage with wandless Cutting Charms (to the awe of the rest of the expedition), Edward Grayson slowly made his way deeper and deeper into the jungle. He and the small team of Brazilian wizards accompanying him had already travelled as far as they could upriver and were forced to cut a trail the rest of the way to their destination.

_“We were hoping, Ambassador Grayson, that with your singular skill with languages and in dealing with remote tribes, that you might be able to help us with this problem.”_

_“I suppose I can give it a try, Minister Cardoso. I can’t make any promises, but I should at least be able to provide protection for your expedition._

 

This, the most unexplored corner of South America, near the intersection of Brazil, Bolivia, and Peru, was home to the greatest number of uncontacted tribes in the world, some of which were surely not even known to exist by the government—magical or muggle. In the territory of Brazil, there were probably a little less than a hundred such tribes that had never come into direct contact with the modern world, with a population of about twenty thousand muggles among them. The demographics of hunter-gatherer tribes were complicated, but the upshot was that, statistically, one would expect a muggle-born magical child to be born into a population that size about once a century.

As it happened, there was exactly one wizard living among the uncontacted tribes of Brazil, and he happened to be nine years old. Unfortunately, his tribe had rebuffed all efforts to communicate with them, and the Brazilian Ministry of Magic was beginning to despair of ever being able to give the child a proper (or any) magical education.

_Thwack! Thwack! Thwack!_

Which was why they had asked one of the most powerful wizards in the world to lead a team deep into the Amazon to find him.

The tribe they were seeking out was so remote that they didn’t even know its name, nor a single word of their language—not conclusively, anyway. They knew the child existed thanks to a book similar to the one that recorded the students’ names at Hogwarts, but it only gave the latitude and longitude coordinates of where he lived. It was unable to record his name because his tribe had no written language. The officials couldn’t even say with certainty that the child was a boy, although they were reasonably sure. A previous expedition had spotted a boy of the correct age working in the position of an apparent apprentice to the tribe’s medicine man before they were driven out, and they had no reason to think he wasn’t the right one.

Suddenly, the path they were beating through the trees let out into a trail. It might have been no more than an animal run, but it was one that hunters could use easily enough, and so could the expedition.

“Be alert,” Grayson told the other wizards quietly. “We should be close now.”

A check of the GPS unit also confirmed they were practically on top of the tribe’s location—or more accurately, the tent where the young wizard slept at night. Ingenious muggle device, that: there were magical ways to navigate that were as accurate as GPS, but this was so much easier. It was impressive, how the Brazilian Ministry was making herculean efforts to reach a single child, but also complicated and risky. In addition to needing to contact his tribe without incident, they would have to be careful about not introducing even mundane diseases, which could ravage such a tribe in the years post-contact. The entire expedition had gone through an aggressive regime of pathogen-purging potions normally reserved for patients with compromised immune systems.

Grayson froze and raised a hand to stop the others when he heard a rustling in the trees. A quick hand signal instructed, _“wands at the ready_ ,” and another one instructed, _“be ready to shield_.” Poisoned arrows were a common weapon of choice in these parts.

There was a tense moment where no one moved—not the expedition, nor the natives, though Grayson could almost feel the bowstrings tightening, ready to let fly against them. As the silence stretched, Grayson decided the natives were waiting for the intruders to make a move, so he began to call out to them in the geographically nearest language he’d had access to information on in Rio de Janeiro. But he only got out two syllables before a half dozen voices (including his own) shouted, “ _Protego!_ ,” and the tribe’s arrows bounced off their shields.

There were audible gasps coming through the foliage. Surely, the natives were thinking that the strange visitors with supernatural powers had returned, and with greater strength than before. There was a sound as if they intended to run, but with their shields in place, Grayson could safely try again. In that same language, he called to them, “We mean you no harm…We want to learn your language.”

 _That_ was not a request this tribe heard often, from their neighbours or otherwise. White men with those strange magic sticks had entered their domain before, but they had more or less barged in and tried to communicate some important matter of theirs in the local trade language without taking much actual interest in them. This new courtesy was enough to intrigue them. There was some hurried discussion amongst themselves in their own language.

Finally, one of them moved halfway out of the trees so that they could see him. His bow was still pointed at their shields. The hunter didn’t know the first thing about magic, but he knew a standoff when he saw one, and this wouldn’t be solved with force. “Why do you invade our land?” he asked in the trade language.

Grayson considered how best to answer and said, “We want for us to understand each other.”

A sharp word came from one of the other hunters. The wizards didn’t have to speak the language to know it was something along the lines of, “They lie!”

The lead hunter hushed this outburst and said, “Other white men came before. They tried to take our medicine man’s apprentice. Why should we trust you?”

Yes, this was the opening Grayson needed. “We do not want to take him,” he answered. “We want to teach him.”

That again threw the hunters for a loop: “Teach him? Why would you teach him?”

“He is special. He works miracles, does he not?”

There were some excited whispers. “Yes, he does,” the leader said. “We have all seen it.”

“We can teach him to do more miracles,” Grayson said. “We can teach him to do what we do.” He motioned to the shields around him, the ones that had stopped the most effective weapons the natives possessed.

Yet another hunter spoke up eagerly in the trade language: “Can you teach others this magic?”

“No. Only him. He alone is…chosen. We…have foreseen it.”

There seemed to be an argument among the hunters after that, but eventually, the leader won out. He stepped fully out of the foliage and led them a short way down the run, whilst sending two of the other hunters ahead. It wasn’t clear what was happening at first, but they eventually discovered that he was arranging a meeting with the chief at the edge of the camp, far enough out that they could still try to defend themselves. There, still in a standoff with bows against magical shields, Grayson explained their story again, with more detail and background. He apologised on behalf of his companions for their rude behaviour on their previous visits and said that a teacher could be sent to the tribe to teach the boy in question, if they so desired, instead of taking the boy to—they didn’t have a word for “school” in the western sense. Of course, that would take an exorbitant amount of money and resources on the part of the Brazilian Ministry and a slightly mad volunteer, but they were willing to do it.

The important thing, though, was respect, which was why Grayson emphasised his desire to learn their language and customs and the other wizards’ desire to leave them as much control as he reasonably could. The chief seemed pleased with this, and although it took a number of magical proofs of their good intentions, as it did back in Tuva all those months ago, he finally convinced the natives to lower their bows. Soon enough, they were able to meet the young wizard at last. The boy claimed his name was Ykunumi, although Grayson thought that might have been a title.

However, given his time constraints, Grayson decided that even with his brilliant speed at learning languages, this would have to be the last stop on his world tour. He would need to get back to Australia soon and clean up all the little messes that had occurred in his absence before going to England in time for the Quidditch World Cup.

* * *

Lord Voldemort and his small band of Death Eaters were not having much success with their own world tour. The Egyptian Book of the Dead had a lot of things in it that would have been very useful twenty years ago, but the rituals it contained required some very specific preparation that they were not able to do now. Now, the Cult of Molech in the Levant had also failed them.

“I suppose the excursion was not a total loss,” the small, wrinkled form of Voldemort said dryly. “Their human sacrifice rituals did look very…interesting. It’s a pity they did not make the obvious connection of a life for a life. But come, we must make haste. Potter has not sat idle, even before he came to Hogwarts, and we cannot allow him the advantage of time.”

“The sandstorm will transport us at dusk, Master,” said Barty Crouch Junior. “If the schedule the traders gave me is right, we should be able to make two jumps tomorrow.”

“Good. Good. That should put us in Burkina Faso by the day after tomorrow, and from there, we shall find a discreet way into Ghana.”

They were travelling across the Sahara now—a region that was sparsely populated and poorly policed. The main long-distance mode of transport here was by sandstorm—the Arab wizards’ answer to Floo Powder. It wasn’t as convenient as Floo Powder. It required a messy miniature sandstorm to sweep through the area, so it could only really be done on a fixed schedule, except by very powerful wizards. But it covered a wider area, and much like the Floo Powder flames, the sand could instantly transport people from one oasis to the next to the next clear from Casablanca to Baghdad and back.

However, the Death Eaters’ destination this time was Ghana, the heartland of the Vodun ritual traditions, the ancestor of Voodoo.

“I still don’t get it,” Amycus Carrow muttered to himself. “I thought they only did inferi.”

Unfortunately, Voldemort heard him. _“‘They’_ are mere amateurs, Amycus,” he said. “They make playthings for children. A true master of the art will be far more subtle and may know things that are quite useful indeed.”

“Quit yer whingin,” Amycus,” hissed Alecto. “The Dark Lord knows what he’s doing.”

“I do not require you to defend me, Alecto,” the creature in the bundle of cloths said. Alecto immediately drew back in submission. “I will require feeding before our next move. Winky, milk Nagini at once.”

Winky only squeaked and nodded and fearfully set to work. She found it very difficult to speak in the terrifying presence of the Dark Lord. It didn’t help that he and Master Barty let the Carrows kick her around half the time, leaving her constantly nursing scrapes and bruises. And that snake. She was petrified to get close to it, and yet she had to milk the venom from its fangs. Even though it was well-behaved and conditioned to comply, Winky’s hands shook so much that she lived in constant fear of nicking herself on a fang by accident. She couldn’t imagine how her life had turned so poorly, and it didn’t look like it would let up any time soon.

* * *

On the night of 25 February, Fenrir Greyback smirked to himself at the thought of magical Britain standing on high alert once again…and finding nothing. His pack wasn’t around Hogsmeade tonight, nor any of the other magical population centres. He had diverted them this month to a stretch of forest far from wizards and muggles alike. He needed to do something a little more constructive than random mayhem for the next three moons. Greyback wasn’t a creature with a natural affinity for long-term planning, but he could learn. It was time to experiment.

Lycaon’s hard work with Geri Lyles had paid off, and he had successfully smuggled to the pack a single dose of Wolfsbane Potion. This was a moment Greyback had been waiting for for ten years. The Ministry guarded the secret of the Wolfsbane Potion as jealously as the goblins guarded the gold in Gringotts, but now, he’d finally got hold of a sample, and he wasn’t about to let anyone else claim this honour. He downed the smoking goblet a half hour before moonrise and waited with his pack. He didn’t know exactly how the potion would affect him, but he was hoping it would make the Wolf more intelligent and goal driven and more able to organise and direct his pack. That was what he needed for his plan to work.

He would find out soon enough. Before long, the full moon rose above the horizon, and Greyback embraced the Wolf.

When he came to himself in the morning, he reflected how useful it was that werewolves remembered everything that happened in wolf form the next morning, unlike some muggle stories. True, the memories were fuzzy and animalistic, but a lifetime of reading and interpreting them made them quite clear to him, and he was able to clearly evaluate the results of his experiment.

He’d read studies and accounts of werewolves who had missed one or two doses of Wolfsbane out of the full course of seven. Apparently, they behaved less like wolves and more like ordinary wizards hopped up on illegal potions. But no one had ever studied what a single dose would do, not even in the very earliest experiments. Wolfsbane had started out as a daily potion, and by experiment, Damocles Belby had discovered that it could be cut back to a seven-day course each month, so he had never had cause to investigate single doses.

So Greyback had done something entirely new that he would need to analyse carefully. In his opinion, the Wolf had not been tamed like a dog, but more like a trained wolf—one that was mostly still wild, but would condescend to do tricks if it felt like it. And he was pleased to find that that _was_ enough to aim its movements, running the course he had mapped out through the forest and hunting the deer only in a particular section. The bad news was that it didn’t help him control his pack, who kept trying to roam around like untrained wolves. The Wolf had spent a good part of the night taking frustrated swipes at his betas and using his alpha influence to corral them into following him. Oh well, if he could get a full course of seven doses, that would be enough.

Now, he needed to plan his other experiments. He would need to see if there was any change if he took the potion on the first night of the week instead of the seventh, and he needed to see how a group of seven werewolves fared after taking one dose each. _And_ he needed to figure out how to get into that damn Shrieking Shack. But it was progress, oh yes. He would be ready by the full moon in May.

* * *

A gathering of third-year students in an empty classroom might have looked a little odd normally, but anyone who saw this particular group of students assembled would have sensed an ominous shift of power, or at least the potential for one. Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, Neville Longbottom, Susan Bones, Mandy Brocklehurst, Zacharias Smith, and the Greengrass sisters all sat in a circle, each bringing no small influence with their families to the table.

“Alright, Potter, we’re here,” said Zacharias Smith, the most reluctant of the bunch. “What’s all this about?”

“Well,” Harry said, “I think you can all guess this is about the Wizengamot—specifically, the two bills regulating werewolves. Now, some of your families support the bill my proxy introduced, and some of you support the bill Amos Diggory introduced. What I was hoping is that we could discuss both bills more freely here than our relatives can do whilst pandering to their political bases in public—don’t deny it. We do it too.”

“So you’re trying to convince us all you’re right?” Smith demanded.

“No, that’s not the point,” Harry said. “In the muggle world, there’s something called a model parliament. That’s where a group of students get together to discuss political issues like the muggle Parliament does. Sometimes, they can have real political influence. That’s the kind of thing I was hoping we could do. We’re not looking to convince you of our bill. I thought we could talk it out and see if there’s any way we can improve our bill—maybe find some middle ground on the more divisive points. To be honest, we’re trying to show that Diggory’s bill is a bad idea more than we’re trying to promote our own per se, but to do that, we need the best possible alternative.

“But Great-Granddad says there’s nothing wrong with Diggory’s bill,” Mandy Brocklehurst spoke up. He says werewolves weren’t a part of society in his day, and it shouldn’t be that big a deal.”

“No offence, Mandy, but things have changed a lot since your Great-Granddad’s time,” Hermione said. “And some things _should_ change, just like the Muggle Protection Act.”

“Daphne, you’re probably the most politically savvy out of all of us,” Harry started. “What do you think of the differences between my family’s bill and Diggory’s?”

Daphne Greengrass gave a low whistle. “That’s complicated, Potter,” she said, “and I’ve only looked at the actual copies a little—”

There was a rustle of papers, and Hermione produced copies of both Diggory’s and Umbridge’s Werewolf Safety Act and Cousin Andi’s and Sirius’s Lycanthropy Regulation and Management Act.

“Of _course_ you did, Granger,” Daphne muttered. “Okay, give me a minute, then.” She thumbed through the two bills side by side to remind herself of the provisions. They were short—extremely short, by muggle standards—but they still took quite a bit of parsing. After going back and forth through them twice, she felt she was ready to speak.

“Alright, so Section 1 of your bill, Potter, that’s the strict penalties for crimes committed by werewolves. That part’s fine. It’s basically the same as Diggory’s bill. Section 2, powers of the DMLE to restrict the movements of werewolves; that probably won’t give you much trouble either. It’s not quite the same, but it’s close enough. Now, Section 3, services for werewolves? That’s going to be a problem. Anything that costs money is going to be hard, as you should know. The same goes for Section 4, repealing the job restrictions. It doesn’t matter if it’s fair or not, the natural reaction of people will be to resist it.”

“Pfft. I could’ve told you that, Potter,” Smith said. “That doesn’t tell us anything new.”

“It tells us that there are two real points of contention, Smith,” Harry countered. “The distribution of services and the repeal of job restrictions. And I would add a third, but I’m not sure the Wizengamot is the place for it—keeping Hogwarts open to werewolves.”

Mandy, Smith, and even Susan gasped at the suggestion. “You can’t be serious,” Smith blurted.

“No, he’s my godfather—”

“Harry!” Hermione chided.

“Sorry. Couldn’t resist. But yes, I am. It worked just fine when Remus Lupin was here, and we’ve learnt more since then. It’s only fair that all magical children to be able to get a magical education.”

“You’re right, though,” Neville said. “You don’t want to be going over the Governors’ heads with anything to do with the school. They won’t like it. We’ll just have to find a way around Amos Diggory on the Board.”

“Fine. So that brings us back to the services—you know what, let’s back off from exactly what they are and focus on what we’re trying to do.”

“Auntie says we’re trying to make sure there are fewer attacks,” Susan said.

“And we want that too, but we also want werewolves to be treated fairly in society,” Hermione said. “At the root of it, we think that getting Wolfsbane Potion as widely distributed as we safely can is the best way to do that.”

“How much would it cost to provide Wolfsbane Potion to all the werewolves in Britain free of charge?” Harry asked.

Most of the group recoiled. That sounded like an insane proposition.

“I mean the ones we can trust,” he added. “I don’t mean Greyback.”

That didn’t assuage much of the shock. Sinking that much money into werewolves was an absurdity to most people. But then, Hermione wasn’t most people. She checked her notes and thought about it for a minute. “Hmm…unless they could bring the price down significantly, it couldn’t possibly be less than twenty thousand galleons per year,” she said. “And that’s if you only include the registered ones. The real number could be twice as high.”

“The Ministry would never go with that,” Daphne said. Most of the others nodded in agreement.

“No, I don’t imagine they would,” Hermione said, “and it’s too much to run sustainably as a charity, unless your name is Malfoy.”

“I’m afraid it’s worse than that,” Susan said. “A lot of werewolf attacks are caused by werewolves like Greyback who actually _want_ to do it. The ones who _don_ _’t_ want to find other ways to control themselves even if they can’t get Wolfsbane. That means it won’t make that big a difference in the number of attacks.”

Smith agreed with this: “And don’t forget, there’s always a risk if some sympathiser of Greyback’s gets hold of it and using it to attack more people. My dad says it causes more problems than it solves.”

“Not for the werewolves, it doesn’t,” Hermione protested. “It’s a godsend for them. It helps their sanity. It leaves them more able to work. It’s better for their health.”

“That’s no good if it puts the rest of us at risk.”

“But if we show that we can help them, it might make more werewolves turn away from Greyback,” she said.

Through this argument, Neville had been frowning with a look of intense concentration on his face.

“What’re you thinking, Neville?” Harry asked.

“Oh, I was just thinking it sounds like we need a better way of being sure the Wolfsbane Potion won’t be misused while still getting it to more people.”

“That’s what the stricter enforcement standards are for.”

“That only helps after the fact,” Susan said. “One big case of misuse, and we could be overrun.”

Suddenly, Astoria Greengrass piped up, “What if you make the werewolves take an Unbreakable Vow to use it right?”

That got mixed reactions, from Zacharias Smith, who seemed interested, to Hermione who was appalled, though she was diplomatic about it: “You can’t ask people to take Unbreakable Vows like that, Astoria. You’d have to be really careful, or it would be too easy to slip up.”

“Actually, I don’t know about that,” Harry said, to her surprise. “If we had some way of binding them without being too restrictive, it might solve a lot of problems. Do you think we could get to wording just right to cover all the possibilities?”

“I doubt it. We could probably cover all the cases we can think of, but it’s the ones we can’t that worry me. Certainly not to the standards of an Unbreakable Vow. And then there’s the distribution part. You need to make sure the potion gets to who it needs to when it needs to with appropriate oversight.”

“I don’t think you can expand the coverage very much all at once,” Mandy said. “I know about infrastructure and facilities and such, and I don’t think bringing that many werewolves together the day before the full moon would go over well—not with what we can do today.”

“Hmm…maybe another one of those long-term plans, then?” Harry suggested. “Start a new trial program and expand it over time if it works?”

“You know, that could work if you have the right procedures for it,” Daphne said. “It might be something to look into.”

* * *

On a warm, dark night in April, a man stood in a ritual circle with a handful of followers hidden behind muggle-repelling wards just outside a major airport. He was a giant of a man, tall, broad, and muscular—possibly enhanced by rituals. His skin was quite dark, but it was clear by the torchlight that he was covered with tattoos both of animals and strange pictographs. His chest was bared, as were his feet, and he stood nearly motionless as he watch a muggle aeroplane fly in.

As the running lights came closer, the man began chanting in a click-filled language more reminiscent of the Kalahari, which had been natively spoken here in East Africa about three thousand years ago. As he chanted, several of his tattoos began to glow with a cold, white light: the first an erumpent, and the second an impundulu, or lightning bird, plus several of the smaller pictographs.

The chanting grew faster and louder, and the flames began to swirl around him. The plane flew closer as it came in for a landing, but alas, it never finished its approach. As the chant reached a fever pitch, the man threw out both of his hands towards the plane and roared two words: “ _!nomku_ _’u, !nomku’u_.”

With an even louder roar like the sound of a rocket, a ball of fire shot out from each of the man’s hands. The first struck the plane, and it rattled, its lights blowing out. The second struck, and it burst into flames. From there, it was mere seconds before it crashed to the ground, straight into the garden of the presidential palace, where it exploded with a force that shook the earth.

Kinani Ngeze turned around to face his followers, and he grinned. “There, now the Rwandan Minister is dead,” he said in a deep voice, “just like the Burundian fool. And that muggle upstart is dead, too. Now, all will call _me_ Kinani—Invincible!”

His followers shouted a word of praise, and Ngeze uttered another word: “ _!gu_.” For a moment, another group of tattoos glowed: a mahamba, a giant, magical crocodile, and several other pictographs, and spray of water flew out from his hands and extinguished the torches.

“Come,” he said, “we have much work to do.”

Twelve hours later, thousands of muggles were dead.

Twenty-four hours later, wizards for a hundred miles around were fleeing from a campaign of terror that had not been seen in East Africa for many years.

Thirty-six hours later, Albus Dumbledore knew he would not be able to stay on the sidelines. He only hoped that no disaster would befall Britain during his absence. Greyback was still at large, and with Sibyll’s recent prophecy, he had his own dark lord to worry about.


	76. The East Africa War

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Don’t interrupt JK Rowling in the midst of being ironic. It’s not polite.

“The muggle governments are not concerned about the situation.”

“The muggle governments see the violence mostly confined to Rwanda. We see it spilling over into Burundi, Uganda, and Zaire in full force.”

“The _speed_ of this retaliation is staggering. The latest reports say that ten thousand muggles were slaughtered on Thursday alone, and there’s nothing to suggest yesterday was any different or that today will be. Those are numbers comparable to the muggle death camps of Grindelwald’s War.”

“Why do we need to worry about the muggle conflict so much? The rebels have already launched a counteroffensive.”

“The two conflicts are inextricably linked. The muggle rebels will never take back Kigali with Ngeze backing the army, and _he_ is operating internationally. And need I remind you that he has racked up quite a few wizard murders in the last few days, too?”

“The fact remains that the muggle United Nations is barely even _talking_ about intervening. They have neither committed the necessary manpower, nor given appropriate authorisation.”

In the crowded castle overlooking the Reichenbach Falls, the squabbling of the International Confederation of Wizards was reaching a fever pitch. Kinani Ngeze’s assassination of the Rwandan Minister and two muggle leaders had sparked a firestorm in East Africa. The pressure for international intervention was redoubled from the meeting last fall, since it seemed that the wizarding population of the region was rapidly descending into all-out war. However, it was going to be a hard sell. International intervention in a wizarding war was not a popular move. After all, the bigger a war got, the greater the threat to the Statute of Secrecy, not to mention the potential cost in blood and treasure to any coalition that sent operatives.

Adding an additional complication was the fact that one of the countries involved, Uganda, was one of the favourites to win the Quidditch World Cup that summer, and while that was unrelated to the conflict itself, it would give them a bigger media platform to beg for aid, as unfair as that was to its neighbours that didn’t have such an advantage.

There was a bang as the doors to the chamber flew open, and a man with brown skin, grey hair, and amber eyes, staggered in.

“Ah, Ambassador Grayson,” Albus Dumbledore said from his high seat, “thank you for joining us.”

“G’day, Supreme Mugwump,” Edward Grayson said gruffly. He walked unsteadily to his seat whilst muttering under his breath, “Bloomin’ portkey-sickness…” He reached his chair and was about to sit when he saw the other delegates staring at him as if expecting him to make a statement. “I think you all know where I stand,” he said. “Someone’s been needing to get rid of Ngeze for a while now. If we can’t intervene when some would-be dark lord starts trying to overthrow multiple countries, I don’t see how there’s much point to this whole organisation.” It wasn’t as eloquent as his usual fare, but he didn’t much care right now. He sat back and tried to clear his head while the arguing continued.

* * *

_WAR IN EAST AFRICA_

_Dark Wizard Kinani Ngeze Brings Down Rwandan Ministry_

 

_EMERGENCY ICW MEETING TO ADDRESS CRISIS_

_Dumbledore to Switzerland to Oversee_

“May I have your attention please?” Professor McGonagall addressed the school at breakfast on Saturday morning. “As you can see by now, Professor Dumbledore is, indeed absent for an emergency ICW meeting to address the East African Crisis. I must report that he may be gone from the castle for an extended period.”

Nervous whispers circled the Great Hall. No one had forgotten the disastrous several months last year when Dumbledore had been removed from the castle by the Board of Governors in a futile attempt to stop the Heir of Slytherin, and there was a far more tangible threat this time around: Fenrir Greyback. Several people expressed this concern aloud.

Professor McGonagall raised her hand and said, “Professor Dumbledore has assured me that he will do his utmost to be here in the castle during the full moons, and even if he is unable to do so, we professors are more than up to the task of keeping the school safe. Hogwarts is a castle for a reason, and all the doors and windows will be locked during the full moon.”

That eased the fears of most of the student body, but Harry Potter still felt nervous. “Mione, I have a bad feeling about this,” he said.

“What’s the matter, Han Solo?” Hermione replied. “Professor McGonagall says the castle is secure. And Dumbledore will probably be here.”

“Like that’s ever stopped anyone before.”

“Well, it hasn’t stopped Voldemort, but he’s, well, Voldemort. Greyback’s not exactly in his league.”

“I know. It’s just that with Dumbledore being away a lot of the time and only two full moons left in the school year, the time for Greyback to try something is now. I don’t know, I’ll just feel a lot safer if they can finally catch him.”

“Well, so will I, Harry, but I don’t think you need to worry about the castle in the meantime.”

Draco Malfoy had a less nuanced reaction: “Well, that’ll get the old coot out of our hair for a while.” However, he was smart enough to keep that sentiment to himself and his friends. He wasn’t worried about Greyback, though. This time of year in Scotland, the full moon would rise near or after curfew, and the Slytherin dorms were the most secure in the school. He was more interested in his letter writing campaign. To his dismay, Hagrid had become significantly more competent after his first letter of complaint, but without Dumbledore around to protect his pet half-breed, he might be able to take up the cause again and leverage some influence with the Board to get rid of him.

* * *

Harry very nearly didn’t go to the Slytherin-Hufflepuff Quidditch game. He disliked both of the Seekers who were playing, and Malfoy more, the one with the broom advantage, he disliked more. He was about to leave the Great Hall and go back up to Gryffindor Tower when Cho caught his eye.

“Hi, Harry, nice day for Quidditch,” she said.

“Er, yeah, I guess,” he replied.

She frowned at his lack of enthusiasm. “Do you wanna come sit with me?” she asked.

Harry brightened at the prospect. The game wouldn’t be a total loss that way. “Sure, that’d be great,” he said.

They walked arm in arm down to the Pitch, which, even after their first date, raised some eyebrows and garnered a couple of wolf whistles. Those were courtesy of the Weasley Twins, and they quickly backed down when he gave them his feline glare and let a few sparks of magic crackle around his fingertips.

“So my roommate, Marietta’s, been asking all about you,” Cho said. “I told her a lot of what you told me.”

“Oh…you did?” Harry said with a flicker of a frown.

“Uh huh. I hope you don’t mind.”

“Oh, no. I mean, none of it was secret or anything,” he said. He was really being too sensitive, he told himself. Of course girls gossipped to each other about their dates. He would need to be clear if he ever _did_ have cause to tell her a secret, though. He hoped she wouldn’t push him to. Neville was pretty much his only friend whom he automatically trusted to exercise discretion, although Ron was a decent bloke about it, and most of the ones with family on the Wizengamot knew to keep their mouths shut when it was appropriate. “I, uh, don’t know if it was that interesting,” he added.

“Of course it is, Harry,” Cho said. “You’re the Boy-Who-Lived. And you’ve been awarded two different Orders of Merlin. Everyone wants to know all about you.”

 _Don_ _’t remind me_ , he thought, but he didn’t say it. He was a little put off by Cho’s enthusiasm on the subject, so he decided to take the rest of the walk in silence.

When they got to the pitch and sat at the border between the Gryffindor and Ravenclaw sections of the stands, Harry surveyed the field. Neither the Slytherin nor the Hufflepuff team was stellar, but the real difference was in the Seekers. It was no contest.

“Well, I don’t think it’ll be a very long match,” Harry told Cho. “Diggory’s already lost to both of us, and Malfoy’s on a Firebolt.”

“I don’t think Cedric’s that bad,” Cho countered. “He just had the bad luck to go up against us.”

Harry smiled weakly: “Maybe so, Cho, but as much as I’d rather not see even him lose to Malfoy, I don’t think he has much chance.”

She gave him an appraising look and said, “You don’t like him much, do you.”

He grimaced, not wanting the conversation to turn unpleasant. “It’s not so much about him. It’s just…it’s a political issue. We don’t see eye to eye. I hear he’s a a nice enough guy—I guess…Malfoy, on the other hand…”

He remembered how Malfoy had been even more disagreeable than usual in Care of Magical Creatures class that week:

 

_“Professor Hagrid, is there any truth to the rumour that you were caught raising werewolf cubs under your bed as a student?” the Slytherin asked._

_“Those were ordinary wolves!” Hagrid snapped, and several Gryffindors smacked their foreheads. Raising ordinary wolf cubs wasn’t a thing to be advertising, either. “Werewolf cubs—ridiculous! Merlin forbid there was such a thing, they’d be regular babies ‘cept on the full moon.”_

_“And what about the one about sneaking into the Forest to wrestle trolls.”_

_“It weren’t sneakin’. It was a Care o’ Magical Creatures project. I was studyin’ a troop o’ forest trolls that came through. Trolls are ser’sly misunderstood creatures, you know.”_

_The other Slytherins were aping this last line behind Hagrid_ _’s back. By the end of the week, another letter to the editor had come out in the_ Daily Prophet _complaining about Hagrid_ _’s lack of safety standards and common sense._

 

“Yeah, I don’t like him much, either,” Cho agreed. “I was glad when I got a leg up on him in our match. He’s almost as good as you are. It gives me hope I’ve still got a chance against you, even though he was on a borrowed Nimbus then.”

“You can try,” Harry said with a grin. “What if he was just having an off day because he was forced to _borrow_ something?” Harry was glad that, if nothing else, Cho was sporting enough that she giggled at that.

The two teams took off, and Malfoy was all over the field. Harry hadn’t seen the Firebolt fly from a distance, and he had to admit it was impressive, maybe even more impressive-looking than his own flying. After all, Malfoy flew gracefully, like a bird, compared with Harry’s more predatory aerobatics.

The one thing that worried Harry was that, on a Firebolt, Malfoy might be able to beat his record of catching the Snitch in under five minutes that he had scored against Hufflepuff in first year. Though he was loathe to admit it, Malfoy probably had the talent to pull it off, so he was very glad when the five minutes ticked by without incident. Still, it was less than half an hour into the match when Malfoy nabbed the Snitch and won the game in a crushing defeat for Hufflepuff.

“Well, disappointing, but expected,” Harry said.

“Not that it matters that much,” Cho pointed out. “You can still win the Cup easily, and even we can win if we beat you by enough points.”

“True, but good luck doing that…Anyway…it’s Hogsmeade again in two weeks. Would you like to come with me again?”

Cho grinned: “I’d like that very much, Harry.”

“Good. It’s a date, then.”

Cedric Diggory was downcast as he walked off the field. In his first year as starting Seeker, he had gone oh-and-three, Harry Potter had a grudge against him _and_ was dating a girl he had lately developed a crush on, and he was starting to think his father and most of Britain were going a bit paranoid about werewolves. Plus, he still had O.W.L.s coming up. And here he thought fifth year was going to be a good year for him.

* * *

Harry’s and Cho’s second date was going pretty similarly to the first one: pleasant, but uneventful. Probably the biggest plus was that it was much warmer on the last day of April than in February. Harry decided to do something a little more special this time and brought Cho flowers. Nothing too fancy—he brought her a pink rose— _friendship, admiration_ —and to be a little more complimentary and as a nod to her heritage, he added a cluster of China roses— _beauty always new._ That last part seemed to go over her head, though she did appreciate the gesture. Cho, like most people at Hogwarts, didn’t know the Language of Flowers beyond red rose, pink rose, white rose, yellow rose, but what could you do?

It was a fine day, and Harry was humming to himself as he and Cho took advantage of the fair weather and walked to Hogsmeade. He hadn’t done that in quite a while. They first visited Madam Puddifoot’s again, and Harry was pleased to find that on days other than Valentine’s Day, it looked much more normal, although it was still a crowded, romanticised setting.

Harry was a little more prepared this time for conversation. He asked after Cho’s family, for example. Her grandparents had fought with the Magical Allies during Grindelwald’s War. They’d been stationed in Scotland for a time as liaisons to Dumbledore from the Chinese Bureau of Magic and had loved it so much that they moved there after the war. The Changs lived close to the muggle world to ensure that they would always be familiar enough with it to blend it, and Harry was pleased to learn that she had seen a fair amount of muggle television. However, he was less pleased that she didn’t share his own family’s enthusiasm for _Doctor Who_.

“It’s alright,” she said. “I watched it off and on. I really prefer things like _Eastenders,_ though.”

“Did you see _Dimensions in Time_ over the holiday?” Harry asked.

“No, nobody recorded it.”

“You weren’t missing much. It was almost as bad as _The Twin Dilemma_.”

“The what?”

“The one with the giant slug-people?” he said. She showed no signs of recognition. “Never mind. It was pretty bad.”

Asking Cho about her other interests, he learnt that she was quite athletic and enjoyed tennis at home in addition to Quidditch, but otherwise preferred not to be as feverishly busy in her off hours as Harry and Hermione were with karate, duelling practice, wandless magic, politics, and various other activities. She apparently much preferred curling up with one of those romance novels that Hermione always called “tedious, derivative, and unrealistic.”

Cho, for her part, also managed to ask Harry more questions that he could actually answer, but their interest didn’t seem to mesh much. She didn’t seem to share his interest in muggle fantasy. (To be fair, he might not have cared for it himself if he’d been raised in the magical world.) She wasn’t interested in taking the time to learn wandless magic or martial arts. And more worryingly, she still asked the occasional question about his holidays overseas over the years that sounded like they had been inspired by the _Harry Potter Adventures_ books. He could understand how it could be hard to separate truth from fiction with all the stuff that was written about him, so he tried to set her straight gently when that came up.

Overall, Harry made an effort to take it in stride, but after they left Madam Puddifoot’s, during the mid-morning lull, he decided to go out on a limb and try to show her a little more of the _real_ Harry Potter’s life.

“Let’s go out to the Shrieking Shack,” he said.

“Okay,” Cho said. As they got up to go, Harry went out on another limb and, instead of offering his arm again, held her hand. They were smiling as they walked hand in hand to the “most haunted building in Britain.”

* * *

Contrary to popular belief, Barty Crouch Senior hadn’t been the last of his line, though he was the last male that anyone knew about, so that was as good as. Most people had long forgotten that Artemis Crouch, Old Barty’s niece, was still living. This was probably because Artemis Crouch was a werewolf and hadn’t been seen in civilised society for about twenty years—twenty years during which she had been raised and trained by Fenrir Greyback. For many years, it had been a challenge for Greyback to keep her in his pack, not because of her loyalties, but because she was a natural alpha, and this put her in conflict with Greyback’s mate. It would have come to tooth and claw, but Artemis had no interest in being a mate to the man she called father. When she came of age, she found a reasonably fit beta and stuck to him.

Artemis’s real value to the pack, though, was as a spy. When not running under the full moon, she was a smallish woman, only lightly scarred, and, like a certain cousin of hers, she was good at acting innocent. Today, that spy was lurking around the Shrieking Shack, trying to tease out a way in through the wards, either above ground or below. While she had never been to Hogwarts, she was quite adept with a stolen wand when taught by a couple of older werewolves who had.

The wards, however, were very strong. Dumbledore must have set them himself. It was almost impossible for humans to get in—unsurprising, since you wouldn’t want people wandering in when a werewolf was in there. And so far as she could tell, it _was_ impossible for a transformed werewolf to get out, at least on their own. They would need a wizard with them to open the wards—unsurprising again, since you wouldn’t want a werewolf getting out of the place so close to people’s homes in Hogsmeade. Greyback suspected a tunnel from the basement of the Shack back to the school, but they didn’t know how it ran or where it came out, and it seemed to be impervious to her remote scans.

Artemis cursed under her breath. They had less than a month to solve this problem. One way or another, one of the werewolf bills was likely to pass the Wizengamot this summer, and there was only one more full moon before Hogwarts let out. Greyback was already in a foul mood because of a small revision he’d had to make to his plans. A few days ago, the Pack had managed to get hold of a full course of Wolfsbane Potion—seven doses—courtesy of Mr. Lyles. With a little more pressure and persuasion (and blackmail; after all, he could go to Azkaban for passing the stuff along at all), they had convinced him to join their plan fully, on one condition: that he be allowed to join the raiding party. That was bad enough. He was a captive wolf and had lived most of his life in civilised magical society. That made him the weakest link and the least trustworthy.

The other problem was the test run they had done at the last full moon: seven werewolves, one dose of Wolfsbane each, and an obstacle course they had set up in advance. The good news was that a single dose of Wolfsbane made a difference: a pack of mindless beasts became a team of trained dogs—or at least trained wolves—able to follow a complex plan on a marked course if they were properly led and commanded. The problem was that with only one dose of the potion, Greyback himself wasn’t sane enough to _lead_ it reliably, and there was no time for another test. That meant he would have to bet everything on an untested plan: Greyback himself would take two doses of Wolfsbane, in hopes that it would be enough to lead the Pack, and he would take five others on one dose each—one less chance to cause mayhem, but it was the only way. Granted, they were still working on some other contacts, and it was possible they could get another batch of the stuff for a total of thirteen—practically everyone in the Pack who was worth a damn.

But all that was moot if they couldn’t actually get in. One stratagem after another of teasing her way through the wards failed, and time was of the essence. That was why Artemis was here at all on a day when the students were here. It was bad enough trying to stay hidden with just the regular tourists.

Few people came by the Shack in late morning, so Artemis thought she’d have a chance to keep working, but no luck. She was at it for only a few minutes before she heard voices coming up the lane. She ducked into the nearest cover, a cluster of bushes a short distance away and froze, waiting to see who was coming.

When she saw who it was, she couldn’t believe her eyes. It was Harry Potter, the Boy-Who-Lived, Basilisk-Slayer, and personal friend of the Pack-traitor, Remus Lupin. There was a very pretty girl with him, whom it sounded like he was trying to impress enough for her to take him as a mate…or something like that. It had been a while since she had thought about mating in human terms. She watched and listened from the shadows as they stopped in front of the Shack. Artemis didn’t dare make a sound. The episode at Halloween demonstrated that the Boy-Who-Lived had very keen ears.

“Hey, Cho, do you want to know a secret?” said Harry.

Cho’s eyes grew wide with anticipation. Harry had been so cagey about his life that she was dying to know something more. “Oh, yes, Harry,” she whispered. “What is it?”

He looked over towards the Shack and said, “It’s not really haunted.”

Cho’s grin slipped, and she stared at him with confusion. “What are you talking about?” she asked.

“The Shrieking Shack. There aren’t any ghosts. It’s not even that old. You might not know, with your grandparents not being natives, but if you ask around, you’ll find that the stories about it being the most haunted building in Britain only started circulating in the seventies.”

“They did?” Cho said, still trying to figure out what this had to do with anything. “But why…?”

Harry leaned a little closer to her: “D’you remember my friend, Remus Lupin?”

“The werewolf?” she said a little too fast.

“Yes. You see, when Remus first started at Hogwarts, he needed a safe place to spend the night during the full moon, away from the rest of the students. So Dumbledore bought an abandoned shack on the outskirts of Hogsmeade and enchanted it to hold a werewolf. Then, he made a secret passage from the shack back to the school so he could go there before moonrise on those nights.”

She raised an eyebrow when she put it together. “So the Shrieking Shack is actually connected to the school?” she asked.

“Yep. If you go down to the basement, you’ll find a tunnel, and from there, it’s a straight shot up to the school grounds, where it comes out under the Whomping Willow down the hill past Hagrid’s hut. There’s a big knot at the base of the tree, and if you press it, the tree freezes long enough to get out from under it.”

“Wow…” Cho said, trailing off for a moment. “That’s kind of disappointing.”

“What? Why?”

“There’s supposed to be a bunch of super-tough ghosts there who even the Bloody Baron won’t go near, but you’re saying the whole thing’s just a scam?”

“Remus likes to think of it as more of a prank…He loves pranks.”

“But still, that’s not as interesting as the most haunted building in Britain.”

Harry resisted the urge to shake his head. Sometimes, he thought, people who grew up in the magical world just didn’t get it. Ghosts were everywhere in the magical world. Hogwarts itself was easily the most haunted building in Britain. And granted, he didn’t find the Shrieking Shack _that_ interesting by itself, but just the fact that Dumbledore and Remus together had pulled one over on the whole country was pretty neat in his opinion. “There’s more, though,” he tried again.

“There is?”

“Yeah. Did you hear how Sirius Black registered as an animagus?”

“Uh, yeah I heard something about that.”

“And Peter Pettigrew was one?”

“Yes, I remember that.”

“Well, my dad was one, too. He was a stag. The three of them actually became animagi when they were in school, and on the full moon, they’d sneak out to the Shrieking Shack with Remus in animal form.”

“Your _dad_ was an animagus?” Cho said in surprise, suddenly sounding much more interested.

“Uh huh.”

“I guess that is pretty cool. Anyone else in your family?”

“No need,” Harry said carefully. “Remus isn’t in school anymore. He can go off on his own, or Sirius can keep him company.” All that was technically true, but he was nowhere near ready to reveal the full story. He didn’t even say that the Marauders had left the Shack to roam the Forbidden Forest. He was hoping that if Cho proved trustworthy with what was already basically an open secret that Sirius had become an unregistered animagus in school—and if they stayed together—that he could trust her with his bigger secrets later.

“Well, head back for lunch, then?” Cho said after a little more aimless conversation.

“Sure, let’s go,” Harry agreed. They turned and walked away from the Shrieking Shack hand in hand.

Artemis couldn’t believe her ears when she overheard the conversation. Harry Bloody Potter had just given away most of the information she needed, completely oblivious to who was listening in. That was just too perfect. She waited until the young couple was out of earshot, then apparated away at once. It seemed that this day hadn’t been so unproductive after all.

* * *

Harry and Cho shared a pleasant lunch at the Three Broomsticks, which only turned unpleasant when they got up to leave because that was when Cedric Diggory walked up to them.

“Good afternoon, Lord Potter,” he said.

Harry froze and shot the Hufflepuff a wary look. Formal titles—that meant serious business. “Good afternoon, Mr. Diggory,” he replied.

“I was wondering if I might be able to have a word with you…?” He glanced at Cho. “In private?”

Harry also cast a glance at Cho. “Is that really necessary?” he asked.

“Yes, I believe so. There are sensitive government matters in play.”

Harry grumbled to himself a bit and then gave his date a sympathetic look. “I’m sorry about this, Cho,” he said. “I’ll try to keep it short.”

Cho gave him an exasperated sigh, but she said, “I understand, Harry.”

“Sorry about this, but this sounds important—I’m sure Mr. Diggory knows that it had _better_ be important.”

“It is. And this shouldn’t take very long,” Cedric said apologetically. He led Harry to one of the back rooms in the pub. Harry had a faint urge to draw his wand, but he wrote that off as being a little _too_ paranoid. Once there, Cedric took a deep breath, steeling himself for what was to come. “I wanted you to know, Potter, that I visited the Robins family this morning.”

Harry did draw his wand, then, though he kept it at his side. “And what did you do to them?” he demanded.

“Nothing, nothing. We just talked.” He held up his hands to show he didn’t want trouble.

“About what?”

“This wasn’t the first time,” Cedric said hesitantly. “I…I wanted to understand what they’re going through. I needed to see for myself instead of just parroting what everyone else says.”

That was not what Harry was expecting. He holstered his wand. “And what did you find?”

“I…” He swallowed uncomfortably. “I think my father is wrong—about werewolves. Tell the truth, I don’t see how anyone can look at that little girl and see a monster. People talk about werewolves like they’re not even human—including my father—and they just can’t see how wrong that is. I’ve been researching the Wolfsbane Potion, too. Anyone can see it’s perfectly safe if it’s properly used—”

“Okay, I get it,” Harry said. “What brought this on, though?”

Cedric shrugged: “I couldn’t see someone like you being friends with werewolves if they were all bad.”

He rolled his eyes. It shouldn’t take that to get the point across. “Well, since we’re having this conversation, is there anything you can do about your father?” he asked.

Cedric sighed at that. “I can try,” he said, “but when he gets something into his head, it can be awfully hard to get it out…What about you? Have you had any luck finding a school that will take Demelza?”

Harry shook his head. “Nothing yet, but I’m still working on it.”

“Well, good luck with that Potter.”

“Sure thing…” he turned to walk away, but he stopped. “Cedric?” he called.

“Yeah?”

“Thanks.”

Cedric smiled: “No problem, Harry.”

Harry made it back to Cho right away, who was looking a little impatient, but brightened in response to his improved mood. She asked what was going on, and he gave her a cursory overview of the situation. She said she thought it was sweet of Cedric to think of Demelza like that, and they continued on their date with no further trouble.

By the end of the day, Harry still didn’t think he felt anything beyond “just nice” with Cho. Indeed, the two of them had got on each other’s nerves a little bit a couple of times, but of course, in the real world, things never went perfectly smoothly, so he didn’t let it faze him. He did notice, however, that one of the things that annoyed her the most was being interrupted for business, and being Harry Potter, he had quite a lot of that. That was something they would have to discuss if this was going to work out. As for Harry, what annoyed him was those times when Cho started getting a little too fangirlish over the Boy-Who-Lived thing. That was a common trait of girls at Hogwarts, though, and she seemed to be making a real effort, so he tried to suppress his annoyance for her sake.

On the whole, however, he still enjoyed the date, and when they got back to the castle, it was Harry who leaned in and kissed Cho this time.

* * *

_Dear Dad,_

_I_ _’ve been putting off writing this letter for a while, but I don’t think I can any longer. For most of this year, I’ve been going along with you on the Werewolf Protection Act, but to be honest, it’s only really been a matter of family honour. As much as I respect your work, I think we’ve established that I’m not the politician you are._

_I_ _’m sorry, Dad, but at this point, I don’t feel that I can continue to support the bill just out of family honour. I think you’re making a mistake, both with the bill and your stance against werewolves at Hogwarts. I know that’s probably pretty shocking to hear from me, but this isn’t something that happened overnight. I’ve been thinking about it and researching it for weeks, and I just can’t see the rationale. You’re even on the opposite side from Harry Potter on this, and while no one is infallible, and it’s only to be expected that we would have some political disagreements, that should really give you some pause._

_I do see your point on a lot of this. Potter_ _’s bill is probably too sanguine, and the safety issues with Wolfsbane Potion are real, but I think you’re close enough in position that you could work out your differences and work together instead of fighting each other. And I think you’re completely wrong about the job restrictions. All but the most staunchly anti-werewolf people will admit that werewolves are only inherently dangerous on the night of the full moon if you press them on it, so why would we ban them from a bunch of jobs and make it that much harder for them to function in society?_

_As for Hogwarts, maybe it would have been appropriate to ban werewolves from the school back in the 1970s, when Lupin was here, but it_ _’s a lot safer now than it was then with Wolfsbane Potion. There’s a better way than shutting innocent people out of a good education. If we made sure they got a reliable supply of Wolfsbane and had them transform in the Shrieking Shack, there shouldn’t be any problem._

_I_ _’ve spoken to the Robins family on my last two Hogsmeade visits. That may surprise you, but I’m glad I did. I found them to be good people who are trying to make the best of a bad situation. Demelza is a sweet girl with an unshakable optimism and a natural Gryffindor who would never harm anyone if she could help it. There’s a lot I can’t say without betraying their trust, but I can tell you that they do have a reliable supplier for Wolfsbane, and I was surprised at how strong their safety precautions were. They take it very seriously, and I can honestly say that I would not be uncomfortable at all having her at Hogwarts. So I guess what I want to say is that you should give some serious thought to reconsidering your position._

_Love,_

_Cedric_

* * *

West Africa was a wash for Voldemort. The Vodun traditions, though varied and powerful and very interesting, just couldn’t be made to mesh with his horcrux and Homunculus system. If he’d known his options would be this restricted at age sixteen, he might have investigated a different path to immortality. As it was, he and his death eaters had to keep moving.

“I should have suspected,” he muttered to himself in a high, cold voice. “Not just any dark wizard can handle the horcrux magic properly. If it were easy, we would not need to make this journey in the first place. In order to do the extraordinary, we must find the extraordinary. Egypt was a good idea. Lebanon and Ghana were less so. But the Aztecs were more developed of any others in the magic of life and death. We must seek out true skill at our next destination.”

It wasn’t easy to get hold of an international portkey from Ghana to Mexico. In fact, it was impossible. They were just too tightly regulated. Fortunately, Voldemort knew a few tricks. Like hijacking portkeys. They managed to sign themselves onto a portkey from Ghana back to Britain for the Quidditch World Cup, and Voldemort instructed Barty how to add an intermediate destination. He had to add it blind, never having been to Mexico, but after consulting a map for appropriate coordinates, the arithmancy was easy. The portkey transported them across the Atlantic to an obscure hollow near Chixulub. Then, the Death Eaters Obliviated the Ghanans and sent them on their way to the portkey’s final destination in England. No one was ever the wiser.

Once in Mexico, they started poking around, and one name—or title, rather—kept coming to their ears: _La Dama Obscura de Veracruz_ —the Dark Lady of Veracruz.

* * *

_Dear Cedric,_

_I was surprised, to say the least, to read your last letter, my boy. I_ _’m pleased that you’re taking a sudden interest in politics, but I would be lying if I said I wasn’t a bit disappointed in you conclusions. I can tell your heart’s in the right place. It’s a fine, Hufflepuff thing to want to help people in difficult situations. But in this case, it’s not that simple. You’re young; it’s understandable, but you should get a clear measure of things._

_The lycanthropy illness itself is not the problem. I_ _’m sorry if I gave that impression, but the fact is that werewolves as a whole tend to be an unsavoury lot. Just look at the crime rates for werewolves versus the general population. Or worse, look how many otherwise law-abiding werewolves flocked to Greyback’s pack during the war. I admit that the restrictions in our bill are harsh, but we’re trying to keep people who pose a danger away from positions of power where they could do serious harm to others._

_And as for those who are of school age, yes, it_ _’s a tragedy that innocent children must suffer from this illness, mostly at Greyback’s hands, and it’s a tragedy that their education must suffer as well, but Hogwarts is not immune from sleeper agents or radicalised students. The last war proved that. There would be far too much risk that a student who_ _ wasn _ _ ’t _ _following the rules could become a danger to others. What little I know of Miss Robins indicates that she is a sweet girl, and it_ _’s very noble of you to try to help her, but you cannot base your conclusion off of a single case._

_I hope you can see my position, my boy. If you like, we can discuss this at greater length at home._

_Love,_

_Dad_

 

Cedric found himself surprisingly annoyed as he finished reading his father’s letter. He knew how his father operated. The whole thing was a diplomatic way of saying “I’m right, and you’re wrong.” He could just tell. “Surprised, to say the least”—translation: he was pretty ticked off. And the way he called him “my boy”—Cedric knew he meant it affectionately, but somehow, it came across as condescending, as if he were an ignorant child. In fact, he’d even come out and said it: “You’re young; it’s understandable.” He was sixteen, for Merlin’s sake.

His father was still repeating the same talking points that all of the anti-werewolf people used. He could recite the whole debate in his head. Werewolves have sky-high crime rates, they said. Then the other side would say that was because of poverty and disproportionate scrutiny from the DMLE. And then his father would bring up _violent_ crime rates (despite the fact that violent crime was uncommon enough outside the war that it was nigh-impossible to do an arithmantically significant analysis). Then his opponents would point out the lack of affordable Mind Healer’s care. And it would just go on, with both sides just talking past each other as much as talking to each other. The thing was, after all that, Cedric just couldn’t get past the injustice of denying anyone an education.

And the admonition to discuss it at home. That meant his father would rather not see another letter on the topic and would probably rather Cedric forget about it entirely. That was probably less out of anger and more out of not wanting to deal with it, but still…

And so, Cedric was annoyed, and he _wasn_ _’t_ going to forget about it.

This probably wouldn’t end well.

* * *

Day after day, the report was the same: ten thousand muggles killed in Rwanda. Some reports said twenty thousand. And murders of wizards every day at the hands of Kinani Ngeze and his followers—murder and terror fell as a shadow over East Africa.

And yet, the ICW still squabbled in Meiringen over whether to intervene. The justification for staying out of it was that, supposedly, the Rwandans could take care of themselves. After all, the muggle rebels had been making steady progress in April.

But then May came, and the muggle rebels were bogged down besieging the capital of Kigali. Ngeze had thrown up barriers to them that the magical opposition could barely understand, and he ruled the population centre of magical Kigali with an iron fist while still continuing to send forays into neighbouring countries. That was a good argument to send a task force, but apparently not a good enough one. Day after day, they debated and came to no consensus.

Albus Dumbledore was growing increasingly frustrated. This mess was taking valuable time away from his duties in Britain. He could get away for the full moons and the Wizengamot meetings, but just barely, and Minerva must be losing her mind running Hogwarts on her own. Merlin knew she had in that mess last year. Today, they really needed to wrap it up. The debate had gone on and on until the twenty-third of May, and it was the day before the last full moon of the school year. It was time to close the session for a two-day recess, and then maybe he could get some real work done for a change.

Unfortunately, Fate seemed to be working against him. Near the end of the business day, a page ran in, frantic, carrying a message for the assembly.

“Hold it! Hold everything!” the young man yelled in a thick accent. “Supreme Mugwump I have an emergency communique for the ICW addressed from the Burundian government in exile in Zaire.”

Gasps rang out from the assembled delegates. The Burundian government wasn’t _in_ exile.

“Oh dear,” Dumbledore said. “Please read the communique, Mr. Thibault.”

“To the Delegates of the International Confederation of Wizards from Pascal Hakizimana, Interim Minister for Magic of the the Burundian magical government in exile,” the page read in a shaky voice. “We have lost our country. We do not know what happened. There was an attack on our Auror force. We do not know what happened. There were no survivors who witnessed it. All we know is that our entire Auror Department is gone—literally cut to pieces. The next day, Kinani Ngeze came to the Ministry building personally. He threw fire from his hands. His feet shook the earth. We didn’t have the manpower to defend it. We were forced to flee. There are so few of us left we have no hope of taking our country back on our own. We beg the help of the ICW to intervene and liberate our people. Message ends.”

Horrified murmurs swept the castle, and Dumbledore stared gravely. This was not good. Ngeze had scored a decisive blow and spread this war far beyond what the muggles knew or saw. Intervention would be nearly certain now, which was good on the whole, but on a more personal matter, it looked like he would have to send a message to Minerva that he wouldn’t be able to make it back to Britain tomorrow night.


	77. Greyback's Attack

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Correct horse battery JK Rowling.
> 
> Wow, this is the first chapter I’ve ever had to write three major drafts of. It took a lot of work to accomplish all of my goals for this confrontation in what I hope is a pretty plausible and realistic way. A big thanks to Endgames for his advice on this chapter.
> 
> I have chosen to ignore JKR’s assertion that Hufflepuff has the most secure common room at Hogwarts along with a couple of other details because it really doesn’t mesh with the description, and it’s just implausible that no one (including the Marauders) has managed to break into it in over a thousand years. I also used the movie layout of the castle to construct the battle plan.

“Hey, where’s Dumbledore?”

“Tonight’s the full moon.”

“He’s supposed to be here.”

“What happens if he’s gone?”

The whispers were flying fast and furious in the Great Hall on the morning of the twenty-fourth of May. Headmaster Dumbledore was nowhere to be seen at breakfast, and the apprehension quickly grew to such a pitch that Professor McGonagall had to stand up and make an announcement.

“May I have your attention, please?” she called out, and the Hall quieted down. “As many of you have noticed, Professor Dumbledore is still absent today. I’m afraid that he has been detained in Switzerland for longer than expected due to sudden developments in the East African crisis, and he will not be returning tonight.” Worried murmurs broke out at this. “I assure you that there is no cause for alarm,” she said, raising her voice a little higher. “We will continue to provide a full range of security measures tonight, as on the previous full moons. We _are_ living in a castle, if you recall, and no transformed werewolf can get in through any door or window when Hogwarts is locked down, so I don’t want to hear any more worries about the moon cycle.”

“Well, she seems pretty certain,” Hermione observed.

“Yeah. This is still gonna be Greyback’s best chance to get in, though,” Harry said. “If he wants to make a move here, it’s gonna have to be tonight.”

“I’m sure the teachers know that, Harry. And so do the Aurors. They’ll be ready.”

“Besides,” Neville said. “Isn’t what Greyback really wants an army of muggle werewolves?”

“That’s what everyone says, but that’s just a guess,” Harry countered. “I’d feel better if we had a solid idea what his plans were.”

“Is there any way we can keep watch?” an eager voice said. Everyone in earshot turned to look at Colin Creevey.

“Keep watch?” said Ginny Weasley, who was sitting across from him. “How? Who’s gonna go out to the front lines to watch?”

“I meant like from the battlements or something,” Colin said. “If Greyback shows up, he’s gonna have to come across the grounds, right?”

“He wouldn’t have to,” said Ron. “There’s secret passages into the castle—Oi, Fred, George! Could a werewolf get in through a secret passage?”

Fred and George conferred with each other, and Harry also considered the question, since he knew the Marauder’s Map as well as they did by now, but they reached a conclusion before he did: “Nah, couldn’t be. The only one they could use you need thumbs to get through.”

“I doubt we could keep watch better than the teachers, Colin,” Hermione said, “but it’s a nice thought.”

“Well, I might have a trick or two—” Harry started, but something else distracted him: “Oh, look, the mail’s here.”

The post owls flew into the Great Hall; Harry was surprised when a strange owl landed wearily in front of him, dropped its letter, and immediate snapped up a double rasher of sausage from his plate. (“Hey!” he said.) At first, he thought the bird was an eagle owl, but it was leaner, more orange-coloured, had larger ear tufts and, if it were possible, an ever harsher stare. It was a great horned owl. From the Americas.

Harry let the sausage go and eagerly ripped open the letter.

“YES!” he yelled.

“Harry, what is it?” Hermione demanded.

He read the letter aloud:

 

_Dear Mr. Potter,_

_I apologize that it has taken so long for us to get back to you. There were a lot of hoops to jump through. I won_ _’t bore you with the details, but suffice it to say that your request had to be approved by the Department of Magical Education in Boston, our own school board here in New Orleans, and our Parent-Teacher Organization. However, I am pleased to inform you than the final hurdles have been cleared. With this approval, we will be happy to admit your friend who suffers from lycanthropy for the 1994-1995 school year on the condition that she takes the Wolfsbane Potion monthly. We have always valued diversity here at Long River, and we are honored to work with someone who believes so strongly in equal magical rights, especially overseas._

_Sincerely,_

_Sequoyah Proctor_

_Dean of Admissions and Defensive Magic Teacher_

_Long River School of Arcana_

_New Orleans, LA, USA_

 

“Why don’t _we_ have a parent-teacher organisation?” Hermione wondered.

“Who cares? I finally found a place for Demelza to go. This is great! I’ll have to write her right away.”

She smiled at her brother’s enthusiasm: “Yes, Harry, it’s really good of you to do that for her. But still, I think a PTO would be a big help here.”

“Well, have Neville write his Gran,” Harry said. Once breakfast was over, he jumped up and practically ran to the Owlery.

After he left, Hermione turned to Neville and sighed: “And Harry Potter does the impossible again. You know, sometimes it almost makes me wonder if he secretly _likes_ being famous.”

“Yeah, it kinda does,” Neville agreed. “Almost.”

* * *

It was time.

After three weeks of careful, painstaking work and planning, Fenrir Greyback had all his pieces in place. To his great fortune, one of his recruiters had come through with another batch of Wolfsbane Potion, and so, he had thirteen werewolves ready to go to Hogwarts, and now, thanks to dear Artemis, they had a way in. How fitting that it had been Potter himself who let slip the information he needed. Now that they knew the exact route of the secret passage onto the grounds, they didn’t need to get into the Shrieking Shack. All they needed to do was to find a secluded spot above the passage itself and start digging.

Slowly, carefully, they prepared, digging in a well-hidden place under a tree in the Forbidden Forest, just outside the wards, using as little magic as possible to avoid suspicion. Now, they had a hole big enough for them to wriggle down in human form. Once in the tunnel, they struck a light and proceeded towards the castle. They felt a tingling sensation as they passed through the powerful wards of the Hogwarts grounds, diluted by the earth above them, and another ward on the tunnel itself. There was no indication that they had triggered for the passage of an untransformed werewolf. Above ground, they triggered for any human crossing the boundary other than through the gates, or this whole thing would have been much easier, but the wards on this tunnel had been adjusted to allow untransformed werewolves to pass in both directions for the Pack-traitor Lupin’s sake all those years ago.

With that obstacle out of the way, they reached the exit of the tunnel under the Whomping Willow. Reaching up, they found the knot that immobilised it and tested it. Everything worked according to plan. They would be able to strike it again just before moonrise.

“Good, good,” Greyback whispered to his brethren. Lycaon was there, as was Artemis Crouch, Geri Lyles, and just about every good hunter from his pack. “Everything is ready,” he said. “At last, we will have our revenge.”

* * *

“Alright, kid,” said a gruff, old, one-eyed wizard. “This is your final exam: the Hogsmeade beat on a full moon. And remember, it’s the last full moon of the school year. If something’s gonna happen here, it’s probably gonna be tonight, so exercise CONSTANT VIGILANCE!”

“You got it, boss.” Nymphadora Tonks shifted her hair to a deep purple so as to be less conspicuous in the dark, checked her wand holsters (being Mad-Eye Moody’s apprentice, she _had_ to have at least two), and mentally prepared herself for the night ahead. Three years of training had led to this night. If she did well tonight, she’d be a fully-qualified Auror. And there _was_ a good chance of some trouble tonight, but she was resolved to be ready. Once this was over, she would…what would she do? What did she want to do? She grinned when she got an idea.

“I’d better make sure the Robinses are secure, Mad-Eye. My cousin isn’t exactly CONSTANTLY VIGILANT!”

Mad-Eye chuckled and let her go. (There were enough Aurors and Hitwizards in the village that they didn’t need to go in teams _per se_.) She walked quickly through the streets until she came to the thatched house where Hogsmeade’s one declared werewolf lived and where her cousin and his best friend were once again staying for the night.

“Sirius? Everything set here?” she asked when she found them.

“All ready to go, Tonks,” he said. “Even threw up a couple extra wards like Mad-Eye wanted. If Greyback tries to come in here, they’ll at least slow him down long enough for me to give him what for.”

“Don’t get cocky, Padfoot,” Remus admonished. “We can’t afford any mistakes tonight.”

“Moony, we’ve been doing this just fine for months. I know how to be careful. So, big night for you, isn’t it, Tonks? All finished with training? Just have to make it till morning without screwing up?”

“Yep. Then I’ll be fully-qualified,” Dora said with a grin. “It’ll be great not to have to introduce myself as “Apprentice Auror Tonks’ anymore.” She paused and shot a glance at Remus. “Say, Wolfie, when I’m done, I’m taking you out for celebratory drinks.”

“I—wait, what?” Remus sputtered.

“You heard me. I’ll take you out for drinks.”

“Um…Dora, isn’t it supposed to be me who takes you out for drinks?”

“Well, since you’re offering, I’d be honoured.”

Remus slapped his forehead. Sirius barked loudly with laughter. “Oh, damn, Moony, you walked right into that one,” he howled.

“How did I fall for that?” he grumbled.

Before he could try to take it back, though, he heard a mischievous giggling. He turned and saw Demelza crouching on the stairs, peaking at the three of them through the bars of the railing with a huge grin on her face. “Aww, it’s so romantic,” the little witch said. Dora giggled along with her. Demelza was already over the moon from receiving Harry’s letter earlier that day, which was making her inordinately giddy about everything.

“This is not romantic,” Remus protested. “She tried to trick me into asking her out for drinks.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa. I did not _try_ to trick you,” Dora said. “I succeeded.”

“She’s right, Mr. Lupin,” Demelza said. “Now you gotta take her.”

“You have _got_ to be kidding me,” he muttered.

“Come on, Mr. Lupin,” the little girl said insistently, “Auror Tonks has to save you before your heart turns all gross and hairy.”

Sirius roared even louder with laughter at the fairy tale reference and fell on the floor. Dora and even Demelza’s parents watched and chuckled at Remus’s predicament. “Useless! Useless the lot of you!” he growled sardonically. “Why does everyone insist on trying to play matchmaker for me?”

“Because you refuse to take the initiative,” Sirius said without hesitation. “And deep down, you know you don’t really want to be alone.”

“I told you, it’s not a question of what I want—”

“Sure it is!” Demelza interrupted. She scampered down the stairs and stood in front of him, looking up at him with big, pleading eyes. “Mr. Moony,” she said more timidly, trying his nickname for the first time, “Harry Potter told me that I can do anything I want with my life. He even found a school I can go to. He said I shouldn’t ever let being a werewolf stop me, and anyone who said different was just being stupid. And if you’re his friend, maybe _you_ should quit being stupid and listen to him, too.”

Remus stared down at the girl, wondering how she had come so far as to try to verbally slap some sense into him. She’d be a Gryffindor for sure if she could go to Hogwarts. And yet, she kept looking up at him with those big, pleading eyes. He wondered if maybe Sirius and Harry and practically his whole family had a point. Pretty much all of them had told him not to let his lycanthropy get him down at one time or another. And as for how he felt about Dora…honestly, he wasn’t sure if it could work out even without his furry little problem. She was thirteen years his junior and almost as wild as Sirius had been at that age. But then again, few people ever would’ve pegged Remus for a Marauder like James or Sirius. He could adapt. And he had to admit, Dora was fun to be around; she reminded him of the more carefree days of his youth, and she truly cared about him, the way she kept trying to comfort him the day after the full moon. He still couldn’t fathom what she saw in him, but maybe it was worth a shot…Demelza certainly seemed to think so.

“Oh, Merlin, I can’t say no to a face like that,” he said. “Alright, you win, Dora, Friday night, I’ll take you out for drinks—just for Demelza’s sake, mind—”

“Yes!” Dora ran up and grabbed him in a tight hug and kissed him on the cheek. “It’s about time you finally came around, Wolfie. Thanks, kid, I owe you one.”

“I’m doomed, aren’t I?” Remus said.

“Yep,” Sirius replied.

* * *

Moonrise at Hogwarts was at 9:12 in the evening on the night of 24 May, not long after curfew. The moon was in Scorpius, which Professor Trelawney said meant someone would be stung tonight, but hardly anybody paid attention to her. Safe inside the walls of Hogwarts, things were going smoothly. Prefect and teacher patrols were going about as normal. In the Gryffindor Common Room, even Harry Potter was mostly unconcerned.

Then, at 9:13, an eerie sound wafted across the grounds: _Arrrh-oooo-erk!_

Harry looked up and over to Hermione and Neville, who were working on Charms homework. Hermione was idly petting Crookshanks with her free hand. A few other humans and the cat remarked the sound and shivered.

“That sounded close,” Harry said.

“Hmm, maybe,” Hermione said absently.

When no one else said anything, Harry said, “Like inside the grounds close—and like someone was trying to keep that wolf quiet.”

“I doubt that. They couldn’t get through the ward boundaries.”

“I don’t know, Mione. I’d feel better if—of course, the Map.”

“The Map?” Hermione and Neville said in unison.

“Yeah, to check if there’s anyone out on the grounds.”

“Really, Harry?” Hermione said.

“Hey, it can’t hurt to check. I’ll just run up and take a look.”

Harry could scale the seven flights to his dorm pretty quickly, but tonight, a strange sense of urgency overtook him. As soon as he was out of sight of the Common Room and sure he wasn’t being watched, he dropped to his knees, changed to cat form, and sprinted up the stairs. He changed back outside the door and barged in. With a wave of his hand and a wandless charm, he opened his trunk and fished out the Marauder’s Map.

“I solemnly swear that I am up to no good.”

The Map quickly showed him what he needed to see.

“Bloody buggering hell!” Harry dove for his communication mirror. “Sirius Black! Sirius Black!”

It was an agonisingly long time before the connection was answered, even if it was probably only a few seconds. Finally, Sirius’s worried face appeared in the mirror. He started to speak a word or two, but Harry didn’t listen and shouted over him, “Greyback’s on the grounds!”

“What?!” yelled three human voices. At the same time, the sound of a growl and a whine came from the background.

“He’s got a whole pack—here, just look,” Harry didn’t waste time describing what he saw and instead just held the mirror over the Map so that Sirius could see.

Sirius’s response was even more colourful than Harry’s. Thirteen dots were coming up the hill from the Whomping Willow up to the castle, moving fast and seemingly in formation. The lead dot was labelled _Fenrir Greyback_.

“How? How did they get in?” Sirius said. “They couldn’t get through the wards.”

“Maybe they were already there?”

“But how could they—never mind. I’ll alert the Aurors, and Moony and I will come up to the castle. You could use a couple extra sets of claws on your side.”

“Sirius—”

“There’s no time, Cub.”

“I—just be careful. I’ll warn McGonagall.”

“Harry, no!”

“I’ll be fine. Animals are safe if they don’t attack. I won’t have to be in human form at all.”

“Augh—dammit, just you be careful, too. Mirror off.”

* * *

Sirius set the mirror down and spun around. “You get all that Moony?” he said. The werewolf nodded his head. “Okay, we need to try to get you in by whatever path they took and get the Aurors up there. Stick close to me and let me do the talking.” Moony growled at the bad joke, but there was no time to fight about it. “I’m sorry, Mr. and Mrs. Robins, but we have to go. Stay,” Sirius said sharply, pointing at Demelza. The wolf pup whined with indignation.

They hurried up the stairs and out the front door of the house. Sirius’s eyes scanned around the street as Moony stood at his heels. Finding someone who could help, he called out, “Oi, Auror! Auror Savage!”

Lutetia Savage turned to look and immediately brought her wand up when she saw a wolf standing beside the Hitwizard. “Black? What is it?”

“Harry Potter says Greyback’s at Hogwarts! I’m gonna take Lupin to try to follow his trail. You get everybody you can to the gates.”

Auror Savage’s face went white. “Are you sure?” she said.

“Positive. I saw the tracking spells that found him.”

“Go, then. I’ll cover you. Hurry!”

“Right, come on, Moony.” Sirius changed back into Padfoot, and they sprinted away along the edge of the village until they came to the Shrieking Shack. But once there, their keen animal magic senses told them that the wards hadn’t been breached at all. Quickly putting their canid noses to work, they sniffed out a trail that led into the Forbidden Forest. This was their old stomping grounds, and they could move through it quickly. The scent grew fresh as they reached a large tree, and under it, they found a freshly-dug hole.

Padfoot barked and growled as he put two and two together. The bastards hadn’t gone into the Shrieking Shack, where the wards were all but impenetrable. They had dug directly into the tunnel. With another bark, he indicated for Moony to crawl in after him. The werewolf barely fit, but they made it. The monsters’ scents were strong here, and they took the tunnel at a run…

Only for Moony to seemingly run into a wall a short distance later. Padfoot untransformed and turned around. “Oh, Merlin, not the wards,” he said. Sure enough, the wards on the tunnel were doing exactly what they were supposed to do—keeping a transformed werewolf from getting through it to the castle. “Come on, come on, think,” he muttered to himself. “Aha! I’ve got it. Sorry about this, mate.” The wards had one obvious weakness, which had been left in place because no one would have been crazy enough to try it in the 1970s, not even the Marauders. He drew his wand, waved it at the werewolf, and uttered, “ _Homorphus Revertio_.”

Under the spell of the complex and fiendishly difficult Homorphus Charm, Remus Lupin changed back to human form—and collapsed flat on his face in pain. It was a hard spell to endure—hardly worth it even the first couple times, when it would last all night. He struggled and couldn’t get up. Starved for time, Sirius grabbed him by both hands and dragged him forward until he could no longer feel the vibrating energy of the castle’s wards. Unfortunately, he couldn’t wait forty-five minutes for the charm to wear off on its own. He hoped this would work. He pointed his wand again and said, “This is probably gonna hurt more, sorry. _Finite Incantatem_.”

It worked. Within seconds, the wolf was back, growling and howling in pain, but on his feet.

Sirius didn’t waste any time. He changed back to Padfoot and started running down the tunnel again with Moony hot on his heels. He wondered how far Greyback and his pack had got. They couldn’t be in the castle, could they? All the doors and windows were locked. Even the drainage tunnels under the dungeons had grates across them now after that troll incident two years ago. There was no way in…right? But then, a memory struck him—something he had considered when he was in school and thought he’d be able to manage if he tried—something he had always wanted to try, but had never got around to it.

_Oh, Merlin, no!_

* * *

Colin Creevey knew nothing of Harry Potter’s actions. He had taken matters into his own hands. He still thought the idea of putting a watch up on the battlements was a good one. Maybe he was being paranoid, but Harry Potter thought there was reason for concern, and that was good enough for him. And it was surprisingly easy, too. The second-year boys’ dorm was one flight up from the Common Room. He couldn’t sneak out of Gryffindor Tower through the Common Room after curfew, not with Percy Weasley, the Head Boy, keeping an eye out for trouble. But how did any muggle teenager ever sneak out of his bedroom? Well, Colin wasn’t quite thirteen yet, but the principle was the same. He tied together some sheets and climbed out the window, sliding done the one storey to the battlements.

And so he kept watch, ready to act if he saw any trouble. The full moon crept over the horizon. For a minute, nothing happened, and then he heard a howl: _Arrrh-oooo-erk!_ He looked in that direction at once. He couldn’t see anything at first, even in the moonlight. Perhaps the sound had been nothing. Or perhaps whatever had made it ran off in some other direction where he couldn’t see. There was nothing for a while, and then, he saw it! A whole pack of shadowy, animalistic figures were running across the grass up the hill towards the school. He raised his magically night-enhanced camera (he might as well get a good shot or two while he was at it), and took a photo. He noticed that the werewolves were running towards the far corner of the school, near the greenhouses. He was puzzled for a minute as he watched (and took another photo), until he realised what they were doing. They were coming inside! He ran to the nearest door into the building and started looking for a teacher—any teacher.

* * *

Hermione and Neville were very surprised when a black and white cat bolted from the boys’ stair case, darted across the Common Room, and began scratching at the portrait hole, mewling urgently. Hermione was even more surprised when Crookshanks leapt from the sofa and joined her brother at the entrance. Then, she heard clearly what the smaller cat was saying. Since she had achieved the animagus transformation herself, even as a different animal, she found that she could understand Crookshanks’s meows a little better. Animagi of different species could understand each other surprisingly well in animal form, and Ratsbane, Padfoot, and Crookshanks could all understand each other well. It wasn’t too much of a stretch for Fisher to join in, so even in human form, she could pick up a couple of words.

She only needed one: the tortured sound of a cat trying to howl.

“Oh my God,” she breathed. She glanced around at the crowded Common Room. The portrait hole was secure enough that she wouldn’t need to warn them, but she would be spotted at once opening it. No time for elaborate plans now. Merlin, how had Greyback—for that was the only one it could be—got into Hogwarts? Seeing a possible opening, she waved her hand with a wandless incantation, and suddenly the Quidditch Cup and the House Cup that sat on the mantel fell to the floor with a loud clang. Everyone looked away for a split second, giving her and the cats just enough time to slip out.

“Okay, Ratsbane, what’s going—?” Hermione said as the Fat Lady’s portrait swung closed. But she hadn’t even finished the sentence when the cats took off down the corridor. “Ratsbane! Crookshanks!” she called again, but he didn’t slow down. “Augh—felines.” She ran after them, but they were too fast for her. Instead, she ducked into the first alcove she came to, closed her eyes, and concentrated. A few seconds later, she was in her otter form, and she was on the move again. An otter still wasn’t as fast as a cat, but it was faster than Hermione Granger on two legs, at least over short distances.

Ratsbane, on the other hand, was moving fast with Crookshanks keeping pace by his side. He had to find Teacher-Cat—er, Professor McGonagall, and fast. Or did he? The castle was supposed to be on lockdown. There was no way for werewolves to get in…was there?

He fell back on his Occlumency skills. In order to protect his mind, Harry had memorised every detail of the castle to throw up a solid wall of imagery to any invaders. He tried to think through to see if there was any way for werewolves to get in while the doors and windows were locked…

 _Oh, Merlin, no!_ They _did_ have a way. It wouldn’t be easy, but he could see it clearly. He needed to hurry.

* * *

Minerva McGonagall was more than a little on edge. Not only was Albus gone during a full moon, but she had a bad feeling about tonight in particular. Maybe it was just that it was the last full moon of the school year, but her feline sixth sense had been tingling all day. So she was already nervous to start with, but that fragment of a howl put her on high alert. Something was definitely amiss.

Her rational side told her she was worrying too much. There was no way any werewolves could get into the castle, even if they were on the grounds. But a lot of impossible things had happened at Hogwarts over the past three years, and Minerva had learnt to trust her instincts. So she was out patrolling the corridors herself tonight, watching for anything out of the ordinary.

Unfortunately, things got very out of the ordinary very fast as, without warning, two cats ran out from around a corner stopped at her feet. She swung her wand around at them, but then she saw which cats they were. One was that large Kneazle cross of Hermione Granger’s, and the other was the little black one with a lightning bolt on its head.

“Mr. Potter!” she said in shock. “What on earth do you think you’re doing?”

Harry was about to answer when a third animal came slinking around the corner. But this was no cat. It was a shaggy-furred, pure brown otter.

“Miss Granger!” Minerva cried. She had only seen the girl’s animagus form twice, but she knew it at once. Both students were clearly up to something extremely reckless, but then, Harry yowled a warning that made her blood run cold. “Werewolves? On the grounds?” she gasped. Harry nodded. “You are certain?” Another nod. “ _Sonorous!_ All students return to their dormitories immediately. All staff on alert. We have intruders on the grounds! _Quietus._ Now, Mr. Potter, where are they?”

Harry meowed, _The ringing towers._

“The bell towers? You think they can get inside?”

Harry started caterwauling to try to explain, but McGonagall cut him off.

“Climbing the walls from the plant-houses—? Oh, honestly, just change to human and tell me, Mr. Potter.”

He did so at once. “Sorry, Professor,” he said. “I didn’t think they could get in, but then I thought if they were here at all, they probably had a plan, and I realised they could jump from the roofs of the greenhouses to the Training Grounds building to the eaves of the roof, and then to the battlements, and—”

“I see it; I see it, Mr. Potter. Sweet Morgana, we never bothered sealing the upper floors! If they get in, then where…of course, the obvious target. Alright, you two go back to your dorm at once, I’ll round up the teachers and try to hold them off.”

“Ma’am, there’s thirteen of them!”

“Thirteen?” she gasped in horror.

“Yes. I called the Aurors, but that’ll take time.”

“We’ll do all we can. Go now,” McGonagall insisted. And without another word, she changed to cat form and took off running towards the stairs.

Harry also changed back to cat form and motioned for Fisher and Crookshanks to follow.

 _Where are man-wolves going?_ Fisher asked.

Ratsbane thought for a moment. _Easiest prey is Badger-House. No secret-meow to get in._

 _Pup of Man-Who-Hates-Wolves is there, too,_ Fisher observed.

_Yes. I want to help more._

_Too dangerous,_ she said. _We are small animals—no good to fight man-wolves._

 _Fish-Catcher is right, Death-to-Rats,_ Crookshanks told him. Being half-kneazle he could actually carry on an intelligent conversation. _Need many cats to hunt like lions_.

Ratsbane stopped short. Both of his animal-friends stared at him. _There are many cats in the human_ _’s-house, Crooked-Legs. Can they help?_

Crookshanks gave him a sceptical look, as if he were a foolish kitten. _Herding cats is herding cats_ , he said wisely.

 _I think we should help,_ he said. _We need other ways._

Fisher thought about this. Cats in sufficient numbers might be able to fight werewolves, but it seemed like a good way to get eaten. To be safe enough to even try they’d need a fool-proof way to evade them. Then it hit her. Cats couldn’t manage that, but there was another animal that could. _I have an idea_ , she said _. Will be outside and safe. We will send owl-friends to help._

Ratsbane started to catch on at once. _Yes, owl-friends can help,_ he agreed. The three animals took a detour from the Big-Cat-House and headed towards the Owlery.

* * *

Cedric Diggory was also nervous that night, and his nervousness increased rapidly when that distant howl echoed across the grounds. When Professor McGonagall’s magically amplified voice sounded, telling all the students to return to their dormitories (though there should only have been a few prefects in the halls anyway), he was growing truly frightened. With his father championing his anti-werewolf bill in the Wizengamot, he knew he was a target, and by extension, that made Hufflepuff House a target. Though only a fifth year prefect, he decided it was time to take the lead.

“Everybody but prefects go back to your dorms,” he ordered, standing up. “Tell the rest of the prefects to get out here now.”

There was a little bit of arguing, but he stood his ground, and his house soon fell into line. A couple minutes later, the only people in the Hufflepuff Common Room were the six house prefects.

“What’s McGonagall talking about, Diggory?” said Gabriel Truman, the seventh-year prefect. “Werewolves?”

“What else would it be?” he said.

“You think they’re coming here?” said Ellen Towler worriedly.

“They might. Hufflepuff’s normally the softest target in the school. We need to make sure it’s not.”

“But…how?” his year mate, Elizabeth Smith asked. “If it’s really werewolves—”

“Use your defence training,” Cedric said. “Start with Stunners and then use whatever else you have to—Cutting Curses and whatever.”

“You mean…actually _fight_?”

“Yes, Elizabeth, that’s exactly what I mean.” Cedric stood in the centre of the Common Room, flanked by the other five prefects, facing the barrel shaped entrance to the Hufflepuff dorms. And then, as they watched, there was a loud bang that made them jump. Then, there was a knocking sound, and then a series of inhuman howls.

“They can’t get in, right?” Ellen said fearfully. “You can’t get in just by banging on the door.”

“I wouldn’t count on it,” Cedric said darkly. There was no password to the Hufflepuff dorms. You just had to knock on the correct barrel five times in the rhythm of “Helga Hufflepuff.” They liked to think it was very secure, but that was mostly wishful thinking. The rhythm didn’t have to be very precise, and the countermeasures to anyone who got it wrong weren’t very effective. From the sounds of things, being sprayed with vinegar only made the werewolves angry, and, unfortunately, the werewolves were persistent. A moment later, there were five knocks on the door, and it treacherously swung open. The next thing they knew, there was a werewolf climbing through it, snapping and snarling (and smelling strongly of vinegar). The prefects threw up a wall of shield charms and shot Stunners around them. The werewolf when down fast, but there were more where he came from. Another werewolf crawled through the door at once and used his downed comrade as cover. The downsides to a wall of shield charms are that it’s hard to aim a spell around it, and it’s hard to manoeuvre and easy to outflank. The second werewolf soon outflanked the prefects, and as he made his move, a third came into the Common Room.

They were in trouble.

* * *

Padfoot and Moony sprinted across the Hogwarts grounds, following the pungent scent trail of Fenrir Greyback. Moony, though fully in his human mind, was in a rage. His enemy, Greyback, had dared to attack the den of his packmate’s cubs. He would pay for that. Padfoot was of much the same mind.

It was a hard path into the castle, but as they followed Greyback’s trail, they learnt it was not an insurmountable one. There were several open-air entrances to the castle—balconies and the like—that hadn’t been sealed for the night because it was thought that they were inaccessible. Most of them were. But Padfoot and Moony followed the path they had considered in their school days but had never dared attempt. The hopped the low outer wall, climbed atop one of the greenhouses, and ran along the roof. From there, they leapt to the roof of the Training Grounds Building, from there to eaves of the second floor roof of the East Wing, from the second floor roof to the third floor battlements, and from the pinnacle of that level to the open-air windows of the bell towers, and they were in the castle.

The scent trail was here, too, which made it even more urgent. Greyback’s pack was already inside. They ran through the castle, across the bridge, and down the stairs, eventually reaching a certain corridor near the kitchens. It was chaos there already. By a lousy stroke of luck, there were a couple of sharp corners leading into the Hufflepuff Common Room, making it easier for the werewolves to hold off the teachers behind the cover. If it were only a matter of shooting offensive spells at them, the fight would have ended quickly, but werewolves are fast and aggressive, and they greatly improved their position by rushing anyone who tried to attack them and keeping them on the defensive. Padfoot and Moony ignored the cover they provided to them and ran headlong into the fray. They were nearly cursed when the teachers saw Moony, but McGonagall recognised them and cried, “Hold! Hold!,” and they got past.

Eight or ten werewolves stood in the hall, snarling and slashing at anyone who came around the corner to try to cut through them. They could smell blood in the air, along with a thick smell of vinegar. Looking to the end of the hall, the door to the Hufflepuff Common Room stood open, and they could see the flashes of light of the battle coming from inside.

* * *

It was surprisingly hard to fight werewolves. Especially if you weren’t fully qualified in Defence. True, all of the Hufflepuff prefects had completed or nearly completed their O.W.L.s in Defence, which was as far as a majority of wizards ever got, but werewolves were rated Class XXXXX for a reason. The werewolves were fast, fierce, and magic-resistant, able to shrug off multiple Stunners, while the prefects were tiring and outnumbered, their defences cracking.

A shield went down unexpectedly, and Gabriel Truman was on the ground with a bite taken out of him before he knew what hit him.

“NO! REDUCTO!” Cedric yelled. The wolf that attacked Gabriel was blasted away with a horrific sound of ribs cracking, but amazingly, it staggered to its feet and kept coming. Of course, _Reducto_ was one of the many spells that didn’t work as well on living tissue, or the beast would be dead, magic resistant or not, but it was still a powerful offensive spell.

“Ellen, watch out!”

“AAAHHH!”

Ellen Towler went down fighting with a horribly bloodied face and two separate bites. She lay twitching on the floor. Their odds were rapidly getting worse, and there were still several werewolves between them and help, despite what looked like a pair of dogs rolling around and fighting them. The wolves just kept coming. They fought hard, but it was a losing battle. Soon, both of the sixth-year prefects went down, not bitten, but knocked down when werewolves bodily collided with them and struggling to get up again, leaving Cedric and Elizabeth the only two prefects still standing.

The next wolf through the door was bigger than the rest, and had those telltale eyes—blue inside a ring of black: Greyback. He bounded forward so hard that he and Cedric went down to the floor, Shield Charm and all. The impact disoriented him, and his shield failed. He felt a swipe of claws across his face and a pair of jaws clamp around his throat.

For a split second, Cedric Diggory was sure he was dead, but the jaws only broke his skin before pulling back. He looked up and was shocked by what he saw: another werewolf had his jaws clamped down on Greyback’s hind leg. The larger wolf spun around and lunged again, and both of them fell out the door.

* * *

A ghostly, silver cat greeted the team of a dozen Aurors and Hitwizards, including Mad-Eye Moody, Tonks, and Lutetia Savage, as they reached the main doors of Hogwarts. “Hufflepuff Common Room! Thirteen of them!” the cat Patronus spoke in the voice of Professor McGonagall. They wasted no time in running down to help. Unfortunately, they weren’t actually of much help. In the confined space of the corridor, with its sharp corners, there were too many people in the way. At least half of the werewolves were incapacitated, but they still couldn’t get through to the Common Room to aid of the besieged Hufflepuffs.

“Out o’ the way,” Moody growled.

“Oi! Aurors comin’ through,” Tonks cried. They pushed their way to the front of the group to take over for the teachers without interrupting the spellfire. “ _Diffindo! Bombarda! Protego_!” Unfortunately, they had the same problem as the students, trying to manoeuvre spells around shields and around the corner whilst fending off direct attacks.

Auror Williamson, the Defence Professor, stood his ground with his fellow Aurors. Unfortunately, the battle, the tight quarters, and everything else proved to be too much for him. He stepped a little too far around the corner, his shield slipped a little too much, and a werewolf jumped on him, teeth flashing. Sirius jumped on top of the werewolf and dragged him away, and the wolf rolled lightning fast and was soon on top of him, snapping its jaws at his throat.

“Sirius!” Tonks cried. “ _Stupefy! Stupefy! Stupe—_!”

_SCREECH!_

Tonks hesitated, her situational awareness kicking in, and tried to assess the new development. She was shocked when she saw the source of the sound. Twelve owls came swooping down the corridor. Where they had come from, she had no idea, but every one of them was carrying an angry red envelope in its beak, and when she caught a good enough glimpse, she saw that they were all addressed to Sirius Black.

The owls swung around the corner and dropped their Howlers at Padfoot, staying high above the teeth and claws of the werewolves. Padfoot didn’t know what was going on either, but he knew an opportunity when he saw one. He began picking up the letters in his teeth and flinging them at the werewolves like Fanged Frisbees. As soon as he touched them, the clock was ticking, and then…

_BOOM! BOOM! BOOMBOOMBOOM!_

There was no screaming; the Howlers were blank, but the exploding envelopes were enough to disorient the werewolves and make them stumble around the corridor in a panic. Wasting no time, the Aurors charged in. Now, they had the upper hand, and the werewolves were subdued…all but one.

* * *

Ratsbane and Fisher were nervous as they ran back to the castle with Crookshanks. They hoped their ploy with the owls had worked. It was a good idea, but they didn’t know how much it would help the defenders of the castle actually stop the werewolves.

It was a simple enough plan. Once they were in the Owlery, they untransformed. Hermione started making blank Howlers, which wasn’t all that complicated, and Harry gave them to Hedwig and a squadron of school owls and ordered them to deliver them immediately, then get out. They obeyed, even though it wasn’t the usual delivery time.

Personally, Hermione thought it was a little much when Harry said “Fly! Fly, my pretties!” when he sent the owls on their way, no matter how much he claimed he was just trying to relieve the tension.

The animals heard a hissing sound when they reentered the castle, and they saw a lean, brown tabby cat with lamp-like eyes slink out of the shadows. Luckily, Bad-Human-Child-Catcher was on their side. She mewled at them, _Be careful. Bad dogs in castle._ Ratsbane meowed his understanding, and they kept on their way, although the female cat kept walking rather uncomfortably close to him.

* * *

In all the excitement, no one had noticed Colin Creevey at the back of the pack of defenders, quietly taking pictures. He couldn’t get really great shots around the corner, but he thought he got a few good ones. He had been pretty confident in the ability of such a large crowd of wizards to keep any werewolves from escaping, but when the explosions sounded, he sensed the battle was ending, and it was time to get out. He ran back up the stairs towards Gryffindor Tower. But he hadn’t got far—certainly not far enough—when he heard growling behind him. One of the werewolves had slipped out and was running after him.

He ran flat out. It was hard to do on the stairs. The werewolf was fast—too fast. He only made it to the third floor, near the Clock Tower Entrance, when the beast sounded like it was right behind him.

Suddenly, Colin nearly tripped over three cats and—and was that an otter?—that chose that moment to run through the corridor. Stumbling, he spun around and saw an enormous wolf running towards him, its blue-in-black eyes seemingly filled with rage. Colin didn’t know any curses powerful enough to stop a rampaging werewolf, so he did the only thing he could. He flipped on the flash on his camera and pressed the shutter.

 _Flash!_ The werewolf howled and slowed down, disoriented, but it wasn’t deterred.

Ratsbane knew he had to do something, or the human-child was about to die. Being familiar with all things feline, he knew that lions typically hunted in prides of five or six females plus a male and usually went after prey that was two to three times their size, but sometimes quite a bit bigger—occasionally as proportionately bigger as a werewolf, but he wouldn’t have a chance against an actual werewolf with fewer than a dozen cats. That was no good as a battle plan.

On the other hand, lions didn’t have that good an idea of where the prey’s vital areas were, that was an advantage for him, and they _did_ have a good strategy for getting on top of a larger animal: circle around, sink their claws into its hindquarters, and start climbing.

 _Come, Crooked-Legs!_ He said, and he circled Big-Bad-Wolf and took a flying leap.

The wolf kept coming, and Colin half-ran and half tried to aim his camera again. He was only vaguely aware of the strange actions of the animals.

 _Flash!_ The wolf stumbled and shook its head again. Had he been able to take stock of the situation, Colin would have noticed that two of the cats had jumped on the wolf’s hindquarters and were attempting to hamstring it with their rear claws. The otter ran around its legs, trying to trip it up.

 _Flash!_ The black cat crawled forward to the wolf’s neck and started trying to scratch at its throat.

 _Flash!_ A grey tabby cat streaked out from around the corner and, without even pausing in her run, assessed the situation and also leaped on the wolf’s back.

 _Flash!_ The wolf was still coming. It was almost on top of Colin.

_Flash! Flash! Flash!_

“AAARRRGGGHHH!”

The werewolf tackled Colin, swiped its claws across his face, and bit down hard on his arm.

Ratsbane gave up on the throat went straight for the eyes. Big-Bad-Wolf howled in pain, a sound that seemed too horrible to come from a human or wolf throat. The wolf gave one mighty shake, and all three cats went flying into the walls. It spun and cornered Ratsbane, looming over him.

_WOOF!_

Padfoot and Moony ran out from around the corner and growled in rage at the wolf that had dared attack their Cub. They slammed into him hard, and the corridor was soon a blur of teeth and claws. Greyback was bigger and stronger than they were, but with two of them, and a lot more sanity besides, they wrestled him to the ground and held him down, and then—

“ _Stupefy! Stupefy! Stupefy! Stupefy_!”

Professor McGonagall had untransformed and started casting Stunners as fast as she could. Unable to run, Fenrir Greyback was lying limp on the floor of the corridor when the Aurors arrived.

* * *

Back in the Hufflepuff corridor, Elizabeth Smith, the one prefect still standing, cautiously stepped out of the Common Room and surveyed the scene. A small army of defenders, including a dog and even another werewolf, had fought Greyback’s pack in the corridor. The floor was slick with blood, and gravely injured wolves were lying everywhere, hastily tied up by the remaining group of Aurors. Cedric, Gabriel, and Ellen had all been bitten in that awful fight, and she herself felt grateful to be alive.

Then, as another part of the scene caught her eye, she screamed—even louder than when the wolves had broken into the dorm.

Auror Eric Williamson, the Defence Professor, was lying on the floor in a pool of blood with his throat ripped out.


	78. Aftermath

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Speak JK Rowling and employ a huge Harry Potter with a crowbar.

By morning, part of the Hogwarts Infirmary looked like a veterinary hospital, filled with two cats, an otter, a dog, and one fully tamed werewolf waiting for the morning. From the start, Padfoot had come over with a stern warning to Ratsbane and Fisher: _Stay animals until sun-up to stop Wolf-Disease,_ a warning that Professor McGonagall repeated to them. She herself had had to untransform to stop Greyback, so she would have to accept any scars she got from the fight. None of the animagi had been bitten, but they had all been scratched up, and the cursed wounds would heal much better if they weren’t allowed to fester in human form under the full moon. If they waited till morning to untransform, the scars might even fade completely.

The same couldn’t be said for Colin Creevey, Cedric Diggory, Gabriel Truman, and Ellen Towler. They had been infected. Cedric and Colin had Greyback’s tell-tale scars on their faces. The only reason they were still at Hogwarts and not at St. Mungo’s was that Madame Pomfrey had stocked up on silver and dittany poultices, just in case.

Gabriel and Ellen were so distraught they had to be force-fed Dreamless Sleep Potion overnight. Cedric seemed resolute, but he was hard to read. Young Colin was in the highest spirits. Though traumatised by the attack itself, as a muggle-born, he was not familiar enough with the prejudice against werewolves for it to really unsettle him.

The Aurors had come and taken the werewolves to a secure ward of St. Mungo’s where they would be kept overnight and identified and treated in the morning. Thanks to the violent curses the defenders had used, two of the werewolves were dead at the scene, and two more might not live through the night. Also, Greyback had lost an eye and his pride thanks to Ratsbane. They also took Professor Williamson’s body away. The one consolation to his death was that he was a widower whose wife had died in the war and who had left no close family behind, but he would greatly be missed by the Auror Corps, not to mention that it would be that much harder to get a teacher next year.

Ratsbane was growing increasingly uncomfortable by Mrs. Norris’s behaviour throughout the night. She had followed him to the Infirmary and stayed close by his cat bed. She kept trying to rub up against him and meowed frequently at him. She also had an odd scent about her, and most suspicious of all, the whole display made Padfoot smirk. Harry was thus very glad when he was given the all clear to untransform (behind a curtain so that no one would see). When he did, Mrs. Norris’s lamp-like eyes bugged out comically, and she hissed and ran out of the Infirmary like a bat out of hell.

“Oh, it’s good to be out of that fur,” he said softly as he stretched. “For a minute there, during the…I think I forgot what species I was for a bit.”

Hermione was shaking the cramps out of her now-lengthened limbs and rubbing her smooth skin. “I’ve never been transformed that long…You’ve done that for weeks before. I don’t know how you managed it.”

“I was five. It was different then.”

“Alright, you two.” To their surprise, it was not Madame Pomfrey, but Professor McGonagall who came around the curtain. “ _Muffliato_ ,” she cast. “Officially, I am tending to the animal patients here in the infirmary, and you were never here. You’re very lucky that you weren’t injured much worse, and that I have enough experience with Healing to help your current problems. I still don’t know how I’m going to explain to Madame Pomfrey what a river otter was doing in the castle.” Hermione blushed. “Now, I would like you to tell me exactly why you were fighting a vicious werewolf ten times your size whilst in animal form.”

The two of them gave her a brief summary of their movements—going out to the Owlery to send the Howlers, coming back to the castle, and having the bad luck to run into Colin just as he was set upon by Greyback. At that point, it was just a matter of trying to save their house mate.

“Very well,” McGonagall conceded. “That was still very reckless of you, even if you were trying to protect Mr. Creevey. Twenty points to Gryffindor for the trick with the Howlers. That was very clever and very helpful to us. And two detentions for each of you. Officially, they are for sneaking out to the Owlery, but it’s more accurately one for disobeying my orders and one for engaging in such a dangerous fight. Also, we will be discussing this with your parents when they arrive.”

Harry and Hermione exchanged uncomfortable looks. Sunrise was early this time of year. It wasn’t yet five o’clock, and most of the patients were still asleep, as their parents would be.

“You aren’t going to wake them up now for this, are you?” Harry asked. Things were bad enough without them being awakened early.

“Not this minute, Mr. Potter, but we’ll need to contact all of the victims’ families before they learn about the attack from the morning paper.”

Both Harry and Hermione suppressed a gasp.

“What did you expect? The Aurors were in and out of here all night, and I think we all know how leaky the Ministry is.”

“You should contact Cousin Andi, then,” Hermione said. “The Wizengamot meets in three days, and she’ll need to be able to respond as soon as possible.”

McGonagall nodded, though she was privately annoyed that politics needed to be considered so urgently at a time like this.

“How are Sirius and Remus?” Harry asked.

“In worse shape than you when they were brought in. They were both bitten, but of course, your godfather was in animal form, so he’ll, er, make a full recovery. I’ll let you speak to them once I have you cleaned up enough so you don’t look suspicious—since I’m sure I won’t be able to stop you,” McGonagall added in exasperation.

There was some shuffling around to make it appear that Sirius and Remus had been in the Hospital Wing the whole time, and Harry and Hermione had just come to visit. Both men were pretty heavily bandaged up. Unlike Harry, who had been able to get on Greyback’s back, where it was relatively safe, they had both gone tooth to tooth and claw to claw, and Remus was also in his post-full-moon fatigue. His eyes fluttered open when they nudged him.

“Cubs?” he groaned softly.

“Hey Remus,” Harry said.

“I’m…at Hogwarts?”

Harry nodded.

“I was hoping it was a dream. Are you okay? We’re you…?”

“We’re fine,” Harry whispered. “Just a few scratches, and we were in animal form, remember?”

“Oh… _oh_ , I remember!” he groaned as it came back to him.

“Yeah, so do I,” Sirius grunted from the next bed. “The owls—that was you two?” They nodded. “And fighting bloody Greyback?”

“That was an accident,” Harry insisted. “We ran into him on our way back.”

“Really? You two just have all the luck, don’t you?”

Harry and Hermione could agree to that.

“Still…Harry…” Remus said. “What you did last night…You scratched Fenrir Greyback’s eye out. And…and we caught him…we finally caught him.” Tears formed in his eyes. “Decades of terror, and no one’s been able to lay a claw on him like that. I’m proud of you, Cub…but you’re insane. Honestly, what were you thinking?”

“We should’ve expected it, Remus,” Sirius told him. “He’s as much James as James ever was.”

“And here I was hoping you’d got your mother’s sensibility.” The werewolf sighed. “But she probably would’ve done the same thing.” He settled back in the bed. “How many students…?”

“Four,” Hermione said. “Including Diggory’s son.”

Remus groaned again: “This isn’t going to end well.”

“I hate to admit it, but it might have been a lot worse without Harry’s and Hermione’s intervention,” McGonagall said from behind them. “Had we been caught by surprise, the Hufflepuff dorms might have been overwhelmed. I still don’t understand how those…those _animals_ got in.”

“We do,” Sirius said, and he explained about the tunnel from Hogsmeade that had been broken into and the path up the roofs into the bell towers, for good measure.

McGonagall lowered her head in shame. “ _Two_ gaps in our defences. What will Albus say?”

It was a question that would go unanswered for a while, since the Headmaster was still in Switzerland, but there was no doubt this would reflect poorly on the school, especially after the Chamber of Secrets fiasco. The holes in the security certainly left something to be desired, even when they’d eliminated all of the obvious threats.

There would be a lot of damage control to do, and Harry decided it would need to start with the four unfortunate students here in the Hospital Wing. He knew he didn’t have long before the parents arrived, so he needed to make this quick. He pulled a chair over to sit in front of them and said, “Hey. You guys awake?”

“Kinda hard to sleep after last night, Potter,” Gabriel Truman said ruefully.

“I heard the news. I’m sorry. I tried to help. I alerted the Aurors, and Hermione and I sent the owls. I wish we could’ve done more.”

“Didn’t do much good, did it?” Truman said, and he turned away in silence. Ellen Towler looked near catatonic.

“Hey, he did what he could,” Colin piped up. Truman didn’t respond.

“Potter?” Cedric said weekly.

Harry froze. Cedric was the real wild card in this. “Yeah, Diggory?”

“You said you found a place for Demelza to go to school?”

“Oh, right, Long River in America. Don’t worry, I’ll write them and see if they can make two extra spots. I think they’ll be fine with it, especially now that we got Greyback so it won’t happen again. I’ll see if they’ll take your brother, too, Colin.”

“Potter,” Cedric interrupted again.

“Yeah?”

“Thank you…How is it that you…that you don’t see things the way the rest of the magical world does?”

Harry smiled weakly. “Well, it helps that I already have a friend who’s a werewolf, but honestly? Muggles learnt a long time ago that that kind of prejudice never solves anything.”

“Huh…Well, you’re a good wizard, Potter,” he replied. “Strange, but good.”

“Thanks.”

The group was able to rest quietly after that. There was no news, and there wasn’t much to say after an ordeal like that. Professor Sprout came into the Infirmary at six to try to comfort her students and, once visiting hours began, fend off any less than respectful visitors. But most of her Hufflepuffs had heard the full story from her last night and regarded the prefects as heroes for defending their sett like true badgers. Colin’s position wouldn’t be quite as good. Even by Gryffindor standards, he would be regarded as a foolish muggle-born who had wandered into trouble without thinking. As for Harry and Hermione, no one had seen them since last night, and Professor McGonagall had been very vague in what she’d told the other Gryffindors, so everyone was sure to be worried for news.

At half past six, Professor McGonagall called Harry and Hermione away from the Hospital Wing and led them to her office. They had a bad feeling about how this bit was going to go.

“Harry! Hermione!” Emma Granger cried when she saw them. She ran over and grabbed them both in a hug. “Oh thank God you’re alright! Also, you’re grounded.”

Dan Granger was more restrained than his wife, but he also was near tears as he hugged his children. “I don’t know how you two keep managing to get in so much trouble. And fighting that werewolf yourselves…?”

“We were only trying to help from a distance, Dad,” Hermione said. “We were just in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“Even so, you’re only thirteen and fourteen. You’re too young to be going up against things that can eat you, possessed teachers and giant snakes notwithstanding.”

“We’re sorry, Dad, Mum,” Harry said, downcast. “I guess we both got carried away when we saw Colin.”

“I think ‘carried away’ is an understatement, young man,” Emma said, struggling to maintain her composure. “You both could have been killed. We’ve had enough of this worry for one lifetime.”

“We’re glad you’re alright,” Dan said. “And we’re proud of you for protecting your friend, even if we disapprove of how you went about it. I think we’d appreciate a complete story, though.”

Harry took a deep breath and began to explain.

* * *

Not long after the Grangers arrived through the Floo in the Headmaster’s office, Amos and Lucille Diggory came in the front gates of the castle. They were rushed up to the Hospital Wing by Professor Flitwick, and upon entering the Infirmary, they saw four students lined up on beds, nursing bite wounds. Sirius Black and Remus Lupin were also there, along with several Aurors.

Lucille immediately ran to her son’s bedside in tears. Amos followed her, but he stopped when Remus caught his eye.

“ _You_!” He flew into a rage and lifted the bruised and dazed Remus from his bed by his collar so he could get his hands around his throat. “This is your fault, werewolf! You and your damn secret passage—”

“Dad, stop!”

The ward fell silent when Cedric spoke. Amos loosened his hands from around Remus’s neck, which narrowly saved him from a punch in the face courtesy of Sirius.

“It’s not his fault,” Cedric insisted. “He was on our side…and…he saved my life. He’s the one who pulled Greyback off of me. Blame Dumbledore, if you want, for the security…but not him.”

Amos almost lost his feet, and he stumbled over to Cedric’s bed, saying, “Oh, my boy, my poor boy. All those letters—I had no idea.”

“Huh?” Cedric said, but his father didn’t hear him.

“I only though you were trying to be your own man—”

 _Translation: teenage rebellion_ , Cedric’s brain helpfully provided, but it was only at a subconscious level as Amos continued.

“If I’d known _they_ _’d_ got to you like this, I would have—”

But what Amos would have done he didn’t find out because something happened then that no one had ever seen before.

_SMACK!_

Pomona Sprout slapped Amos Diggory. Hard.

“Shame on you, Amos!” she scolded him like he was an errant first-year. “ _They_ _’d_ got to Cedric? I’ve never felt so insulted on behalf of a student, and by his own father! Your son organised the prefects to defend the Hufflepuff dorms. I saw him on the front lines of that battle, fighting the beasts like a true badger. If you think he wanted this in any way, you’re so blinded by your own prejudice that—that—oh, I wish I could still give you detention.”

Amos was taken aback a second time. In fact, he wasn’t blinded by prejudice. He was blinded by grief and thus not thinking at all rationally. His son, a werewolf—he could barely process it. But that slap had knocked some sense into him.

“Oh, dear,” he said, sitting by his son’s bedside. “I’m so sorry, Cedric. I never wanted any of this to happen. I’ve only been trying to help—to help you and the rest of magical Britain. And then what happened last night…”

“It’ll be okay, Dad,” Cedric tried to assure him. “We can work it out.”

“Oh, of course, of course,” his father said eagerly. “You were right about one thing. It _is_ a lot easier for people to live full lives with…with this illness than it used to be. And—and I’m sure we can make some arrangements for schooling for next year—”

Cedric knew he probably shouldn’t do it. It would be most un-Hufflepuff to kick his father while he was down. And yet, the way the man had been for the past few weeks: “All those letters… _They_ _’d_ got to you…” Well, maybe Cedric _was_ turning into a bit of a rebellious teenager, because he spoke up again and said, “No, Dad.”

Amos stopped short. “What?” he said in confusion.

“You’ve already made your point clear,” his son told him. “I don’t need to come back to Hogwarts next year.”

Professor Sprout, Colin Creevey, and Cedric’s parents looked at him in horror. “But that’s…that’s…policies can be changed, son. What about your N.E.W.T.s?” Amos said.

“Harry Potter said that he found another school that would accept werewolves. I can go to the Long River School of Arcana in America instead of Hogwarts next year. There’s no need for you to become a hypocrite on my account.”

Amos Diggory almost always had something to say, but now, he was struck speechless. “Am-Am-America?” his wife stammered.

“It’s in New Orleans, Mum,” Cedric told her gently. “Or near there. It sounds like a nice place, very diverse, and it has a great program in World Magic.”

“And…and you’d go there, Ced,” she asked. “You’d leave home for another country?”

“No more than I do here. I’d still be home for holidays.”

“You…you _do_ know we could work something out here?”

“I’m sure you could, Mum, but Dad’s made his position clear, and I’ve made mine clear to him over the past few weeks. Dad, I told you before that I respect what you’re trying to do, even if I don’t agree. But I think you should have the courage to hold to your convictions, or you should take a step back and objectively reassess them to see if you’re wrong.”

“Son, I’m sorry. We can certainly change things for—”

“For _me_?” Cedric cut him off. “That’s what you were going to say, wasn’t it? Or that’s at least what you meant? No, Dad, that’s the point. I don’t _want_ you to change your opinion just because it’s me who’s affected now. I can make my own way. If you really wanted to change your position, either on the bill or on Hogwarts, then you’d go down to Hogsmeade and apologise to little Demelza Robins first because she’s been hurt a lot more than I have.”

That left Amos gaping even more than before. It probably wouldn’t be unfair to say that Amos was the type of parent who was so proud of his son that he never really _listened_ to him. That is, until they stopped discussing and finally put their feet down. And outright refusing his father’s help, especially for something as important as his schooling, certainly counted as that.

“Al—alright, Cedric,” Amos said, unable to answer anything else. “I’ll try to go back and…and take an objective look from the beginning.”

“Thanks, Dad.” _That_ _’s all I wanted you to do from the start._

* * *

There was a lot of gossip going around Hogwarts by the time breakfast came. Everyone had heard at least some of the sounds of battle last night, but only the Hufflepuffs knew any of the details. Before they set their classmates straight, the rumours ranged from all of Slytherin House being turned into a werewolf army to Greyback being ritually dismembered house elves on the floor of the Great Hall (although most of them were less far-fetched). Luna Lovegood insisted that Greyback had secretly taken over the castle as a fortress against the Rotfang Conspiracy and that he was spreading a new strain of lycanthropy that she called Umbridge-itis until Harry pulled her aside and told her that he had heard eyewitness accounts that disproved that.

Professor McGonagall broke the real story over breakfast, just before the newspaper came: “I regret to inform you that shortly after moonrise last night, a pack of thirteen werewolves led by Fenrir Greyback successfully entered Hogwarts through two unforeseen weaknesses in the wards and forced entry into the Hufflepuff dorms. One of these weaknesses has already been fixed, and the other is being investigated. All of the werewolves were subdued and captured or killed by the combined forces of the staff, Aurors, Hitwizards, and the six Hufflepuff prefects, who fought to defend the rest of their house.” No need to bring up Harry’s and Hermione’s imitable behaviour just now. “For the heroic acts of these prefects, I award Hufflepuff three hundred points.” There was some scattered cheering, but the Hall remained mostly silent because they knew bad news was coming. “Unfortunately, four students were bitten by the werewolves. They are currently confined to the Hospital Wing, and their long term plans have not yet been decided. It is also with deep sadness that I must report that Professor Williamson was killed in the attack.” That drew more gasps of horror from the majority of the school who hadn’t heard that part yet. “Professor Williamson’s remaining classes will be handled on a rotation basis as per standard procedure for when a professor is killed or incapacitated.” A standard procedure that only existed because of the curse on the Defence position. “All classes today are cancelled in recognition of this tragedy.”

Professor Flitwick hopped up and made an addition of his own: “The Duelling Club tournament will still take place during the last week of term under my supervision, in honour of the hard work that Professor Williamson put into the Club.” As an Auror, Williamson always _had_ cared more for the club than the class.

Harry and Hermione were subdued as they ate breakfast. While Professor McGonagall hadn’t mentioned their part in the affair, Elizabeth Smith, and the other Gryffindors put two and two together soon enough. A lot of people complimented them on their clever trick of sending Howlers to the battle scene, including Fred and George, who looked just a little _too_ excited about it. Officially, the names of the students who had been bitten were not being released, but Elizabeth Smith had that covered as well. Many of the older girls despaired over Cedric in particular, since he was gifted and handsome, and now, in their estimation, both his complexion and his prospects had been ruined. Harry (and Hermione to some extent) was offended on Cedric’s behalf at such shallowness, but he restrained himself from commenting in the already tense environment.

Dan and Emma were still in the castle, in a private room. Harry and Hermione needed to keep up the appearance of not being as involved as they were, so there was no public reason for their parents to be there, but there was still business to take care of, or so Professor McGonagall had told them, and when they reached the private room after breakfast, they received another surprise.

“Professor Dumbledore?” they gasped.

“I thought you were in Switzerland,” Hermione added.

“I was,” the old wizard said solemnly. “However, I was most disturbed when I saw this morning’s _Daily Prophet_ ,” Dumbledore said. He held up a copy for them to see:

 

_HORROR AT HOGWARTS! GREYBACK_ _’S PACK ATTACKS!_

_FOUR STUDENTS BITTEN! ONE TEACHER DEAD!_

_GREYBACK CAPTURED BY MCGONAGALL, AURORS!_

 

“I am deeply sorry that I was not here to help defend the castle,” he said, “and that we missed those weaknesses in the wards. We could have saved all this trouble. Instead, our enemies scored a very lucky victory, even if it was mostly foiled.”

The Grangers weren’t quite sure what to say to that. Three men were dead, including the two werewolves, and four children were effectively disabled. It was pretty devastating attack as it was.

“What happened in Africa, Professor?” Hermione said at last.

“Kinani Ngeze overthrew the Burundian Ministry by means as yet unknown to us. This unknown means, more so than the scope of the violence, scared the ICW into approving an international intervention in the conflict. Some operatives are already _en route_ …If only all of our problems could be solved that quickly.”

“Will that affect us here?” Emma asked with concern.

“You personally? Probably not. Now that Greyback has been captured, the British Ministry will probably be called upon to send a few Aurors and Hitwizards, but France will be leading the operation. However, I will also be joining the expeditionary force. I will be here for the Wizengamot meeting on Saturday to contain the damage here, but after that, I can guarantee little. Again, I wish I could keep a more active role here.”

“We understand how important this conflict is, Dumbledore, but isn’t there someone else who can do that job?” asked Dan.

“That is what I hope to establish on the ground in Rwanda, Mr. Granger, but these things do take time to set up.”

“Ahem.” The group looked up and saw that Professor McGonagall had reentered the room. Another, monocled witch was by her side. “Albus, Madam Bones has just arrived and wishes to speak with Mr. Potter at once.”

The Grangers exchanged troubled glances and wondered what this could be about. Had Harry been found out? But Dumbledore seemed untroubled. “Ah, do come in, Amelia,” he said lightly. “I’m afraid I’m a little out of the loop. Could you tell me what the situation is?”

The Director of the DMLE bristled. “The werewolves are secured, Chief Warlock, no thanks to you,” she said. “We’ll be discussing _your_ part in this later. We’re still trying to identify some of them. A third werewolf died at St. Mungo’s this morning. The rest are expected to live, although two of them may be permanently disabled, besides Greyback’s missing eye.” Harry felt himself turn red and hoped Bones wouldn’t notice. “Also, one Geri Lyles attempted to harm himself when he came to his senses this morning. He’s under suicide watch, now.”

“Goodness!” Emma said.

“It sounds like they took some pretty heavy hits in return for what they did,” Dan added.

“Indeed, Mr. Granger. However, I am here because I need to talk to your son. You may remain present if you wish.”

That made the Grangers much more nervous. They couldn’t imagine what this could be about if it wasn’t Harry being found out for an animagus. They looked to Dumbledore for help, but he seemed equally surprised. _How_ Harry could have been found out they couldn’t imagine. It should have been too dark and the action too fast for anyone to get a clear view of the white lightning bolt on Ratsbane’s head.

Unless…A thought struck Harry. “Madam Bones, does this have anything to do with Colin Creevey’s camera?” he asked.

“No. Why? Should it?” she said.

“Well…he had it with him last night. He might have got a picture of Hermione and me running around.” He could practically feel the rest of his family growing tense beside him.

“Ah, no,” Madam Bones said. “As far as I’m concerned, that’s an internal Hogwarts matter, Mr. Potter.” However, behind her, the rest of the group saw Professor McGonagall’s eyes grow wide, and she quietly slipped out of the room. “No, I’m here because of some of the things we learnt from the werewolves in interrogation this morning.”

“You—you are?” Harry said in confusion.

“Upon interrogating the werewolves, we learnt that two of them were registered as regular users of Wolfsbane Potion who had been radicalised over the issues of the Werewolf Protection Act in the Wizengamot and the Hogwarts Board’s anti-werewolf position.”

“Oh, God,” Harry gasped. “They got some of it, didn’t they?”

“I’m not surprised,” Dumbledore interrupted. Madam Bones stared at him. “I should think the only way that many werewolves could have made that climb to the bell towers was if they had been dosed with some amount of Wolfsbane Potion. A truly audacious plan,” he mused. “It required at least three things to go right—dangerously overcomplicated—but they pulled it off.”

“Be that as it may, Chief Warlock, our chief concern is this: one of the werewolves, who surprisingly turned out to be one Artemis Crouch, testified that she had learnt the way onto the grounds from _you_ , Mr. Potter, during one of your visits to Hogsmeade.”

The Grangers gasped. Harry’s heart leapt into his throat, and the bottom seemed to drop out of his stomach at the same time. She thought _he_ had told them—possibly had radical werewolf sympathies himself. His advocacy over the past year, his friendship with Remus, even his miraculous rescue of Demelza—all could be twisted against him under that kind of attitude.

“Harry, what happened?” his father said in horror.

“I didn’t—I didn’t mean to.”

“You didn’t _mean_ to?” Madam Bones said harshly.

“I didn’t know—I only told Cho! I didn’t know anyone else was there!”

“Cho?” Madam Bones said.

“You told her?” Emma demanded.

“We were on a date. She wanted to know about my family. I showed her the Shrieking Shack, and I told her it was where Remus used to go for the full moon. I told her there was a secret passage from the basement of the Shrieking Shack to under the Whomping Willow. I swear I didn’t think it would hurt anyone. I didn’t think anyone could get through the wards…” Harry was in tears by now. “That’s all I said about it, ma’am, I swear.”

“Harry, I thought we raised you better than that,” Emma said. “I know we’d rather not have to keep secrets, but you know there’s very good reasons we have to.”

“I’m so sorry, Mum. I was trying to be careful. I didn’t tell her anything bigger than that. I wouldn’t. With all the stuff about Remus being out, I didn’t think it would matter.”

Emma’s voice was cold: “Well, it obviously did. You need to consult us or one of the teachers who knows about it before you do something like that again.”

“Mrs. Granger,” Dumbledore interrupted. “And Madam Bones. I believe Harry is right. Revealing these secrets should not have made a difference. Indeed, Greyback might have figured them out on his own. The knowledge of them should not have made the school vulnerable. If it is anyone’s, the fault is mine for not realising that the werewolves could dig directly in the tunnel beforehand to bypass the wards. I assure you I have always found Harry to show appropriate discretion.”

“Well…” Dan said. The most damaging outcome was averted, but he was still very unhappy with the situation. “Just the same, we want both you and Hermione to consult an adult before you reveal any more secrets. Is that understood?”

“Yes, Dad,” they both said.

“I see,” Madam Bones spoke up again. “If that’s all it was, then I suppose we don’t have a problem, although I may ask you to testify to the fact formally, Mr. Potter. In the meantime, I would like to speak with this Cho person about the events in question.”

“Cho Chang,” Harry offered, “but I don’t think she’d tell. I bet anything that werewolf was eavesdropping.”

“I will investigate that as well…Alright, I think I have what I need for now. I’ll be in contact.” She left the room, leaving Harry, and to a lesser extent his family, choking back tears. Even with Dumbledore’s defence, he knew how poorly this whole episode would reflect on him personally, and on everything he had been working for over the past year.

Sensing his distress, Dumbledore patted him on the shoulder, saying, “I do not blame you, Harry,” he assured him. “It’s only natural that you would want to reach out and be honest with those who are close to you. And I do believe you were being sufficiently careful.” In a rare occurrence, he gave a sharp look to Dan and Emma. “I will help you to contain the political damage last night caused.”

Harry sniffed once, wiped his eyes, collected himself, and said, “Thank you, Professor.”

“It’s the least I can do under the circumstances. You acted most bravely last night, albeit foolishly, as you have no doubt heard—the mark of a true Lion growing up. Good day.”

* * *

“So you ran to the Owlery and _mailed_ a bunch of Howlers to Sirius to use in the fight?” Ron said.

Harry and Hermione were explaining what really happened last night to Ron and Neville, since they were the only two students who knew they were animagi.

“Yeah, that’s right,” Harry confirmed.

“And _then_ ,” Neville said, “you just happened to run into Greyback on the way back and fought him?”

“Well, tried to fight him,” Harry said.

“That’s wicked!” Ron said.

“Yeah, not so great when you’re in the middle of it. And it would’ve been nice if Mrs. Norris had helped instead of just sitting there.”

“Yeah, what _was_ that with Mrs. Norris last night,” Hermione asked.

Harry started to turn red, to the others’ confusion.

“Come on mate, what happened?” Ron asked.

“Harry, is something wrong?” Hermione asked.

“It’s fine,” he said quickly. “It’s just…the way she was acting this morning…” He sighed. He could tell from the way they were looking at him that he wasn’t going to get out of this. “I think Mrs. Norris was coming on to me,” he whispered.

Hermione’s eyebrows vanished into her hairline. “You mean she was in heat?” she said, then clapped her hand over her mouth.

Ron laughed uproariously at Harry’s expense, while Neville turned almost as red as Harry himself. Harry was not amused, nor Hermione very much, but Ron couldn’t get enough of it. “Oh—Merlin—can’t—breathe—” he gasped. “Wish—I could tell—Fred and George. That’s about the most horrifying thing—You and Mrs. Norris?”

“I know! Honestly, she’s old enough to be my mother, and then some. She’s almost seven!”

Ron, Neville, and Hermione all looked at him weirdly.

“Sorry, got a little too feline there. Plus she’s always after the troublemakers, and I get in more trouble than anyone around here. That’s just wrong.”

Neville grinned: “Yeah, doesn’t she have any standards?”

“Well, cats are polyamorous and non-discriminatory, so her standards aren’t pretty low—hey, wait a minute!”

Ron laughed so hard he fell over again, and even Hermione giggled.

“Fine, laugh it up,” Harry said. “At least you lot can’t tell anybody else. I’m gonna take a walk.”

“Harry, mate, I didn’t mean anything by it—” Neville said.

“No, it’s fine, Neville. It’s not about that. I just need some time to myself.” He looked Hermione in the eye. “Really,” he insisted, and she nodded her understanding.

At that, Harry left, and Ron soon broke away to do his own thing, leaving Hermione and Neville to talk to each other.

“That was really brilliant with the Howlers, Hermione,” he said.

“Thank you, Neville,” she replied with a small smile. “I didn’t actually think of that at first. My first thought was just to recruit owls like Harry wanted to recruit cat, but I wasn’t sure how. I only got the Howler idea when I talked to Hedwig and tried to picture how to get the others to follow.”

“It was still brilliant. I wish I could think on my feet like that.”

“You’re pretty good at that, though,” she assured him. “You’ve been doing really well in the—” She cut off abruptly and lowered her gaze. “In the Duelling Club.”

Neville sat in an awkward silence for a minute, then he slowly reached out and touched Hermione’s hand. “I’m glad you weren’t hurt last night,” he said shyly.

“Thanks. I just wish I could’ve done more.”

“Hermione, you did more than most people ever could. I’m sure about that. Even if you got in trouble for it, I think it was great.”

She smiled shyly back at him. “You’re a good friend, Neville,” she said. She stood up and hugged him. He went stiff for a moment and then somewhat awkwardly patted her on the back. Her face tinged pink when they broke apart.

“Oh, goodness,” she said, remembering the current situation. “Exams are only a week and a half away. I’m behind revising after last night, too. Mind giving me a hand with Herbology?”

“Uh…sure, I’d love to.”

“Thanks. Let’s go.” They gathered their things and walked together to the library.

* * *

The Hospital Wing was quiet that day. The victims of last night’s attack had few visitors outside of their parents, even when Madam Pomfrey allowed it. Even most of their friends stayed away. The stigma and unfounded fear around lycanthropy were so strong that they suddenly found themselves very alone, even with people they thought were very close to them.

Colin Creevey had never really thought werewolves were that bad—and still didn’t, for that matter. He had seen the attitudes towards patients with AIDS in the muggle world and was well-schooled enough to know most of those fears were unfounded. Lycanthropy wasn’t nearly as bad as AIDS, but he had never really noticed until today that the attitudes of wizards towards werewolves were, if anything, even worse.

It really hit home for Colin when Cedric Diggory’s girlfriend came in and tearfully broke up with him, saying she couldn’t be with a monster. No, those weren’t her exact words, but it was clearly implied. That was quite a shock. Though he was three years ahead of him, Colin knew Cedric was one of the most popular boys in school, and now he seemed to be _persona non grata_.

Ellen Towler was even worse off. She’d been injured much worse than the others. She had lost a lot of blood and would probably suffer a permanent impairment of movement in her wand arm, and there were deep gouges where the werewolf that attacked her had bit her on her face. But the physical scars weren’t the worst. Her boyfriend came in during a lull in the visits knelt down by her bedside, whispered something to her, and walked out. Colin learnt from Ellen’s incoherent sobs afterwards to a female friend who was still loyal that he’d told her he still loved her, but his parents would disown him if he stayed with a werewolf, and he couldn’t make that choice.

Madam Pomfrey screened the visitors a little more carefully after that.

Gabriel Truman had no girlfriend, but his only friend who bothered to visit told him how most of his other friends didn’t want anything to do with him. Colin was devastated when he saw how the other three victims were faring. It looked like his social life was over. His parents, of course, were supportive when they came in, though they gave him a good, long scolding for putting himself in such danger. Dennis said he didn’t mind at all, but then, Dennis still thought a dragon would make an “awesome” pet. They were relieved when they learnt that Harry Potter was willing to help them. The Grangers had been very supportive of them last year when Colin was petrified, and it was good to hear they were still behind them.

The rest of his family had stepped out for lunch a few minutes ago when he heard an unexpected voice by his bedside: “Hey, Colin, how’re you feeling?”

He rolled over and saw a flash of red hair. “Ginny?”

“Hi.”

“Hi…I’ll be okay…I guess…You’re here?”

“Uh, yeah.”

“You’re not scared of me?”

To his surprise, Ginny giggled. It was an uncomfortable giggle, but it was one of the few bits of laughter that had been heard in the Hospital Wing all morning. “Colin, I was possessed by You-Know-Who, and I attacked you with a giant snake,” she said. “I still think you should’ve been scared of _me_ , but you never were.”

“That wasn’t your fault, though. And…well, your Bat-Bogey Hex scares me a little.” She giggled, and he smiled weakly. “But thanks for coming just the same. The other three aren’t doing so well in the friends department.”

“Then their friends are being stupid,” Ginny said. “Harry’s right. The prejudice against werewolves is silly. You’re not a monster any more than I am. And Mr. Lupin isn’t either. McGonagall said he was fighting with the teachers. It’s only ones like Greyback, and at least they finally caught _him_.”

Colin smiled fully: “Thanks Ginny. At least _you_ _’re_ still my friend.”

“Hello, Miss Weasley,” Professor McGonagall said from behind them. Ginny spun around to face her, but she said, “I don’t mean to interrupt. I just wanted to give you your photos, Mr. Creevey. They’ve finished developing.”

“Oh, great. Thanks, Professor,” Colin said.

“You’re quite welcome. Oh, and Miss Weasley, five points to Gryffindor.”

“What was that about?” Ginny asked as she walked away.

“I used my camera flash to try to fight that werewolf,” Colin explained. “It didn’t really work, but Professor McGonagall offered to develop the photos while I was in here.”

“That was nice of her.”

“Yeah, especially since…since I really shouldn’t’ve been doing it—Anyway, I’m glad I could get ‘em developed. If I’m really lucky, maybe I can sell them to the _Prophet_ or something.” He took the photos out of the envelope and took a look. The first one showed the pack of werewolves running across the grass towards the castle. The second showed them trying to get over the wall to the greenhouses. The next several were of the fight in the corridor outside the Hufflepuff Common Room, with werewolves and wizards clashing in silence with spells flying and, later, owls dropping Howlers to help.

“That looks brutal,” Ginny said. “Wasn’t that scary being down there?”

“Yeah, but that wasn’t the worst,” he said as he kept watching the moving pictures. The last sequence was an increasingly terrifying series of shots of an enraged werewolf wincing under the camera flash and charging the camera, then being set upon, amazingly, by three cats. He frowned at the image. “Huh,” he said.

“What?”

“The cat in front—” He pointed at an all-black cat sitting on the werewolf’s back. “The one who’s going for the eyes. I could’ve sworn that cat had white markings last night.”

“Huh. Well, it was dark. And you were terrified,” Ginny said. “Maybe you just didn’t get a good look.”

“Yeah, probably.”


	79. Greyback is Muzzled

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: “Pull yourself together,” said JK Rowling, “for you have to do the job I’ve chosen for you.”

_“Ah, so you finally caught that werewolf terrorist, I see, Mr. Fudge? Now, would you care to explain how he and a dozen of his closest friends managed to get into your magical school?”_

_“Er, if you’re reading the_ Prophet _, Mr. Prime Minister, I think the account in there covers it pretty well._ _”_

_“Well, at least you caught him. I do hope something like this isn’t going to happen again. We lost some good people of ours, too, this past year.”_

_“Of course it won’t! Greyback was the worst werewolf in all of Europe. There’s no one else out there with the muscle_ to _do it again._ _”_

_“That’s good to hear, then. Thank you for informing me, Mr. Fudge.”_

_“Not a problem. Oh, and while I’m here, now that we have Greyback, we should be able to go ahead with the Triwizard Tournament—just a school competition, you see, nothing to worry about, but we’ll probably be importing some large creatures for it. I’ll send you a full list once it’s finalised. If that’ll be all?”_

_“Actually, while you’re here, Mr. Fudge, were you going to inform me about the Quidditch World Cup? I_ _’d really like to iron out how you’re planning to hide a giant stadium with ten times your native population camping out for two months. I do hope you’re not going to do something like…oh, I don’t know, rent out one of our people’s farms and then wipe the owner’s memory of half the summer afterwards.”_

_“Erm…You’ve been talking to Mr. Barnett again, haven’t you, Mr. Major?”_

* * *

“Come on, Remus, you promised.” Tonks said.

“That was before this whole mess,” Remus protested.

“I don’t care. You made a promise, and you’d better keep it. If you were still in the hospital, I’d let you off the hook, but you’re out, so you have to take me out for drinks. I haven’t been able to celebrate making full Auror yet.”

“Dora, do you realise how it’s going to look—a werewolf taking an Auror out on…on a date? After what just happened?”

“But that’s just it. Everyone knows what happened from the _Prophet._ It’ll be a _hero_ werewolf taking an Auror out on a date. What could be better for the cause? It’s not like Madam Bones is gonna fire me. She likes me—and she’s short a man with Mad-Eye retiring.”

Remus rose to his feet. Like it or not, she did have a point. Even with more people against him, he had a rare opportunity when more people than usual were with him for helping to catch Greyback. To be honest, he felt like he needed the chance to celebrate that himself. And as he was worried for Tonks’s career for associating with him, he’d never really made the connection that Amelia Bones was not easily swayed by political winds like that.

“Well, it is a Friday night,” he said, “and I don’t have anything better to do. Shall we go, then?” He awkwardly offered her his arm.

Tonks looked him up and down. “You call that asking me out?” she said in disbelief. Remus stood there, frozen. “When was the last time you went on a date, Wolfie?”

He thought for a moment: “I’m sure it was when James and Lily were still alive.”

“Morgana’s knickers, Demelza was right. I _do_ need to save you before your heart turns gross and hairy.” She grabbed him roughly by the arm and pulled him along. “Come on, I know a muggle pub that sells only the best German brands. Less pressure there.”

Remus was suddenly relieved. He hadn’t even thought about the possibility, with both of them being half-bloods, of going on a date in the muggle world. He really _had_ been out of the game for too long. He caught up with her pace and went along willingly.

* * *

The Wizengamot meeting that Saturday was an unmitigated disaster. Everyone knew it going in. Things had been bad after the previous crises during the last two years, but this was a riot.

Today would be the trial of Fenrir Greyback.

The trouble began just by the witnesses entering the Hall. After the attack on Hogwarts, even with some people praising Remus, a lot of the population of magical Britain didn’t want to see a werewolf in public who wasn’t in chains. This was a problem because Remus Lupin, Demelza Robins, and all four victims of the Hogwarts attack potentially needed to be present to testify. The six werewolves were escorted into the Wizengamot Hall by Aurors and seated in a special section under heavy guard.

Dumbledore’s position was not a popular one either. Without yet addressing what would happen next year, he had insisted at the emergency Board meeting on Friday that Cedric, Gabriel, Ellen, and Colin be allowed to stay at Hogwarts through their exams. That had succeeded only because of a loophole in the rules. Since there were no more full moons before the end of term, they had never actually transformed into werewolves and wouldn’t until after they went home. Under the antiquated rules, that meant that, technically, there was no absolute proof that they _were_ werewolves yet, and so they could stay.

“Order!” he called to the assembly. “Order! Order!” it took him some time to calm down the angry crowd and begin the meeting. “I hereby call the May session of the Three-Hundred and Ninety-Second Wizengamot to order. I want to ask all guests to remain quiet and civil because we have a very full agenda today. Now, before we begin business, I would like to recognise a fallen member of the Ministry, who gave his life in the line of duty in order to protect the children under his care. Auror Eric Williamson, in the course of his assignment as Professor of Defence Against the Dark Arts at Hogwarts School, was alerted to the intrusion of a pack of thirteen transformed werewolves led by the notorious terrorist Fenrir Greyback into the school. Auror Williamson immediately ran to the scene and was one of the first to arrive to engage the werewolves. During the course of the battle, he was fatally mauled by the werewolf known as Lycaon. In recognition of his actions, and in accordance with a petition submitted this morning with the signatures of a majority of the Wizengamot, Eric Williamson is hereby awarded the Order of Merlin, First Class. At this time, I would like to ask for a moment of silence in Auror Williamson’s memory…” Dumbledore paused for longer than was strictly necessary and made the audience sit tight to further calm them down. “Thank you.”

After the initial housekeeping items—the Secretary’s report, Treasurer’s report, and so on—the real work began. “The first order of business falls to Madam Bones of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement,” Dumbledore said.

Amelia Bones stood and addressed the assembly. “Chief Warlock,” she began, “I preface this item with a summary of the results of the DMLE’s investigation of the events of Tuesday night. As most of the assembly know, on that night, which was the night of the full moon, our investigation shows that Hogwarts School was attacked by a pack of thirteen werewolves led by Fenrir Greyback. The attack was facilitated by two breaches in the castle’s wards and the use of fourteen doses—two full courses—of illegally acquired Wolfsbane Potion. The Hogwarts staff was alerted to the intrusion by the timely action of three students, including our own Lord Potter. Lord Potter also informed Lord Black, who was stationed in Hogsmeade that night in his capacity as a Hitwizard, via a private communication channel. The Hogwarts staff and the Hogsmeade patrol engaged the werewolves shortly after they breached one of the students’ dormitories. In the course of the ensuing battle, four students were bitten, and two others were injured. Also, Auror Eric Williamson was killed, and several of the other defenders were also injured. Three of the werewolves were killed in the fight, and four others remain in treatment in a secure ward of St. Mungo’s Hospital. The remaining six the Ministry has recommended to bring to trial today. As such, I move that we adjourn to the Council of Magical Law to hold the trials.”

The motion carried without objection, and Madam Bones took the chair as magistrate and ordered the first prisoner brought in, who was, of course, Greyback himself. The hope was that by getting the biggest fish out of the way first, the angry crowd in the gallery would be placated and start to clear out.

Fenrir Greyback was not merely in shackles, as Sirius had been at his trial. He was in a straitjacket, and he wore a muzzle on his face. To the Grangers, the Creeveys, and other muggle-borns in the audience, he looked disturbingly like Hannibal Lecter, if Hannibal Lecter had been a lot hairier and wore an eyepatch. Even in human form, Greyback’s teeth and “claws’ were dangerous—not infectious, but leaving cursed scars—and the Aurors had been forced to restrain him when he began lashing out at anyone who got too close.

Harry couldn’t help but feel a twinge of pride when he saw the state Greyback was in. He’d been taught to use violence only as a last resort, but Greyback was a very bad man, and Harry had definitely helped cut him down to size. His right eye was gone, covered by an eyepatch that revealed fresh scars around the edges. He also walked with a limp thanks to the number Sirius had done on his arse. When he reached the defendant’s chair in the centre of the Chamber, the straitjacket was undone, though his hands were not freed, so that he could be chained down. Only then was the muzzle removed from his face.

The assembly jeered like a gathering at the Colosseum when the werewolf was led in, but Madam Bones quieted them at once. No matter how hated Greyback was, she was determined that this trial be carried out properly and with due decorum.

“Fenrir Greyback,” she said when he was in place with a mere hint of glee on her face, “you are hereby charged with nineteen counts of deliberate infection of individuals with lycanthropy, eight counts of attempted infection of individuals with lycanthropy, seven counts of conspiracy to infect individuals with lycanthropy, five counts of murder in the first degree, fourteen counts of murder in the second degree, two counts of conspiracy to commit murder, twenty-one counts of accessory to murder, one count of terrorism, three counts of terroristic threats, four counts of stalking and harassment, three counts of simple assault, six counts of hate crimes, two counts of resisting arrest, one count of escaping Ministry custody, one count of being a public nuisance, nine counts of illegal squatting, one count of criminal trespass, one count of breaking and entering, and one count of treason against the Ministry.” Of course, these were only the charges that they had enough evidence to bring to trial and that had occurred within the British Isles. “Mr. Greyback, how do you plead?”

Greyback fixed Madam Bones with his one good eye, that piercing blue inside a ring of black, and spat in her direction. “I refuse to recognise the legitimacy of this corrupt and oppressive organisation!” he shouted.

Madam Bones sighed. “A plea of ‘Not Guilty’ will be entered in the record,” she said, as was required. “Mr. Greyback, will you consent to testify under Veritaserum?”

“I do not require it! I have nothing to hide!”

“Let the record show that the defendant has refused Vertiaserum,” she grumbled. “Mr. Greyback, will you consent to testify under and affirmation of truthfulness?” That was rare, but this would be a lot faster if she could get him to spout off his political screed, which would no doubt contain enough of a confession to lock him up for good.

“Oh, I’ll tell you the truth!” he yelled. “I’ll tell all you effing cowards the truth!”

“Let the record show that the defendant has consented to an affirmation of truthfulness,” Bones said, but Greyback shouted over her.

“You all think we’re monsters—that werewolves are vicious beasts to be confined. Just look what we do. How many people have I infected? It’s more than nineteen, I’ll tell you that! But now I’ll tell you who the real monsters are. Look in the mirror! _You_ are the ones who turn us out of your so-called ‘civilised’ society. _You_ are the ones who deny us the means to support ourselves, forcing us into the worst jobs or no jobs at all. Is it any wonder we become thieves? _You_ are the ones who deny us an education. Is it any wonder that we behave, as you say, like animals? You reduce us to the intellectual state of animals! Is it any wonder that when we are denied any form of political voice through non-violent action—when public pleas and letters are dismissed as self-serving and dangerous, when our voting bloc is non-existent and without allies, when the very fact of our gathering in numbers is treated with suspicion and prohibited—that we resort to violence to increase our numbers and power? NO! We’re building an army because it’s the only thing we _can_ do. And the more you tighten the noose, the more of us you turn against you.

“Now, I know what you’re thinking. You think I failed. I only infected four of your kids at Hogwarts, and they’re sure as hell not gonna join me. Well, you’re wrong! I didn’t get the army I wanted, but biting the Diggory boy alone was worth it. Getting three other kids and killing that Auror were just gravy on the main course. Now you can’t ignore the problem anymore. Now you can’t sweep it under the rug. Now you either have to abandon your oppression or prove for all to see that your every bit as much cruel and heartless animals as I am!

“And you are. _You are_.” Greyback drew the words out with a sneer. “You think you’re all so perfect and noble and enlightened? You’re all out for blood today just as much as I am, too! Look at you—turned out in droves hoping for a good, old-fashioned witch-burning! How many of you are wishing you still had the death penalty? How many of you wish it really _was_ burning at the stake? How many of you think it would be a great show? No, when you get right down to it, all you people are more animals than the animals are. Nature may be red in tooth and claw, but at least She has a reason for it. I kill to get justice for my brethren. You kill just for the entertainment value. So go ahead. Do your worst.”

Greyback fell silent. You could hear a pin drop in the Wizengamot Hall. More than a few people looked genuinely disturbed by the werewolf’s words, although a greater number were indignant, unwilling to listen to any criticism from so savage a creature.

Finally, it was Amos Diggory who stood up to make a proposal: “Madam Bones, in the interest of time, I move that we accept this testimony as a confession to the nineteen counts of deliberate infection and one count of accessory to murder and drop the rest of the charges. That should be sufficient to meet our goal of getting the defendant confined permanently.”

That proposal was by no means universally accepted, since a fair number of people really were out for blood, but a solid majority of the Wizengamot approved it, in part because Diggory proposed it. “Fenrir Greyback,” Bones ruled, “you are hereby found guilty of nineteen counts of deliberate infection with lycanthropy and one count of accessory to murder. As a result of your lack of repentance, you will be given a maximum sentence for each count, to be served consecutively. I sentence you to two hundred twenty years in Azkaban with possibility of parole after one hundred ten.” She cracked her wand to seal the verdict. Even if werewolves lived as long as the average wizard, which they generally didn’t, Greyback would never get out of there alive.

The other five trials went almost as quickly. Two the defendants confessed in political speeches like Greyback did, while the other three simply plead guilty, although this was after being advised that Greyback could be brought back in to testify against them. After the last trial, the most public bit of business was done for the day, and many of the guests (thankfully) left.

The Council of Magical Law adjourned, and Dumbledore took the podium again. There were a few minor housekeeping-type legislative issues for the Wizengamot before they took up the main issue, the two bills pertaining to werewolves. By manipulating a few rules, they were able to take up both at once, since they were on related topics, and the issue was _de facto_ between the two bills much more than it was between either of them and the _status quo_.

In this case, the first motion fell to Minister Fudge, with his toad-faced Senior Undersecretary Umbridge whispering in his ear. “Chief Warlock,” he said, “I would like to reintroduce Amendment 5 to the Werewolf Protection Act, making deliberate infection with lycanthropy a capital crime.”

That generated a surprising amount of controversy. Like muggle Britain, magical Britain no longer practised the death penalty. Technically, escaping from Azkaban was punishable by the Dementor’s Kiss, but so far as anyone knew, no one had ever escaped from Azkaban. Also, crimes against humanity were punishable by being thrown through the Veil of Death in the Department of Mysteries—a law that was specifically written with Voldemort in mind, in the unlikely event that they ever caught him alive. In this case, though, there was not a consensus. Some people wanted to throw the book at the werewolves, while others had heeded Greyback’s words and were determined to prove that they were the better people.

“A ruse to drum up sympathy!” on the proponents shouted of the latter sentiment. “Like the rest of his speech! We’ve had enough of these sympathisers already!”

“It is completely unnecessary! Wasn’t one of the reasons we abolished the death penalty that Azkaban was considered a _better_ deterrent than execution?”

“Yes, we know where _you_ stand, Denbright. You’ve been advocating for years to _remove_ the dementors from Azkaban. Your argument is a bit counterproductive, don’t you think?”

It was an odd debate, with the normal power blocs breaking up and members taking opposite sides seemingly at random. Those for the death penalty had the stronger emotional arguments, while those against could make long arguments about it being excessive and not in line with international standards. The main point for Harry, though, was that, after an enquiring look to Remus, who shook his head “no,” he conveyed to Cousin Andi that he wanted to oppose the amendment. Sirius noticed the same look and also agreed. Remus later explained his concern that the Ministry would be too quick to condemn a werewolf whose motive was unclear, and at least being sent to Azkaban, as Sirius pointed out, could be reversed.

Unfortunately, on this matter, the emotional arguments won the day, and the death penalty was added to both bills.

“Don’t worry, that one’s not that big a deal,” Cousin Ted whispered to them. “You can’t win them all.”

The amendment did turn out to be a minor matter, as he predicted, because the big controversy came when Lucius Malfoy came out swinging against Harry. “Chief Warlock,” he spoke, “these amendments are all well and good, but I think we must ask ourselves why we are still considering Lord Black’s Lycanthropy Regulation and Management Act at all. This bill comes from both Lord Black and the office of Lord Potter, both associates of an admitted werewolf.”

“I object, Lord Malfoy,” Sirius said at once. “We’ve already been over this. We proposed this bill in part because Mr. Lupin is our friend, but that does not mean we sympathise with the likes of Greyback and his ilk. We sure haven’t skimped on the enforcement provisions in our bill, you know.”

“That’s very touching, Lord Black, but there is new evidence that has come to light that casts doubt upon the trustworthiness of the co-sponsors of this bill.”

“No,” Sirius and Harry whispered at the same time. They could see it coming even before he said it.

“Madame Bones’s summary of the attack at Hogwarts—in the interest of brevity, I’m sure—left out one important detail, namely that the investigation into the attack at Hogwarts revealed that the werewolves learnt how to get into the castle from none other than Lord Potter himself!”

The uproar was even greater than it had been at Greyback’s trial. The remaining crowd in the Hall was on its feet at once, and curses were hurled at Harry, mostly verbal, but he was forced to the ground as one spell of unknown intent sailed over his head. Then, there were several flashes of red light, and the crowd quieted down again. When he looked up, Harry saw the Aurors taking down everyone who had drawn their wands. Mad-Eye Moody in particular was casting with a speed and accuracy he had never seen before, sometimes at people he couldn’t even see with wands in their hands.

“I will have order in this assembly!” Dumbledore roared. “One more outburst like that, and I will clear the Hall!” This cowed the crowd even more than the Aurors did. Many of them had never seen the great wizard truly angry.

Harry was on his feet as soon as it was clear. “Lord Malfoy, that’s not the whole story, and you know it—” he called.

“Harry, stop!” his family hissed.

“You heard what he said—”

“Don’t, Harry,” Ted replied sternly. “You’ll only make it worse. Let them handle it.”

Harry looked where he was pointing and saw Madame Bones rising to her feet. He also saw Andi physically holding back a rabid-looking Sirius.

“Madame Bones?” Dumbledore recognised.

“Chief Warlock, in the interest of judicial accuracy, I feel I need to clarify the results of our investigation,” Bones said. “One of the werewolves in our custody, an Artemis Crouch, testified under Veritaserum that she learnt the information that allowed Greyback’s pack to enter Hogwarts by eavesdropping on a private conversation of Lord Potter’s. Lord Potter himself never knew that anyone was listening in. As soon as Miss Crouch is recovered, you can hear it for yourselves at her trial.”

“And yet, shouldn’t we be concerned that Lord Potter was giving out such dangerous secrets at all,” Malfoy pressed.

“I will contest that myself, Lord Malfoy,” Dumbledore said. “By any reasonable standards, these were not dangerous secrets. They were hardly secrets at all—certainly not ones that we were still actively trying to keep. Hogwarts was breached because of an oversight on the part of the school staff, not Mr. Potter’s actions. Had these oversights not occurred, Greyback would not have been able to enter, even with the information he possessed.”

Lucius Malfoy smiled condescendingly at that. He knew full well the actual results of the DMLE investigation. Any organisation leaked plenty under the pressure of enough galleons. That particular gambit hadn’t worked, but like any good chess player, he had planned in advance to use it to his advantage. Now, he moved to play his trump card, to mix his metaphors.

“That’s an interesting story, Chief Warlock,” he said, “although I’m afraid we’re not all as sanguine about Lord Potter’s discretion as you are. But more importantly, I do believe you’re forgetting something: _you_ are the Headmaster of Hogwarts. The security of the school was _your_ responsibility.

“And even that is not the full story.” Lord Malfoy turned to the rest of the crowd. “The Chief Warlock not only committed these “oversights’ that allowed werewolves to slip into Hogwarts and attack our children, but he has also been disingenuous about the case of Remus Lupin, who attended the school in the 1970s. The Chief Warlock claims that no harm came to any students as a result of a werewolf attending the school. He seems to have forgotten the incident in which his own current Potions Master, Severus Snape, who is here as my guest today, was nearly bitten by Mr. Lupin in his transformed state and made a very narrow escape.”

The uproar began anew, including some calls for Remus to be arrested on the spot. Harry’s heart sank, and Sirius looked horrified. This would be much more damaging, especially where the school was concerned. They looked over and saw Snape in the audience, looking smug.

Harry and his family didn’t know what to do. Even if it didn’t affect the bill that much, it could completely derail their hopes of keeping Hogwarts open to werewolves. To Sirius, however, something seemed wrong. Why was Snivellus doing this? He knew Sirius knew the real story as well as he did…Except that it would discredit _him_ , one of the co-sponsors of their bill, and Harry was already on thin ice. That could ruin the whole game, but what choice did he have? Remus could go to Azkaban if he stayed silent. He looked across the Hall to his friend, who sat there silently shaking his head. _He_ was perfectly ready to sacrifice himself for the cause. Sirius looked to his godchildren. They made no indication at all. Nor did Dumbledore when he looked back to the podium.

 _I_ _’m sorry, Moony,_ he thought. He stood up and called, “I protest this slander on my friend’s character, Lord Malfoy. If Mr. Snape were telling the whole story, you would know that that incident was…was entirely my fault.” The crowd gasped again. “I goaded Mr. Snape to go to the Shrieking Shack during the full moon as a prank. It was a foolish and dangerous idea, and for that…for that, I apologise. However, Mr. Lupin knew nothing about the incident until after the fact and was entirely blameless.”

“A likely story,” Lord Malfoy said. “You would risk your reputation in this Chamber for your friend, Lord Black? It doesn’t seem very believable.”

“Yes, I would, Lord Malfoy,” Sirius said icily. “And it’s the truth. Snape knows! Do you deny it, Snape?” Sirius demanded. “You only got close to Remus because I tricked you into it, and you were saved by the timely actions of James Potter! Admit it! Admit it or I’ll demand a formal subpoena!”

Lucius Malfoy turned to Snape. “This is true, Severus?” he said so that one could practically _hear_ his nose sticking up in the air.

Snape put on a heavy scowl and said, “It was Lord Black who pressured me to pursue Mr. Lupin that night…To my knowledge, Mr. Lupin was unaware.”

“ _Well,_ then,” Malfoy continued haughtily. “I think perhaps pressing charges against Lord Black might be in order.”

Harry and Hermione shuddered again. This day was getting worse and worse. Their bill might be dead, for all they knew, and now Sirius could get in _actual_ trouble with the law. Sirius himself actually wasn’t so concerned. Since the incident had happened so long ago and he had just apologised unprompted, he would probably get off on time served.

Severus Snape, however, smirked to himself at Black’s predicament. Contrary to popular belief, Severus Snape was usually a rational man. Sure, he had his moments. When the younger Potter first started school, for example, he was strongly inclined to dislike him on account of his father, but Harry had shown him that he had a lot of Lily in him, and Severus quickly came to accept that. More recently, when Potter and his family had essentially forced him to teach better, he was forced to admit that it worked. Teaching still tried his patience to no end, but when he actually made an effort, he found that he _was_ better at it, and when he became better at it, he found it more tolerable, and, to his genuine astonishment, the average marks in his classes had improved.

Moreover, Snape didn’t actually hate werewolves, either. He feared them. It was petty, and he rationalised it away as mere prudence to the point that he refused to admit it even to himself, but he feared them because of his personal experience, and he would really rather not have them inside Hogwarts again. With Potter finding another school that would take them, it was no great loss to them, or so he told himself.

And Snape didn’t even dislike Lupin in particular because he was a werewolf. He disliked him because he was a Marauder. The same went for James Potter long ago, though their history had been slightly different. But he _hated_ Sirius Black. There was a certain cold, Slytherin calculation in many of what looked like his emotional responses, such as his admitted pro-Slytherin bias in his teaching, but this was none of that. This was pure emotional reaction: he _hated_ Sirius Black for trying to kill him back in sixth year. He hated that he had forced James Potter to save his life. He hated that he couldn’t even tell Lily why he was so angry and dare he say scared all of a sudden—in his mind, the last thing that would have had any chance of getting her and Potter to split up.

He’d been angry when Black was found innocent and released from Azkaban because he _knew_ he was really guilty, just not of the crime he was charged with. And so, when he saw the opportunity, Snape made this plan. It had been a while since he took the initiative like this, but he thought it was a good one. He would reveal the incident in sixth year to the world. Albus would frown at him, of course, but he would never fire him. And when it was done, either the idea of werewolves in Hogwarts would be discredited, or Black would be forced to confess his crimes and would lose much of his credibility. If he was lucky, both. In a perfect world, he wouldn’t have to go through Lucius Malfoy to do it, but the enemy of his enemy was his ally, and it would make his job that much easier if the Dark Lord returned, as Albus feared, so he made do.

He thought little of Harry Potter glaring daggers at him.

“Do we really need to go into ancient history now?” asked Lord Bletchley. “This crime Mr. Snape claims was nearly twenty years ago. I think we have more pressing matters.”

“I’m sure the DMLE will be happy to investigate the incident at its convenience,” Lord Smith added. “And while they’re at it, there’s still the matter of Mr. Lupin. Accidental exposure _is_ still a crime.”

“Is it?” said Elphias Doge. “I think you will find that _negligence_ is the relevant crime. If Mr. Lupin was acting on good faith that his location was secure, he is not responsible.”

“I think we’ve seen that any sort of ‘security’ when it comes to werewolves is no more than wishful thinking,” Tiberius Ogden replied. “I agree with Lord Smith. Mr. Lupin should be investigated.”

“Mr. Lupin saved my son’s life,” Amos Diggory said, effectively stopping the conversation. He looked much quieter and more subdued than he had before. “While transformed. I haven’t properly thanked him for that—and I do, Mr. Lupin. Lord Doge is right. I will not stand in the way of justice. If Mr. Lupin was acting on good faith, he is not responsible.”

That got the angry cries for justice to calm down, although Madam Bones did stand up and inform the assembly that “The DMLE will investigate as it sees fit.”

That was not the result either Malfoy or Snape was hoping for. They were expecting people to want to deal with Black right away, not get on with the legislating. Quickly, Lord Malfoy tried to get on track again: “Ladies and gentleman, why do we need to wait any longer? The Lords Black and Potter’s bill still sits before us even though serious doubts have been cast on its sponsors. I move that we take it to a vote now and get it out of the way so that we can finish working out the only reasonable proposal.”

“I second that,” said Lord Nott at once, and it looked like a solid majority of the Wizengamot was on their side from the nods of agreement.

To Sirius and Harry, and his family, it looked like their LMRA was about to go down in flames, but it was then that David Monroe from International Cooperation stood up. “I object, Chief Warlock. Lords Black and Potter are _not_ the only supporters of this bill,” he snapped in his gruff voice. “Their personal issues aside, the ideas it contains are fundamentally good ones, drawn up with the help of the DMLE and several of our other key members. Now, in light of the tragedy at Hogwarts this week, I do think we need to reassess the content of _our_ bill, so I move that we set the whole issue aside until next month to give all parties time to draw up amendments.”

“I second the motion,” his father, Lord Solomon Monroe, said at once.

“Have we not already delayed enough, Lord Monroe? Mr. Monroe?” Malfoy said. “The time to update the law is now, before another incident like this one can happen. The Minister and Mr. Diggory already have a perfectly acceptable alternative.”

That got a lot of nods from both around the Wizengamot and the audience. It looked like it was all over, but then Amos Diggory stood and said, “I support a delay.” All eyes turned to him in surprise. He had been one of the staunchest advocates for his own bill, but no one really knew what would happen to him now that his son had been bitten. “After this week, I’m not convinced we have the bill we need either. I support Mr. Monroe’s motion to set it aside till next month so that it can be revised.”

Umbridge looked furious. Her staunchest ally was falling away. From the new wave of murmurs around the hall, it sounded like he was taking quite a few people with him. She hurriedly whispered in the Minister’s ear, and he repeated what she said: “Mr. Diggory, we are all truly sorry for your hardship here at the Ministry. It must be very difficult for you, and we would all understand if you feel the need to take an extended leave of absence. I’m sure we can find someone suitable to take over your office on a temporary basis.” Of course, Fudge thought, Dolores had experience in that department and would make a good choice, and then she could legislate directly, but more importantly, even if Diggory refused, it would still make people question his competence.

“I think that is not relevant to the current discussion, Minister,” Diggory responded testily. “I stand by my position.”

“Perfectionism gets us nowhere,” said Lord Nott. “The most important thing to do for national security is to act now.”

“Actually, I must also agree with Mr. Monroe,” said Lord Bletchley, to the surprise of many. Malfoy, normally an ally, gave him a look that seemed to say _Et tu, Brute?_ “For a different reason, however,” Bletchley clarified. “In all this discussion, we seem to have forgotten that the werewolves gained access to Hogwarts using the Wolfsbane Potion. _Wolfsbane_ , which is supposed to be so tightly regulated by the Ministry in order to prevent just such a disaster from happening. If we are going to revise these bills, I think we should carefully consider whether we’re going to continue the production of Wolfsbane Potion at all.”

That set off yet another round of arguing. “It’s a no-brainer after this week.” “It’ll only set up a black market.” “It’ll still be available overseas.” “How many more attacks is it going to take?” “Wolfsbane is the one thing lets werewolves lead productive lives.” “Why are we even considering keeping it up?”

And yet, at the end of the day—a long, long day—it was past supper by the time it was over—the Wolfsbane had the desired effect. The bills were set aside until next month so that they could be revised. Harry’s head was spinning as he walked out of the Ministry building. Things had gone every which way so many times today that he could barely make sense of it, and their position definitely looked weaker than it had before. He’d need all week just to settle back in at school.

But he knew one thing: they had one month to find an acceptable way to keep up the production of Wolfsbane Potion.


	80. The Dark Lady of Veracruz

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Nothing is stranger to Harry Potter than his own JK Rowling.
> 
> I’ve had several complaints that I made the bad guys too powerful in the last chapter and that the story is getting too depressing with Harry not being able to make any headway. I want to stress that it is not over yet. Just be patient for this chapter and the next one, and you’ll see how it really turns out.
> 
> Politics is hard, and you don’t always win all the battles. I think I’ve mentioned before that I dislike it when people make things too easy for Harry. This is even truer in political stories where the opposition just melts away, and Harry completely reforms magical society practically overnight. These interests have been entrenched for decades, and they’re not going to be dislodged easily.
> 
> That said, the bad guys have now played their hand, and it’s time for Harry to strike back—and strike back he will. He already has everything he needs to turn the tide. Now, he just has to put it together.

_“Well, Dumbledore, the werewolves are out of our hair, now. I don’t see why there should be any more reason to worry about the Tournament.”_

_“You have the power to overrule me if you wish, Cornelius, but I warn you I have heard far more troubling rumours than those of werewolves.”_

_“All the other players are on board, Albus. I suggest you get to it quickly, or else have Minerva talk to them if you’re going to be away again.”_

* * *

Harry and Cho were locked in an epic battle in the last Quidditch game of the year. A win for Gryffindor today would net them the Quidditch Cup. If Ravenclaw won, because of the way the points had worked out, the Cup would go to Slytherin—at least with as poorly as the Ravenclaw Chasers were playing today. Harry was having a good time for a change. It was a welcome break from all the politicking.

This was especially a treat for Harry and Hermione because Alicia was out sick, so Hermione got to play her first game. And she could definitely play. She wasn’t as good as Alicia, but she still wowed the school by zooming around the pitch with a skill and athleticism that few had expected from the bookish girl.

Harry took the opportunity to play the protective brother role in this game. He made a point of dive-bombing the Ravenclaw Chasers a couple of times when they tried to interfere with Hermione’s plays. Hermione was not amused.

“I can take care of myself, you know,” she said.

“Yeah, but I have a faster broom,” Harry pointed out.

That was a big advantage, as he quickly found out, and not just for disrupting the other team. Cho had learnt with Malfoy that it was no use trying to outfly a Firebolt. Instead, she decided to mark Harry closely, cutting across his path frequently and preventing him from using his broom’s speed. Once, then twice, she stopped him from grabbing the Snitch, though both times she failed to get it herself. She was a challenge to play against; that was for sure. The third time he spotted it, however, he got up above her, and he had a clear path. Cho didn’t stand a chance against the Firebolt’s unfettered acceleration.

The crowd erupted in cheers when Harry caught the Snitch. Hufflepuff would deservedly receive the House Cup for the year, but Gryffindor was pleased to sweep the Quidditch Cup for the third year in a row. Oliver Wood was especially glad. It was his last year, and the professional recruiters were out today, taking a close look at him. He’d been even more manic than usual before this match, doing everything he could to make sure they won the Cup.

Hermione was praised by her teammates and house alike. There was always a lot of pressure being a rookie player, but she’d made good. Neville was especially eager to compliment her on her flying skills, for which she warmly thanked him, and several of the upper years gave her a hearty “Great flying, Granger. Who would’ve thought it?”

“Good game, Miss Chang,” Harry said pleasantly when he shook Cho’s hand afterwards.

“Yes, excellent flying,” she agreed. “But you know you’re going to have to pay me back for that, don’t you, Mr. Potter?”

“Well, it’s a good thing there’s still one more Hogsmeade visit next week, isn’t it?” he kept up the banter.

“Yes, I suppose it is.”

* * *

Harry was ready for his date bright and early on the following Saturday morning. Exams had just ended, and everyone would be out and about today. It was a hot, sunny day, and Cho looked prettier than ever in a short summer dress. They decided to take advantage of the nice weather and walk to the village.

“Well, it’s been some year, huh?” Cho said, trying to make conversation.

“Some _three_ years, more like,” Harry answered. “I’ve been having crazy stuff happen around me from the start.”

“Wow…yeah, I guess you have.” She hesitated a minute before voicing the concern that had been troubling her. “So…we haven’t really had a chance to talk properly since…well, since the full moon.”

Harry went stiff in what Cho didn’t recognise was a very feline reaction, but it lasted only a moment before he forced himself to relax. “I guess not,” he said.

“Harry, I’m sorry about the whole Shrieking Shack thing,” she said suddenly.

“It’s fine, Cho.”

“No, I was pushing you to tell me your secrets—”

“ _No_ , Cho. It was my choice. It was my own fault for not being more careful. And besides, Dumbledore’s right, they weren’t really that secret anyway.”

“Still, if there are things you’re not comfortable telling me—”

“Then I’ll hold them back, but honestly? I was doing that already. I only told you the ones…the ones I was comfortable with.” He almost said “the ones I trusted you with,” but he stopped himself.

“Oh. Well, I appreciate your faith in me,” she said sincerely. “So you didn’t get in any trouble for it?”

“No. Mum and Dad were mad at first, but they understood once they calmed down. The Owlery bit, though…”

“But that really helped them,” Cho protested. “That’s what Elizabeth Smith said.”

“I know, but my parents are big believers in basing punishment on how bad the risk-reward analysis looked at the time.” She gave him a quizzical look. “Basically, we had no reason to think that trick would help much at the time, so we should’ve done the safe thing and gone back to the Tower.”

Cho continued to give Harry a funny look. “Your parents _do_ know you’re Gryffindors, right?” she asked.

“Cho!” he said indignantly. “They adopted _me_ , didn’t they?” Of course, he realised at once, she didn’t understand the full history behind that decision—how they had literally made it in twenty-four hours after he showed up scared and alone on their doorstep, how Dumbledore had warned them (correctly) that Voldemort was still out there and itching for vengeance, how that day had also been their first introduction into the world of magic. She only knew the abridged and bastardised version Rita Skeeter had reported in the _Daily Prophet_ two years ago, and for whatever reason, Harry didn’t feel comfortable telling her more just yet.

Even so, she seemed to understand enough of his meaning. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean—It was just a bad joke.”

“Oh…It’s alright,” Harry said, feeling embarrassed. Of course it was a joke. How could it not be? He was just touchy about his family by nature.

They pushed the incident aside and walked through the village. Practically the whole school was out here today, who were old enough. They passed Cedric in the street, and he and Harry waved to each other. Harry was glad to see Cedric looking better. He knew the fifth-year was on his way to yet another meeting with the Robins family, Sirius, and Remus. They’d met as often as they could since that night.

“What do you think will happen to him next year?” Cho asked.

“I don’t know,” Harry answered. “The rumour is his father’s taken an extended leave from work, and they’re not sure if he’s coming back. Same with the Board of Governors. Maybe he’ll come around, maybe he won’t, or maybe he’ll just quit…I hope he comes around though…I know Remus’s father did.”

“You think they’d let him come back to Hogwarts, though?” she said. She didn’t look fond of the idea.

“Why not. It’s perfectly safe.”

“Is it? I thought after what happened…I mean, they’d still need to use the Shrieking Shack, won’t they?”

Harry thought he saw what she was driving at. “Probably, but we _know_ the Shrieking Shack is secure,” he said. “The Shrieking Shack was never breached. And the tunnel was an easy fix. And besides, with the Wolfsbane Potion, they might be able to come up with some other options.”

Cho’s face definitely darkened at that remark. “So,” she said, “you still think the Ministry should distribute Wolfsbane Potion?”

Harry stopped and turned to face her. He took a deep breath to slow down and stop this from turning into a shouting match. “Yes,” he said. “Wolfsbane Potion is the best thing to happen to werewolves in the past hundred years. Before it was invented, the biggest reason a werewolf couldn’t hold a job in either the magical or muggle world was because they were laid up for several days every full moon. With Wolfsbane, they only have to miss one day. That’s why we’re even _talking_ about job restrictions now. And that’s not even getting into the long-term improvement in health.”

“I understand that, Harry, but you know that Greyback used Wolfsbane to attack the school.”

“That’s no reason to keep it away from the others—you know, the one’s we’re sure about. Most werewolves just want to live normal lives.”

“But Greyback _got_ Wolfsbane from werewolves who were cleared to use it,” she reminded him.

“Yes, but that just means that we need better enforcement—do more to make sure it doesn’t get _out_ of the hands of those whom we trust with it. That’s why I think we should have a clinic—give the potion to them on site so they can’t take it somewhere else. But people don’t want that many werewolves in one place.”

Cho considered that, but ultimately dismissed it. “There’s other problems to that, though. Making Wolfsbane in bulk, at one location, would make it a bigger target for thieves, wouldn’t it?”

“Hmm…I guess you’re right,” Harry admitted. “But still, there are places with wards strong enough to keep out thieves. It shouldn’t be that difficult.”

“Can you really stop werewolves from misusing it?” she said. She held up a hand to stop his response. “I know most of them are good, but it only takes one mistake to have something bad happen again. Unless they take an Unbreakable Vow not to misuse it, I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

Harry gave her an interested stare. “Astoria Greengrass said the same thing a few weeks ago,” he said. “It’s a tempting idea, but honestly, the whole Unbreakable Vow thing makes _me_ a bit nervous.”

“Well, if you don’t want to do that, I don’t know what else you can do,” Cho said testily.

Harry deflated under her gaze and sighed: “That’s the problem we’ve been having all year…Oh, come on, we’re supposed to be enjoying today. Let’s not worry about it for a while.”

Cho was a little jolted at the sudden change in subject, but she didn’t complain as Harry led her down the street, hand in hand. They had got a late start that morning, even more so with taking the time to walk to the village. So they skipped Madam Puddifoot’s and just wandered and browsed the shops until lunch. Harry was reminded how small the magical world was. There just weren’t that many options for a date in a tiny village of two thousand. But they found things to do until they decided it was time to go to the Three Broomsticks.

As on their previous Hogsmeade trips, they ran into Neville Longbottom as he finished his Occlumency lesson with Maxwell Barnett. He was looking surprisingly good these days. The now-daily exercise was really paying off, and the Occlumency combined with his new wand had improved his course work dramatically.

“Hey, Neville,” Harry said. “How’s it going?”

“Great,” he replied. “Mr. Barnett says my Occlumency is almost ready to qualify.”

“It’s true.” Maxwell Barnett came up behind him. “If Mr. Longbottom spends the week after term ends in intensive training, I think he’ll be ready.”

“That’s good,” Harry answered, hiding his discomfort at the reason they had asked Neville to learn it in the first place. “Neville, if you’re ready in time for the next Wizengamot meeting, I think Hermione and I would like to meet with you afterwards.”

Neville’s eyebrows rose as he, too, remembered what they had told him of the reason for this whole exercise. “Alright, Harry. I’ll try to be ready then.”

“I think that’s very achievable,” Barnett said. “And now, Lord Potter, if you’ll excuse me, I have a meeting with Prime Minister Major.” He leaned down and whispered conspiratorially. “You didn’t hear it from me, but he’s making Minister Fudge revise some of his poorly-laid plans for the World Cup.”

Harry smiled: “Sounds like Minister Fudge, alright. Good day, Mr. Barnett.” He stared after the man for a minute as he left before snapping out of it. “Anyway, I’ll see you later, Nev. Come on, Cho, let’s find a table.”

He kissed her as he showed her to her seat, and she blushed prettily, even if he seemed a little distracted that time. They enjoyed a pleasant lunch and talked about nothing in particular whilst carefully avoiding revisiting their discussion from that morning.

The afternoon looked to be more of the same. Some people had decided to swim in the large pond that lay at the far end of the village from the Shrieking Shack, but Harry, given his feline tendencies, wasn’t much of a swimmer, and in any case, they hadn’t prepared for that. So instead, they walked around the perimeter to watch the antics of the swimmers.

It was while they were walking in silence that Cho got to thinking about something else. The past two weeks since the full moon had made her think a lot about her relationship with the Boy-Who-Lived—no, Harry. He certainly acted a lot more like Harry than the Boy-Who-Lived. He wasn’t at all what she’d expected nor thought she wanted, but she found it oddly charming. Merlin, he was complicated, though. There was the Boy-Who-Lived—the hero—who was the subject of books, albeit inaccurate ones, and who did flashy deeds of daring, albeit reluctantly. Then there was Harry—the ordinary boy—who was very kind and courteous and open about most things and just wanted to get along—the boy he _wanted_ to be, she was sure. And then there was also Lord Potter, who was formal, secretive, and politically minded out of necessity. She could tell that mantle was forced upon him; it fit him less comfortably than either of the other two, but it was there.

But Cho wasn’t so worried about whether she could navigate the intricacies of Harry’s life. The thing she was really noticing was the development of their relationship—or rather, the lack thereof. Their dates had been very nice, of course. Harry was a true gentleman. But they hadn’t really been more than that, and this latest one seemed almost perfunctory at times. That was understandable; Harry had a lot of other things on his mind, but still, it highlighted what she had been feeling lately.

Finally, when they reached the most remote corner of the pond, she turned to her date and said, “Harry, can I ask you a question, and get an honest answer?”

Harry cocked an eyebrow a fraction. That could be a dangerous question, depending on what she asked. Still, he couldn’t think how she could know any of his really big secrets to dig into those. He decided to take a chance and took a page out of Dumbledore’s book: “If you ask me, I won’t lie to you, Cho.”

“Do you see this going anywhere? Us, I mean?”

A small part of Harry’s brain felt a touch of relief that she hadn’t asked something more sensitive. The larger part was thinking, _Oh, God, this isn_ _’t going to end well_. He kept a calm outward appearance while he silently wracked his brain, trying to make sense of his feelings about her. Merlin’s beard, was it this hard for girls? He waited about as long as he dared, and he finally said, “No, not really.”

He braced himself for the waterworks, but to his surprise, Cho merely looked a little wistful and seemed to sigh with relief: “I was thinking the same thing. I really do like you, Harry. It’s just that I think we’d both be better off finding someone we’re more compatible with.”

“I understand, really, but…I mean…I hope this wasn’t about the secrets, though,” he responded.

“No, it wasn’t that,” she said quickly. “I understand why you have to do it, and…I think I could get used to it. I wasn’t worried about that. Um…it’s not about the Wolfsbane thing for you, is it?”

“No, of course not. We don’t have to agree on everything. I just feel like…like we…”

“We never really had the spark?”

“Yeah, that’s it.”

Cho smiled a little: “I _am_ glad we tried this, Harry. I enjoyed it, and you were really kind to me the whole time.” She didn’t mention how much she enjoyed having most of the girls in school being jealous of her; if she were honest with herself, maybe she enjoyed it a little too much. She didn’t think Harry would appreciate that bit.

“Thanks. I enjoyed it, too,” he said awkwardly. “So we’re still friends, then?”

“Of course.” She stood on her toes and kissed him, on the cheek this time. “You’re a good wizard, Harry Potter. I can tell you’ll make a lucky witch very happy someday. I wish you luck.”

“Er, yeah. Um, same to you, Cho—except flip the witch and wizard part.”

She giggled and walked away with a smile.

* * *

“Sirius Black.”

Harry had grabbed Hermione when he got back to the castle and pulled her in for an important conversation with their godfather.

“Hey, there, Harry. How’d the date go?” Sirius said with a grin when he appeared in the mirror.

“Huh?” he said, not expecting this shift of gears. “Oh, yeah. Um…about that. We, uh, decided to end it.”

“Oh no!” Sirius gasped. “Are you okay, Cub?”

“It’s fine. There wasn’t any trouble. We just both decided it wasn’t going anywhere, and we’d be better off seeing other people.”

“You don’t have to put on a brave face for us, Cub—”

“No, really. That’s what happened.”

“It’s true,” Hermione confirmed. “I saw them both afterwards. They’re fine.”

“Are you serious?” Sirius said.

“No, _you_ _’re_ Sirius,” Harry shot back. They heard Remus laugh from off the side of the mirror.

“Yes, but none of _my_ breakups ever went that well,” Sirius protested.

“That’s because you’re _you_ , Padfoot.” Remus pulled the edge of the mirror so he could be seen in it.

“Or James’s either. Remember that time he dated Marlene McKinnon in fifth year?” Sirius grinned at Harry and Hermione. “On the second date, she hexed him until he admitted he was still in love with Lily.”

“Don’t listen to him. Honestly, Harry, I think you handled the whole thing very well, especially for your age,” Remus cut in again. “The best kind of break-up is one where you both still want to be friends afterwards.”

“Actually, I think the only like that I remember was you and Mary Macdonald, Moony,” Sirius said. “James and I never had a chance, and when Lily tried to date, it got ugly between the boy and James—and then it got three times as ugly between _her_ and James. And of course, the Rat never dated anyone.”

“So what you’re saying is that Harry has once again succeeded in beating your low standards,” Remus said.

“You watch your mouth unless you want me to bring my cousin into this,” he shot back. Remus backed down. “Anyway, Cub, what did you want to talk about if it wasn’t your date?” Sirius continued.

Harry had to think for a minute to switch gears back to what he originally wanted to discuss.

“The Wolfsbane Potion,” Hermione reminded him.

“Yes. We were trying to figure out how we could make it more available safely, right?”

“We _were_ ,” Remus said grimly, “but after Greyback…I don’t know if we can…I’m not sure if we can even keep up the regular production at this point.”

“We know,” Hermione explained. “But the problem is that people don’t trust werewolves not to misuse it. A couple of people even suggested we make them take Unbreakable Vows not to misuse it in order to get it.”

Remus frowned. “I’d probably take that Vow,” he said. “I know a lot of other werewolves would, too. But it’s not a good solution. It’s one more piece of oppression, and a heavy one, not to mention risky.”

“That’s what I said, more or less,” Harry agreed. “But I got to thinking. When we had Mr. Barnett teach us Occlumency he signed a cursed contract not to reveal our secrets. How did that work?”

“The cursed contract?” Sirius asked. “It’s a contract that…well, curses you if you break it. It’s sort of like a less powerful form of the Unbreakable Vow. It can’t kill you or do serious injury, but it can make you sick—or unlucky—or mark you so it’s easy for people to see that you…broke it…Of course,” he saw what Harry was driving at. “You think if we had werewolves sign a cursed contract not to…not to willingly let anyone else take the Wolfsbane Potion or use it to attack anyone, it’ll be easy to spot the ones who break it and blacklist them—or arrest them.”

“Exactly!” Harry said. “It’s so obvious, I don’t know why we didn’t think of it before.”

“Probably because cursed contracts are so rare. Most contracts in the magical world are like muggle contracts—financial penalties and the like. Actual binding magical contracts are almost as rare as Unbreakable Vows.”

“That _could_ work, in principle,” Remus agreed. “But we have another problem. After last month, even with the contracts, I’m not so sure the Ministry wants to continued production of Wolfsbane at all.”

That was a mood-killer. They weren’t sure they could even keep the werewolves who were already taking Wolfsbane supplied, let alone adding more. Hermione was growing really unhappy with the whole thing, maybe even more than Harry. If only the Ministry were willing to make Wolfsbane more available. If only they or _anyone_ was willing to subsidise it.

Wait a minute.

“If you want something done right, do it yourself,” she whispered. She started to calculate. The others all stared at her. “Sirius, Remus,” she asked, “how much would it cost to hire a potions master who was licensed to make Wolfsbane?”

Sirius and Remus turned and looked at each other in surprise. “A potions master?” Remus said. “A good one…probably fifteen hundred galleons a year, less if they were part-time.”

“Good. And how much would it cost to provide security to a warded Healer’s clinic for one week each month.”

Sirius blew out a breath. “That’s a bit complicated, Kitten,” he said. “Let’s see…hire some off duty Aurors, “round-the-clock for one week…a hundred galleons a month should be more than enough.”

“Great. And, excuse me, Sirius, but how much gold do you have in your vault at Gringotts?”

“About four hundred thousand galleons. Hermione, are you saying I should build a clinic to make Wolfsbane?”

“No. Not a clinic. I’m saying you should start a _charitable foundation_ to make and distribute Wolfsbane. I mean, I know it’s a lot to ask—”

“No, no, I’m listening. I’ve got more than I could ever spend, and it would make my whole family roll over in their graves. What are you thinking?”

“Okay, then, I’m thinking you start a foundation to support werewolves. Set aside…maybe a hundred thousand galleons as seed capital. Use it to build the clinic, pay for some good wards, and hire the management, the potions master, and the security, and to cover publicity and whatever other overhead you need. Then, invest the rest and use the profits to pay for the potion itself. Conservatively, you could probably supply Wolfsbane to a dozen or two werewolves free of charge. Now, it’s not that many but—”

Harry jumped in, finally catching on: “But you could say that all Hogwarts students who need it will get it automatically! And then extend it to as many other children as you can. Hermione, you’re a genius!” He grabbed his sister and hugged her until she got annoyed and pushed him away.

Sirius and Remus were awestruck and again wondered why they hadn’t thought of this themselves. Of course, while there were a handful of charities in the magical world, an actual foundation was a little too muggle to catch on. “Hermione, do you really think that would work?” Remus said hopefully.

“If you can get permission to hire the potions master,” she said. “The maths works out fine. It’s just a matter of whether Sirius is willing to sink a quarter of his wealth into a scheme that the Ministry might try to shut down.”

“I’ll do it,” Sirius said without hesitation.

“Padfoot—” Remus started.

“No, Moony, I don’t want to hear it. You’re family—my _real_ family, and my family’s worth more than that. And besides, it’s not just about you. It’s about Cedric Diggory, Colin Creevey, Demelza Robins, and any other kids who need it.”

Remus smiled briefly, but then he turned back to Hermione with another question: “You were right, though, Hermione; ten or twenty werewolves are only a start. How do we expand from there? Or could we?”

It was Harry who answered: “Well, it’s a charity, isn’t it? Ask for donations. I wonder how much Mum and Dad would let me put in.”

“I doubt a quarter of what you have,” Hermione warned him. “You _might_ be able to convince them of ten thousand galleons if you explain the political significance of it. But the really hard part would be getting other wealthy families in on it. You might be able to get Neville’s Gran to match your donation, and I’m sure the Monroes will chip in, but it’ll be a long way to go if we eventually want to cover all werewolves in Britain.”

Remus’s eyes grew even wider. “Do you really think we could do that?” he asked. He had never dared to think that far ahead.

“Why not? It’d be just like the NHS in the muggle world.”

“Well, we have years to work that out,” Sirius said. “I’ll contact Cousin Andi and our solicitor and see what we can do to get started. You two are brilliant, you know.”

“We try,” Harry said with a smile.

Sirius laughed. “Love you, cubs,” he said. Remus echoed him.

“Love you, too,” Harry and Hermione said in unison. “Mirror off.”

* * *

In the inland, highland regions of the Mexican state of Veracruz, hidden away from the world and forgotten by the muggles, stood an Aztec pyramid. Unlike most such pyramids that now lay in ruins, or were made to look like ruins, this one was clearly still in use. It was painted with red and blue trim, and its steps ran a dingy red-brown with (mostly) animal blood.

It was this pyramid that Barty Crouch Jr found himself climbing alone, seeking an audience with the one within.

It was not the grandest of pyramids, even for the Americas, only about a hundred feet high. The top tier was a building about the size of a house from the outside, but magically expanded to a small, but lavish palace on the inside.

Barty entered into the main hall of this palace, and there at the other end, on a gilded throne surrounded by attendants, sat a witch who was feared throughout Mexico. She was tall, even sitting, and her face, both in the blackness of her hair and eyes and the expression she wore, could have made a Mesoamerican Bellatrix Lestrange, though perhaps a few years older. She wore a large headdress of green quetzal feathers. Her chest was covered with only a shawl dyed with indigo, but she wore an elaborate gold collar set with precious stones on top of it. Her skirt was more modern, but was still plain white and knee-length in the Aztec style.

In their travels in Mexico, Barty had learnt that this witch’s name was Meztli Ocelotl, but to anyone who didn’t have a death wish, she was known as the “High Priestess,” La Pantera de Veracruz. Or, in English, The Jaguar.

Barty approached the throne as close as the attendants would allow and bowed low. It galled him bowing to anyone but his Master, but he needed to get on this witch’s good side—if she had one. He waited to be spoken to in the traditional submissive mode.

“Well?” the witch said sharply. “You’ve come to me, wizard. Who are you, and why are you here?”

Her accent was thick, and her voice was deeper than Bellatrix’s, but it came through with the same icy clarity. Merlin help us all if the two ever meet, he thought. He suspected she already knew who he was, or he would never have been allowed to enter the pyramid, but he dutifully answered, “My name is Bartimeus Crouch Junior, High Priestess. I am a servant of Lord Voldemort, Heir of Salazar Slytherin, who vanquished Death itself—”

“Spare me the grandstanding, Crouch. That’s for the masses,” La Pantera interrupted. “I know who your boss is. Now, what’s your business here?”

Barty was indignant. How dare she talk to him like that? How dare she speak of his Master like that? But he reminded himself that this woman was far more powerful than he, and the one whose help they required. Calming himself, he summarised the problem: “My Master cheated death, but at a cost. His soul remains tied to the earth, but his body was destroyed. Using alchemy, we have bound his soul to a homunculus, but he still seeks the most effective way to return to his full power. For that, my Master seeks your assistance, High Priestess.”

La Pantera raised her chin slightly, setting her feathered headdress twitching. “A resurrection, then?” she said. “Interesting. It’s been a while since a stranger asked me to play _curandera_.” She flashed a ghastly grin, and Barty shuddered as he mentally translated the words and noticed the (for the magical world) double entendre. He really didn’t want to think about precisely what she meant by that.

She rose from the throne, then, and stepped towards him. She was even taller than Bellatrix, he noticed, and she may have had a bit more of a square jaw and less of those prominent Black Family cheekbones, but the crazed look in her eye was, if anything, even scarier: it was more controlled. She looked him in the eye, and he felt the familiar tingle of Legilimency. Deciding some discretion was necessary, he shut her out of his mind and hoped she wouldn’t take offence.

“Hmm, not bad,” she said, “especially for one so young.” She walked around him, disturbingly close, but the harsh gazes of the guards warned him to stay still. Of course, La Pantera could probably kill him faster than he could get a spell off, anyway, if her reputation was true. “I heard a lot about your Voldemort the last time he got really big. He was making good progress, and then…defeated by an infant. Tsk tsk. How embarrassing.”

Was she _trying_ to egg Barty on into lashing out? Well, it wasn’t going to work. He was a damn good actor. If Hogwarts had allowed stage plays, his life might have been very different. He kept his cool for now, but the Dark Lord _would_ be hearing about this later.

“And how does your ‘Master’ intend to pay for this job, should I deign to take it?” she asked.

“I have access to several thousand European galleons. More if we can shake down some other Death Eaters.”

La Pantera mentally made the conversion to doubloons. Changing currencies in the magical world was even more complicated than in the muggle one, but it happened that it was about three doubloons to the galleon at the moment. “It’s a start,” she said. “We’ll be discussing full terms later. For now, if Voldemort will come here and submit to scanning, and explain his…methods, then I will see what I can do for him, for a sum of…fifteen galleons.”

Barty fought to keep his expression neutral. Fifteen galleons was a steep price for a mere consultation, but then, La Pantera could charge him anything she wanted, and he would have to pay it. “Then we have a deal, High Priestess,” he said. Then, he (slowly) reached into his robes and withdrew his money pouch, counted out fifteen galleons, and handed them over.

“A pleasure doing business with you, Mr. Crouch,” La Pantera said, still with a tone of condescension. “Bring your ‘Master’ here when he is…available.”

“I can call him now if you like, High Priestess.”

“Good. It’ll save time. But not here—on the top step, if you don’t want to be mincemeat.”

Yes, this woman was every bit as dangerous as the Dark Lord. Barty half-turned and looked for a sign from the guards as to whether turning his back would offend. He saw no protest, but he thought better of it and stayed half-turned, keeping one eye on the witch as he walked back out of the palace and onto the top step of the pyramid. He pulled back his left sleeve and touched his wand to his Dark Mark.

“Hmm. Branded with a Protean Charm,” La Pantera recognised the magic at once. “Classy. I should try that sometime.”

There was a loud gong and a flash that surrounded the pyramid, and suddenly, they heard a flurry of cursing from below. Amycus and Alecto were lying on the ground at the foot of the staircase, rubbing their heads, their Apparition having bounced off the wards. A small, tinny voice would be the Dark Lord shouting at them for their incompetence. Barty turned to his host and saw La Pantera grinning like a cat. That had obviously been planned.

Amycus and Alecto climbed the pyramid, Alecto carrying their Master in her arms.

“Bow,” Barty hissed. The other two Death Eaters managed an awkward bow.

“So you’re— _ouch_!” Amycus started and then abruptly cut off when Barty stamped on his foot. Merlin, were these two lumps the best they had to work with?

However, he couldn’t stop the Dark Lord himself from speaking first when he came face to face with La Pantera, as he seemed to think he was entitled to do. Barty didn’t disagree with that, but it wouldn’t help the powerful witch’s attitude. “Lady Pantera,” Voldemort said, “it is a pleasure to meet you. Your power and ruthlessness are legendary.”

La Pantera looked down at the homunculus like the ugly, mutilated baby he looked like. “Lord Voldemort. Such unusual circumstances for us to meet, aren’t they? I understand that you are in need of some…assistance.” Her lips twisted into another wicked grin, clearly taking pleasure in having such a feared wizard at her mercy. Yes, far too much of Bellatrix for Barty’s liking.

But La Pantera did a job well when she was paid appropriately. She was a stickler for quality. She drew a wicked obsidian knife from a sheath on her belt that appeared to have a handle made from the knuckle-bone of a dragon, and she began _casting_ diagnostic spells with it. The Death Eaters were surprised, but did their best to hide it. A while later, after running a number of magical scans that even Voldemort didn’t recognise, she began to question him about how he’d got into that state.

“A magical protection of _love_ —” Voldemort spat the word. “—when I killed the boy’s mother. It causes any offensive magic I cast on him to reflect back upon me.” Barty’s eyes widened. The Dark Lord had never told him or the others _this_ part of the story.

La Pantera, however, _laughed_. “A protection of _love_?” she said. _“El amor?_ Huitzilopochtli, how did you let yourself get manoeuvred into _that_ old trap? What do they teach you people in England?”

That was too much for Amycus Carrow. He stormed up to La Pantera, yelling, “Hey, don’t talk to the Dark Lord like—ARGH!” _THUD!_

The black knife appeared in La Pantera’s hand faster than he could blink, and he was hurled across the room and into the wall before it vanished again. “Call off your attack dog if you want him in one piece, Voldemort,” she said.

“Do not interfere, any of you,” Voldemort ordered. “Some degree of…leeway is warranted here. It was a foolish oversight on my part, I admit. A secondary goal would be to nullify that protection.”

“Noted. _El amor_ , hah!” she repeated. “So your own Killing Curse bounced back at you and killed you, then?”

“It was…rather more dramatic than that. I believe _that_ was a feedback effect in my wand.”

“Ah, so blown to bits, then?” La Pantera was certainly gifted enough in magic to figure out that riddle. “So how did you survive?”

“Naturally, I had taken precautions: I made horcruxes.”

La Pantera narrowed her eyes at him: “Horcruxes? Plural? How many?”

“Five.”

“ _Cinco?! Cinco horrocruxes? Estas loco_?” She went off on a rant that Barty quickly realised was laced with both Spanish and Aztec swear words, then cast several more diagnostic charms that Voldemort only vaguely understood as having to do with the soul. “You’re lucky you’re still sane, Voldemort,” she told him. “ _One_ horcrux is sufficient if it’s adequately protected. Maybe two if you’re especially paranoid. What ever possessed you to make five of them?”

“Surely you know,” Voldemort sneered, which have been a lot more impressive if he weighed more than eight pounds, six ounces. “Seven is the most magically powerful number.”

“Ugh. Europeans—white wizards thinking you have the best numerology in the world. You seem to have forgotten that the most magical number is eight in Asia and four in the Americas, and _none_ of those makes cutting your soul into that many bits a good idea.”

“I did not come here to be lectured like an errant student, Lady Pantera,” Voldemort snapped. “I came here to seek your help returning to power. My horcruxes are my own business.”

“Fine. It’s your funeral as long as I get paid. Let’s take a look at this homunculus, then.”

Thence followed an explanation of how they had made the homunculus body, a tale that La Pantera actually was impressed with. “Snake venom,” she said. “I wouldn’t have thought of that. It looks like you _do_ have a few good tricks, then.”

“I am not paying you for commentary,” Voldemort said.

“Apparently not. _Magos_ ,” she muttered under her breath. “They talk so grand, and then they’re so impatient. Well,” she spoke up again, “you’ve certainly complicated things with all of your changes to the rituals. I’ll have to design a new ritual to make all the parts mesh together correctly.”

Barty’s eyebrows shot up under his hair. He knew this witch was skilled and powerful, but she was talking about inventing rituals like arithmancers talked about designing ordinary spells. He may have doubted when people said she could go toe to toe with the Dark Lord in his prime, but now, he wasn’t so sure.

“You can do it, then?” Voldemort said.

“Do I look like a novice acolyte? Of course I can do it! I’ll need a couple of weeks, though, and a commission. I’ll order my servants to arrange accommodations for you elsewhere in the complex. At a fair nightly rate, of course. You may go.”

It wasn’t phrased as an order, by the guards made clear it was. They led them out of the pyramid and to a smaller outbuilding in its shadow. Once there, Barty summoned Winky and, giving her a good hard nudge with his toe out of frustration, ordered her to get them settled in.

“A most disagreeable woman,” Voldemort mused in front of the fireplace. “But if she can make good on her word, then our search has paid off. Soon, we will have our revenge.”


	81. Justice

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: It is the mark of a modest Harry Potter to accept his friendly circle ready-made from JK Rowling.

The Ugandan National Quidditch Team was powering through the group stage of the Quidditch World Cup and was virtually assured a place in the tournament stage when it began next month in Britain. Back at home, however, Uganda—or at least magical Uganda—was not doing well. The nation was at war. The urban south was under siege by the dark forces of Kinani Ngeze in Rwanda, and much of the more sparsely populated north was already _de facto_ under the control of his guerrilla allies in Zaire to the West.

The nation was very much living in fear. The Quidditch team had very nearly been called home. In addition to the fall of the north, the sudden and complete overthrow of the Burundian Ministry, still unexplained, had sent shockwaves throughout East Africa. Many feared that Ngeze would repeat the feat there in Uganda. It didn’t seem like it would be that hard. Indeed, many believed it was only a matter of time and were making preparations for the event.

In a repurposed farm-house in the southeast corner of the country, two of the most powerful wizards in the world and the other planners of the war were studying a map of the movements of the enemy forces. One of them, a very old wizard with a long, silver beard and, unusually for him, subdued silver robes, pointed to the edge of the occupied territory and said, “The obvious thing to do is to send a company to take back the wizarding quarter of Soroti.”

The other leader of the ICW forces was a younger and more exotic-looking wizard, with light brown skin, steel-grey hair, and amber eyes—and he did not look pleased with this idea. “No, no, no, Dumbledore,” he said. “The guerrillas are bogged down trying to hold the territory the already have. The thing to do is use our mobility, send a force _around_ the enemy lines, and come at Lira from the east _here_.”

Albus Dumbledore frowned at this idea. “What about Soroti, Grayson?”

“Soroti is of minimal strategic value,” Edward Grayson replied. “In terms of wizards, it’s almost all residential.”

“We cannot just abandon them.”

“We won’t _be_ abandoning them if we force the guerrillas to recall their troops deeper into their territory.”

“But—”

“Dumbledore, you said you wanted my help in this operation,” he snapped. “My help _leading_. After all, you have more problems at home than I have.”

“I did,” Dumbledore said stiffly. “However, upon seeing the situation on the ground, I felt it would be prudent to be able to collaborate in this effort.”

“If you don’t trust my judgement, just say it,” Grayson said.

Dumbledore frowned harder and took a deep breath. “I don’t think it’s a secret that I have been sceptical of you stratagems.”

Grayson just shook his head: “This isn’t like either of the wars you fought. In your British Civil War, you were fighting terrorists. You never lost control of any _territory_. In Grindelwald’s War, you were on a _front_ , fighting with the muggle armies, but here, we’re nowhere near them. I saw the Pacific Theatre from Australia, and it’s the same here. By muggle standards, our people live in small enclaves scattered across the country. This is island hopping. You don’t sweep across the entire ocean; you take strategically important islands to use as bases for launching new attacks.”

Dumbledore thought about this, recalling what he knew of the Pacific Theatre. He did remember the island hopping strategy, but he had truthfully not considered applying it here. On closer inspection, though, he could see the merit in it. “Very well, Grayson,” he said. “We will make the assault on Lira.”

“Excellent. Let’s get to work.”

* * *

Exams were over at Hogwarts, but people had not relaxed the same as they usually did. There was excitement in the air as people prepared for the duelling tournament that the late Professor Williamson had planned for the Duelling Club. Now overseen by Professor Flitwick, it promised to be quite a show. Membership in the club was not required to participate, so nearly half the school was involved.

The rules were simple. The first-years would go first. Like most tournaments, it would be a single elimination contest with an extra match to decide third place, but in addition to a ribbon and a certificate, the top three duellists in each year would also qualify for the first round for the next year up. The first- and second-years, whose duels were likely to be the quickest, would go together on Sunday, the day after the Hogsmeade visit, with the tournament for the next year held each day until the last day of term.

On Sunday afternoon, the house tables were removed after lunch and replaced by viewing stands with the coordinated efforts of the teachers and a large number of house elves. Harry and Hermione watched the firsties as they got ready. They were surprisingly cordial with one another about it. Annabel Entwhistle and Nathan Boot were still giving out tips on wandless magic. A few of the older students listened in, but the first-years were least entrenched in the wand-based paradigm, so it came most naturally to them. Several of them had succeed in casting wandless _Lumos_ Charms or Hover Charms, but Harry and Hermione suspected that Annabel and Nathan were the only two who had a chance of using it in the tournament. Many of the younger students also flocked to Harry and Hermione with questions, which they answered as best they could.

The tournament began, the contestants selected by random draw. A pair of first-years duelling was actually pretty cute. Many of them couldn’t cast the Disarming Charm yet, so they would hit their opponents with minor jinxes like Leg-Locker or the Curse of the Bogies until their opponent dropped their wand, and then they would just run up and grab it. Some of the cleverer ones would use a Full-Body Bind on their opponent and a Levitation Charm to call their wand to them if not an actual _Expelliarmus_. It looked more like little kids playing a game than the serious business the older students made of it.

Sure enough, Nathan and Annabel did very well in the tournament, supplementing their wanded spells with the occasional wandless one. The wandless ones weren’t very strong; it was more the advantage it gave to the speed of their casting that helped them.

In one especially entertaining duel, Annabel was disarmed by Billy Carmichael of Ravenclaw and repeated the feat that she had only heard tell of Harry having done last year against Theodore Nott. She threw out her hand and screamed, _“EXPELLIARMUS!”_ The spell connected, and Billy’s wand flew across the platform, landing at the edge of the duelling wards. Both children stared at each other for a moment, both disarmed, and then Billy ran for his wand. But Annabel didn’t. Nor did she try another wandless spell. As a muggle-born, she thought like a muggle and charged him.

Billy shouted in surprise. Many in the Great Hall gasped, but then, a louder shout could be heard over the noise: “NO CONTACT RULE, SIS!” her brother, Kevin, warned her.

Annabel skidded to a halt just before she would have tackled Billy to the ground. Instead, she threw both of her hands forward and cast two Stinging Jinxes at him from point blank range. Then, she did it again and again. With seconds, Billy was too busy trying to protect his body to pick up his wand again, and he yelled, “Ah! Ah! Okay, I yield!”

Annabel was very pleased by that win, but unfortunately, she was defeated in the third-place round by a quiet Ravenclaw named Logan Hilliard and didn’t get to go on. Nathan Boot made it to second place, where he was defeated in the finals by a surprisingly fast and flashy Astoria Greengrass. Harry made a mental note to keep a closer eye on the Slytherin girl.

There was a short break before the second-years started their tournament. Harry and Hermione were interested to see how several of their friends would do in this one, too. Ginny Weasley, they were sure, would be excellent. Her hexing skills, honed by years of living with six older brothers, were legendary, and sure enough, she powered through every opponent who was thrown at her. They were more surprised to see Colin Creevey doing quite well. He wasn’t outstanding, but he fought hard and better than most. He had recovered well from his werewolf bite, and, although there were some murmurs about him competing, he did well, although he did have one opponent forfeit because he refused to duel a werewolf.

Another surprise was Luna Lovegood. She was well-known for being creative and unpredictable in the Club, but no one had thought that would translate to a material advantage in a tournament. However, she threw her opponents for a loop enough that she made it to the final. It probably didn’t hurt that she shouted a goblin battle cry at the start of each duel. Harry and Hermione were impressed, although they felt a little guilty when they saw that. Their gobbledegook studies with Luna had lapsed a bit with all the other excitement this year. The older students just thought it was funny; it was still incongruous to see someone as cute as Luna yelling like an angry goblin, but it did intimidate her year-mates.

Unfortunately for Luna, Ginny also made the final. Ginny was Luna’s closest friend and knew most of her tricks. It was a harder fight than with most of her opponents, but Ginny still won out. Harry thought both of them would make good allies, and he hoped people would make fun of Luna less when they saw she could defend herself. Colin placed fifth in second year, and while all three of the first year entrants fought valiantly, they gave only average performances.

* * *

On Monday, it was time for the third-years to duel, and everyone was much more excited about today’s tournament. Many were hoping for a rematch between Harry and Nott. Others wanted to see Harry duel Hermione, and the rest just wanted to see what kinds of wandless magic they would come up with.

“You may be disappointed,” Hermione told Ron and Neville when they brought it up. “It’s a lot harder to cast the third year spells wandlessly. We never did get a lot of them to the point where we can cast them as well as we do wanded.”

“Yeah,” Harry agreed. “A wand helps the magic flow better, so it becomes more and more important for more powerful spells. Wandless may not even be worth the trouble by the time we get to O.W.L.-level.”

“Oh,” Ron said, disappointed. “Well…just kick Malfoy’s arse out there, will ya?”

“With pleasure,” Harry said, just hoping he could live up to it.

The first round was easy for both Harry and Hermione. Harry made short work of Lavender Brown of Gryffindor, and Hermione quickly bested Wayne Hopkins of Hufflepuff. Neville and Ron also made it through the first round with relative ease.

Ron probably would have made it to the quarter-finals, but he fought a very close duel with Padma Patil in the second round, which he eventually lost. Seamus Finnigan and Justin Finch-Fletchely were _both_ eliminated when they duelled each other and blasted each other with fire that got out of control and nearly burned the platform down. Also, in second round, Luna was eliminated by Blaise Zabini, and Harry found himself facing Ginny. He was pleased to see that Ginny kept her wits about her and no longer seemed painfully shy around him. She even brought her full strength to bear on him with little prompting. However, she still wasn’t on his level, and he took her down before long.

In the quarter-finals, Padma lost out to Daphne Greengrass after another difficult duel, and Neville had the bad luck to draw Draco Malfoy. Neville had become a pretty good duellist, but he was no match for the Malfoy scion, who could still intimidate him for good measure. Hermione took down Anthony Goldstein in that round, and, sure enough, Harry found himself facing Theodore Nott.

“Ready for a rematch, Nott?” Harry said.

“Bring it on, Potter!”

Nott was sure he would have won the honour duel last year had he known about Potter’s wandless magic. Potter had merely caught him by surprise. But what he didn’t realise and hadn’t fully understood from watching those two mudblood firsties was that, now that he could use it openly, Potter could start flinging wandless jinxes fast and furious from the start, and it dramatically increased his casting speed. Nott found himself on the defensive right away.

“Dammit— _Contego—_ Potter— _Furnunculus—_ how’re you— _Contego_ —this good?” he demanded.

“Cause I started early and had a good teacher,” Harry said whilst still casting a constant stream of jinxes with his free hand. He and Hermione had always found that wandless and wordless magic went well together, especially for lower-level spells. “You might’ve heard of him,” he taunted. “Remus Lupin— _Brachium Plumbum_!”

Nott’s split-second distraction at his words was all Harry needed. His hex connected, and Nott’s arms dropped to his sides like lead, unable to raise his wand. A quick _Expelliarmus_ , and it was over.

“Excellent! Excellent charms work, Mr. Potter,” Professor Flitwick squeaked. “Now, we are ready for the semi-finals. The first match will be…” He drew the names. “Draco Malfoy and Daphne Greengrass.”

That meant Harry and Hermione would be facing each other in their match. Malfoy and Daphne faced off in a very technically competent duel, if a straightforward one. They more or less used all standard forms, and Malfoy had the clear advantage. Before long, he disarmed Daphne, and she graciously yielded.

Then, it was time for Harry’s and Hermione’s match. They could see Fred and George Weasley and some of the older students around the Hall whispering to each other, no doubt taking last-minute bets on the outcome. As soon as Flitwick called start, it was clear that if Malfoy’s and Daphne’s duel had been standard, this one was anything but. Harry and Hermione were dodging and weaving all over the platform, shooting spells with their wands and their left hands at breakneck speed. Hermione was faster than before; her reflexes had improved some since she completed her animagus training, although they still weren’t at the level of Harry’s feline ones. The audience cheered as they went at it, even if they couldn’t tell what was going on.

Harry and Hermione were each lifted by their ankle once, but they quickly freed themselves. They were also tripped up, partially petrified, and had various amusing cosmetic alternations made on them like antlers or tails. Hermione pulled off a tricky spell that cast a deep shadow over the duelling platform. It would only last a few seconds, unlike other methods like Instant Darkness Powder, and it didn’t cause total darkness, but she hoped she could flank Harry’s position that way.

Harry, however, thought it was safe enough—no one would notice at that distance—to transform his eyes to cat’s eyes. His pupils turned vertical, and he could see his sister clearly. Throwing another volley of spells put her on the defensive. On a whim, he concentrated and, to his delight, felt something else change. The shadow dispersed, and, in what he would insist to others afterwards had been due to a stray jinx, bared a fine set of fangs in addition to his cat’s eyes.

“How fast can you run, sister?” he hissed.

Distraction really was an excellent duelling strategy. No competent duellist would allow themselves to be distracted for long, but it only took a split second, and something sufficiently odd and off-the-wall could trip up almost anyone. For Hermione, that something was a fleeting memory of the last episode of _Doctor Who_ , and it gave Harry just enough time to disarm her and bind her with his next few spells.

“Harry Potter wins by incapacitation,” Professor Flitwick announced.

As Harry helped Hermione up, he whispered to her, “Finally. I’ve been trying to do that trick for four and a half years.”

Hermione sighed: “Harry, you are incorrigible.”

“The contest for third place will be between Hermione Granger and Daphne Greengrass,” Flitwick announced. After a couple minutes’ rest, the two of them took their places again.

“I take it you got your training from the same person as your sister, Miss Greengrass?” Hermione asked.

“Naturally,” Daphne replied. “And you, Miss Granger? Lupin?”

“Yes. He’s very good. Professor Dumbledore offered to make him the Defence Professor, but he turned it down.”

Daphne’s eyebrows rose. “A werewolf _teaching_?” she said. “That’s rich. That law of yours is one thing, but who would ever go for that?”

“Why not? It shouldn’t be any worse than having one as a student. Better, even.”

Daphne thought about that. There _were_ technically four werewolves in the school right now, and they weren’t causing any trouble. And an adult would be more responsible if they were trustworthy. But still, a _werewolf?_ She pushed the thought aside. “Alright, enough talk. Let’s duel,” she said.

The duel between Hermione and Daphne went similarly to the one between Harry and Nott. Daphne was technically skilled, strong, and precise, while Hermione moved fast and cast fast, putting Daphne on the defensive. It was a hard-fought duel, but eventually, Hermione won, earning her a place in the fourth-years’ tournament tomorrow.

Finally, it came time for Harry’s and Malfoy’s duel. There was as much excitement for this duel as for any of the others so far. Malfoy preferred to let others do his dirty work, but everyone knew he was good. He had the highest grades in Slytherin by a significant margin and almost always won his practice duels in the Duelling Club, although he never challenged Harry or Hermione. When he faced one of _them_ , he didn’t want it to be in a practice duel. He wanted it to be the real deal—not to mention he was leery of the fact that he could lose, considering what Potter did to Nott last year. He was less worried about that now that he was in second place and guaranteed a place in the fourth-year tournament. That would at least confirm his duelling credentials.

“So you got your training from a werewolf, Potter?” Malfoy taunted as they got ready. “And here I thought you couldn’t sink any lower. Of course, what can you expect from a boy who _chooses_ to live with muggles?”

“Leave my family out of this, Malfoy,” Harry snarled. “And I’ll have you know Mr. Lupin is an excellent teacher.”

“I’m surprised he taught you more than biting, scratching, and attracting fleas,” the Slytherin shot back. “That won’t do you any good here, Scarhead. No contact rule.”

“I don’t need to touch you, Sparrow, and I don’t want to,” Harry said, remembering the nickname he’d given Malfoy in second year. “I’ll let you handle that part.”

Malfoy’s face reddened with anger as much of the audience giggled, although the teachers frowned disapprovingly, but before they could respond, Malfoy snapped, “Oh, _that_ _’s_ it, werewolf-lover! You’re going down!”

“Ahem,” Flitwick interrupted sternly, and they stopped to look at him. “Duel on three, you two. One…two…three!”

There was a flurry of spells as the two had at each other. Malfoy may have known the proper forms, but he played this one more aggressively. He had been watching and learning from Harry’s duelling style and was now surprisingly good at dodging. Of course, the Quidditch skills probably helped, too. Harry also found himself dodging some nasty hexes that were really borderline as to whether they should be allowed. There were a couple of times when Malfoy’s disarming charms connected, and once he actually did lose his wand from his wrist strap, but he pulled it back with a quick wandless Levitation Charm. He almost lost in the seconds that lost him. It would have been a lot easier if he could manage a Summoning Charm. He’d have to work on that for next year. He managed to hit Malfoy with a Disarming Charm, too, but the Slytherin was also wearing a duelling holster, too, and didn’t lose his wand.

After a while, Harry was getting worried about whether he could actually win this one. Malfoy was holding his own, and Harry’s usual distraction tactics weren’t working. (To be fair, Malfoy’s distractions weren’t working on Harry, either.) Then, Harry got an idea. A more _active_ distraction would be more useful. He would beat Malfoy at his own game.

Harry gave a large flourish of his wand and cast “ _Serpensortia_!” A large, black adder burst from his wand and slithered towards Malfoy.

“ _Vipera Evanesca_!” Malfoy said.

To most competent wizards, a conjured snake was no great challenge, since it could be vanished with a simple charm. Unfortunately for Malfoy, Harry was a Parselmouth.

 _“To the right!”_ Harry hissed to the snake.

The snake dodged Malfoy’s spell.

Most of the audience gasped, and Malfoy’s eyes widened, and he began to look very worried.

“ _Expelliarmus! To the left_!” Harry cast and hissed as Malfoy tried again. The conjured snake had no real brains of its own—not enough to dodge spells—but it could follow instructions. Now with two opponents who couldn’t be dismissed easily, Malfoy was distracted enough for Harry to make his move.

“ _To the right_!” he hissed again while at the same time flicking his wand and thinking _Levicorpus!_ Malfoy was hoisted into the air by his ankle. Then, before he could aim his wand again, Harry threw out the strongest _Expelliarmus_ he could, two-handed, and Malfoy’s wand was ripped off his wrist strap. Harry caught it in midair with a wandless charm and pulled it to him. “ _Sai-achass haashee_!” he hissed as an afterthought. The snake stopped just as it was about to bite Malfoy on the nose. “ _Vipera Evanesca_.”

“Do you yield, Malfoy?” he demanded.

“Argh! Yes, I yield, Potter. Now cancel this spell.”

Harry cocked an eyebrow at him. Malfoy had just enough time to register a look of horror at what he’d just said before Harry snapped his fingers, causing him to drop to the floor in a heap. This was embarrassing, Malfoy thought. A Slytherin beat by a Gryffindor _with a snake_.

“Erm…yes,” Flitwick said as he took down the duelling wards. “Harry Potter is the winner of the third year duelling tournament.”

“Good match, Malfoy,” Harry said as the blond boy brushed himself off. He offered him his wand back, and Malfoy snatched it from his hand as quick as he could. Harry also offered his hand to shake, but Malfoy didn’t take it.

“Just you wait Potter,” he said. “We’re both going on to the next round. There’s still a chance for a rematch.”

But there was no rematch between the two of them. The next day, Malfoy performed well with the fourth-years, but he was knocked out in the quarter-finals—a respectable showing that wouldn’t leave his father _too_ cross over getting beat by Potter. Harry and Hermione placed third and fourth, respectively after another duel between the two of them, leaving only Harry to go on to the fifth-year tournament. That was a truly impressive feat, but with the fifth-years, he had the bad luck to draw Cedric Diggory in the first round, and he went down in seconds. Cedric went on to become the only other student in the school to make it into the round two years above him, placing first among the fifth-years, third among the sixth-years, and a respectable showing among the seventh-years.

The all-school winner of the Tournament, to almost everyone’s surprise, especially his siblings, was Percy Weasley. Yes, it was true that he was Head Boy, had received twelve Outstanding O.W.L.s, and was likely to receive ten Outstanding N.E.W.T.s, but even with all that, no one had ever pegged him for a stellar duellist. Hermione took this as further evidence of the value of good grades, and Fred and George decided it would be a good idea not to prank Percy for a while.

* * *

True to her word, La Pantera devised a completely new ritual to restore Lord Voldemort to his full power in just two weeks, and at that time, she called him and the Death Eaters up to the pyramid to lay it out for them.

“You have a modified homunculus body at the moment,” she told Voldemort. “It’s basically human—made from human parts—but it’s stunted and fragile because it was unnaturally grown. It doesn’t have enough life force to actually stay alive on its own, and it’s not _yours_ in any sense. Even with your modifications, it might as well be an off-the-shelf model. Worse yet, the magic is infused from external sources like your magical snake venom. It doesn’t actually produce magic of its own.”

“I know all this, Lady Pantera,” Voldemort said coolly.

“Good. Now, what you want is to turn your incomplete human body into a complete one that fixes all of those problems _and_ gets rid of that protection of love that makes your archenemy, Potter, so resistant to you. To do that, we’ll use a ritual built off of a scaled-up version of the homunculus creation process.”

“Scaled up how?”

“Scaled up as in I’ll need a whole unicorn to make the base—rendered down. And this is critical: you must capture it alive and intact. You cannot spill a drop of its blood before it goes into the potion. The sacrificial ritual can negate the curse effects of its blood, but only if it is thrown in the cauldron and dissolved bloodlessly. The unicorn will supply the necessary life force. The other ingredients will be mostly the same, but I’ll need a _lot_ of snake venom.”

“That can be arranged,” Voldemort replied.

“The ritual itself will involve sacrificing three significant items to build your new body. First, the bones of your father—if you know where they are?”

“My father was a muggle,” he protested.

“Doesn’t matter. The magic comes from the third item. The bones are for the family connection to make it your own body. I can use another male ancestor, but your father would be the most powerful. Hell, I could use a female ancestor if you don’t mind coming back as a woman.” Amycus and Alecto had to fight to suppress sniggers at that point.

Voldemort glared at his followers and said, “Very well. My ‘father’ is buried in his family graveyard in England.”

She nodded. “Second: the flesh of a servant, willingly given,” La Pantera continued. “That sacrifice will be used to build your new body out of human flesh. I _assume_ your followers would be devoted enough to part with a hand or a foot?”

“I would pay it gladly!” Barty jumped in.

“Thank you, Barty,” Voldemort told him. “I think that will not be a problem.”

“Third: the blood of an enemy, forcibly taken. It is this blood that will be your new source of living magic. Now, for a mere resurrection, any magical enemy of yours will do, but to meet your other requirement of dispelling the protection of love, the solution is now simple: you must take the blood of Potter himself. Elegant, is it not?”

“Of course. And you are certain this will work?”

“Do _you_ allow people to question your competence like that?” she demanded. “I’m more certain than I am about those five horcruxes of yours.”

“Very well. However, Potter is protected by Dumbledore at all times. No one knows where he lives in the muggle world, and he is untouchable inside Hogwarts. His visits to magical homes and districts are always unannounced, except for Wizengamot meetings, at which he is, again, guarded.

“There _are_ still visits to Hogsmeade, my Lord,” Barty suggested. “And the Quidditch World Cup this summer. We know that Potter is a Quidditch fan.”

“Yes, both possibilities,” Voldemort said. “Not certainties, however. Security at the World Cup will be tight, and there may be unforeseen protections on Hogsmeade. In any case, there will be no visits there until autumn…” He considered for a minute, then made his decision: “We will return to England; interrogate a few Ministry personnel in secret to learn of the security at the World Cup and any other important information. We will also further investigate Potter’s movements to search for an opportunity to get the boy alone.”

“Hold on, Voldemort,” La Pantera interrupted. “You’re going to need _me_ to perform this ritual, and this is starting to sound less and less like a quick, in-and-out job.”

Voldemort glared up at her.

La Pantera glared back down at him.

There was a tense silence in which even Amycus was bright enough not to speak.

Finally, Voldemort said in a smooth, cordial voice, “Lady Pantera, might you be interested in a long-term partnership?”

She raised one formidable eyebrow: “A long-term partnership?”

“Yes, your assistance in England until we are able to acquire the boy and complete the ritual.”

La Pantera kept glaring: “You’re serious?”

“I do _not_ jest.”

“Hmm…interesting,” she said. “If I were to agree to this, I would need more gold. A _lot_ more gold.”

Voldemort took it in stride: “Lucius Malfoy has been sitting idly on his fortune for far too long. Young Barty will approach him and bring him into our circle. I am sure he will be cooperative.” Both he and La Pantera turned to look at Barty.

The young Death Eater nodded: “Working my way to him using Polyjuice sounds promising. I will start brewing right away, my Lord.”

“Fine,” La Pantera agreed, “but I will _also_ need a steady supply of exotic creatures, both magical and mundane, for my sacrificial rites.”

“I am sure that Lucius has the connections for that as well. Albino peacocks can’t be easy to find, after all.”

“Accommodations?”

“My father’s mansion stands empty, but fully furnished. It will not take long to bring it to a high standard of living.”

La Pantera considered the possibility. Her acolytes were well-organised and well-disciplined. They could easily keep things running here for a while. She would probably be better off going to Britain alone. It would be better if only she were involved, not her organisation, in terms of international reactions, and she could easily handle the three Death Eaters, though she would want to be wary around a restored Voldemort.

“I’ll expect the full cooperation of your servants,” she continued.

“You will have it.”

“And an agreement of mutual assistance should you succeed in conquering magical Britain.”

That was unexpected. An actual alliance between dark-ruled nations was rare. But Voldemort noted that La Pantera didn’t actually control a country, and her efforts to do so were not particularly aggressive. She probably wouldn’t need as much assistance as he would if he wanted to expand into Europe.

“Agreed,” he hissed.

“Alright, Voldemort,” she said imperiously. “You’ve got a deal.” She shook his tiny, skeletal hand.

* * *

“So _this_ was what you were driving at?” Daphne Greengrass asked.

The Greengrass family was meeting with Sirius and Harry’s family the night before the June Wizengamot meeting. It was here that Sirius began putting Hermione’s plan for werewolves into motion, but the Greengrass Family were very surprised at his proposed move.

“Frankly, I don’t see why it should be such a shock, Miss Greengrass,” Hermione told the blond girl. “It seems like a perfectly reasonable way to help those children.”

“You don’t know if they’ll be able to go to school, though, Miss Granger,” Daphne guessed their purpose. “In fact, you don’t even know if they’ll let you make Wolfsbane Potion at all.”

Harry shook his head at her: “Miss Greengrass, in the muggle world, we learn that you never get very far if you refuse to back anything but a sure thing. And another thing we learn is that equal rights aren’t something you can put off forever. Even if this venture fails, someday another one will succeed, and at least then we can say we tried.”

“Really, Mr. Potter?” Astoria asked. “Do you really think they can? Things don’t change much in the wizarding world.”

Daphne shot her younger sister a glare for being a little bit too eager, but she said, “She _is_ right, Mr. Potter. The political alignments in the Wizengamot haven’t changed appreciably in three hundred years.”

“But we’ve only had Wolfsbane Potion for ten, and look how this bill is shaking things up.”

“True, but how will this ‘Foundation’ of yours help that? It wouldn’t affect any of the provisions.”

“No, but it would be a symbolic gesture—a proof that somebody is making a positive change for werewolves regardless of what the law says.”

Daphne just stared at him: “You’re a _strange_ wizard, Mr. Potter.”

The rest of the Greengrass Family didn’t have a much higher opinion of the idea, either.

“You’re not asking us to support this “Foundation,” are you?” Lord Greengrass said. “I can’t imagine your odds of success are very high.”

“No, we’re not,” Sirius assured him. “At least not until we have some proven results. We’re only asking you to oppose any amendments to increase the restrictions on Wolfsbane Potion. We need to keep the way open to make this move.”

“That’s not going to be a popular position, Lord Black. Not like it used to be. What benefit do we get out of it?”

“You’re in the imports business, aren’t you, Lord Greengrass? A lot of the ingredients for Wolfsbane are rare and imported. If we’re able to expand like we hope to in the out-years, that would be good business for you—maybe _exclusive_ business if we can come to an appropriate arrangement…”

“Hmm…that would be an interesting proposition,” Lord Greengrass mused.

* * *

It didn’t help that with Dumbledore bogged down in East Africa, the presiding official at this Wizengamot meeting was Minister Fudge, who allowed Dolores Umbridge to make a lengthy opening statement railing against werewolves, Sirius Black, and the supporters of his bill—as a “concerned citizen,” of course.

There were a number of bombshell moves in this meeting. There were, indeed, some new restrictions on Wolfsbane proposed as amendments to the two werewolf bills. Fortunately, though, they remained loose enough that Sirius estimated the cursed contract idea would still work. What was now mostly Fudge’s and Umbrige’s bill had been revised with more restrictions laid on work, residency, and movement of werewolves that would essentially cast them out of civilised society, while Sirius’s and Andi’s bill added more options for werewolves to go to designated safe areas during the full moon and stronger incentives to use them, plus a rider for better wards against transformed werewolves around critical infrastructure.

Once the bills were more or less hammered out, it looked like Fudge would win out, but then Sirius made his announcement.

“Lords and Ladies, honoured guests, fellow citizens,” he began, “all this time, we’ve been discussing how we must, literally or figuratively, confine werewolves in order to keep us safe from them. Even our proposals to be accommodating have, in large part, been put in fearful terms: if we make the werewolves desperate, they’ll be more likely to strike back at us. There’s been a little talk of real incentives, but I think it’s become clear from what little there has that this body is not interested in devoting the funding to pay for them. Well, my goddaughter recently told me that if you want something done right, you have to do it yourself. If you want to make life easier for victims of lycanthropy, then you have to do something that _actually_ makes life easier for victims of lycanthropy.

“Therefore, I am announcing the establishment of the Cor Humanum Foundation, which I am starting with an endowment of one hundred thousand galleons of my own fortune, and the mandate of which is to make Wolfsbane Potion more available financially and logistically to all werewolves in Britain.”

There were surprised gasps and outraged protests from the around the Wizengamot Hall. A donation of that size _anywhere_ was unheard of. But Sirius was, well, serious. And he had worked hard on that name and mission statement. After considering naming it after Remus (to his friend’s protest), Remus’s father, James and Lily, himself, Auror Williamson, or one of Greyback’s victims from the past year, none of which felt quite right, Remus suggested that the most deserving werewolf in Britain for such recognition was the anonymous author of _Hairy Snout, Human Heart_ , who was the first to strongly raise awareness of the plight of werewolves in the 1970s—at great risk to himself, given the war at the time. Hence, Cor Humanum.

Sirius anticipated the protests to his idea, so he continued: “Don’t think I’ve gone into this blind. The Cor Humanum Foundation has already applied for a permit to brew and distribute Wolfsbane in its facilities and published a job offer for a licensed Potions Master to make it. Our facilities will be manned by a fully-qualified security team. Furthermore, we will guard against wrongdoing with a novel method: a binding magical contract, signed by all takers, written to place easily identified marks on any werewolf who misuses the potion. By signing it, they are agree to abide by the law, and wrongdoers will be easily caught after misappropriating a single dose. We will have no repeats of Greyback’s Army at Cor Humanum.”

A murmur of surprise circled the Hall. The solution was so simple that many people wondered why they hadn’t thought of it. The idea alone might well save the Wolfsbane Potion in general.

“Once we begin brewing, it is our intention to provide Wolfsbane Potion to as many werewolves as we can who pass a background check…free of charge.” There were shocked exclamations at this. “Furthermore, we have already preemptively fast-tracked background checks and membership for Gabriel Truman, Ellen Towler, Cedric Diggory, Colin Creevey, and Demelza Robins for a minimum of one year past the end of their formal schooling. With sufficient funds, we expect to be able to extend that membership indefinitely.”

Gabriel and Ellen, who were in the special section of the audience again, both burst into tears. Since they had finished school, they were worried they might be on their own to get the potion, but now, a Lord of the Wizengamot was doing his utmost to keep them supplied for life. It was the greatest show of kindness they had received since they were attacked. The other three students also looked gobsmacked and incredibly relieved.

(Remus’s name was conspicuously absent from the list. To avoid any accusations of nepotism, Sirius would continue paying for his potion out of pocket rather than from the endowment.)

Sirius’s announcement truly didn’t have any direct effect on the bill. It was merely timed to create an air of goodwill and to show the people that there was another way. In this respect, it was successful, and it won a few converts, but sadly not enough. The last hope for a more tolerant bill was the much awaited statement from Amos Diggory. His behaviour _had_ changed in the past month. He had become more subdued and introspective—a great shift from his previous nature. No one was quite sure what he would say, and the entire Hall hung on his words.

“Lords and Ladies…” he began uncomfortably, “on the morning after my son was attacked, he told me in no uncertain terms that he did _not_ want me to change my opinion for his sake. He told me that I should either stand by my principles or make an honest reassessment…I listened to my son for what I am sorry to say was the first time in too long. I read all the latest research on both sides of the issue, and I have since taken to heart a number of things that most people claim to know, but few ever truly act upon. Lycanthropy is not contagious except during the full moon beyond a mild scarring should an untransformed werewolf be wild enough to attack with bites and scratches. Werewolves with steady jobs do not commit more crimes than ordinary wizards. The most common crime committed by werewolves is theft, not assault. Most werewolves are innocent victims who are doing their utmost to try to control their illness and not harm anyone.

“As Head of the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, I of course knew or had read of all of these things, and yet I still allowed my prejudice to blind me. As such, I would like to offer a personal apology to one person in this Chamber in particular…Demelza Robins.” There was a murmur of surprise as he didn’t name Cedric. Cedric, however, got a huge grin on his face and patted Demelza on the shoulder. “Miss Robins,” Amos continued, “I apologise for what might as well have been personal attacks against you. I apologise for trying to cut you off from an education. No good could come of that to anyone. And…in light of Lord Black’s new foundation…I will report to the Governors of Hogwarts that I now support the enrolment of werewolves on the condition that they take the Wolfsbane Potion under binding magical contract.”

There was another uproar at that. Demelza looked like she might faint. Harry, Hermione, and their entire family stared at Amos Diggory, wide-eyed, but the biggest jolt was still to come: “I have come to learn that werewolves are human beings who mostly trying to make the best of a difficult situation. It does no one any good to treat them like beasts. Therefore…I can no longer in good conscience support the Werewolf Protection Act that I introduced, which would do just that, and I must throw my support behind Lord Black’s Lycanthropy Regulation and Management Act.”

There was a lot of shouting and horrified looks from Fudge and Umbridge. Their bill was only staying afloat because Fudge himself was now signed on as a cosponsor, and for his bill to be defeated would lose him a lot of face. He tried to use Umbridge as an attack dog again, and she claimed that Amos was blinded by grief and family loyalty, and that his judgement could no longer be trusted, but even so, the tide had turned. Harry just hoped it would be enough.

Finally, after much more debate, Fudge called the vote. Thanks to the parliamentary manoeuvring, it was the one bill directly against the other, and it was so close that no one dared to admit the outcome for fear that they had miscounted. But the Minister couldn’t get away with misrepresenting the results. “By a vote of thirty to twenty-seven…” he said shakily, “the Lycanthropy Regulation and Management Act…is passed.”

“YES!” Harry jumped up, shouting, unable to help himself. He hugged Hermione, then Sirius, Andi, and, finally, he ran over and hugged Remus. Beside him, Demelza jumped up and hugged Harry, thanking him for all he’d done.

Many of their opponents shouted loudly in protest. Umbridge could easily be heard screaming, “NO! NO!” over the din, and the entire Malfoy Family looked mutinous, but there was nothing they could do. They had lost this round. It was a razor-thin margin, but if Sirius succeeded in effecting a positive change for werewolves, the public opinion would probably swing more in their direction over the coming months.

 _One more for the light side_ , Harry thought.

* * *

“Mum, Dad, I think it might be better to talk to Neville alone, at least to start with,” Harry said.

“Alright, Harry, if you say so,” Dan told his son.

After the meeting, despite the celebration, there was one more, less joyous task to do. In a private room at the Leaky Cauldron, Harry and Hermione called Neville Longbottom in for a private talk. Mr. Barnett had certified Neville as a competent Occlumens, and it was time to tell him their secrets.

“Are your secrets really that bad, Harry?” he asked.

“I’m afraid so, Neville,” Harry replied. “You know about what happened in first year, and you saw what happened last year. Voldemort is still out there somewhere.”

Neville shuddered at the name, but he stood his ground. “You know something about it, then?” he asked.

“Yeah. You see, back in early 1980, a prophecy was made. It was Professor Trelawney who made it, but Professor Dumbledore says it was a real prophecy. There’s two parts to it. The first part Voldemort knows about, but the second part he doesn’t. We want to tell you the whole thing.”

Neville thought about it for a few moments before he said, “Okay.”

“Okay. The first part goes, _The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches_ _…born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies_ …”

Neville shivered more violently, but he again stood his ground. Hermione walked up beside him and started rubbing his upper back with one hand. Neville barely noticed. He knew enough about the war, and he quickly did the maths. “Harry…” he said, “that could apply to either of us.”

“I know. That’s why we wanted to tell you. But there’s still the second part: _and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not... and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives... the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies_.”

Neville’s eyes grew to saucer-sized as he stared at his friend. “But that means…you have to kill him, Harry? In the end, I mean?”

“That’s certainly what it sounds like. The mark is my scar—and probably my Parseltongue ability, too. And…well, either must die by the hand of the other. But the thing is, Neville…prophecies always have loopholes. They don’t always follow the most obvious interpretation. I mean, just look at Macbeth.”

Neville nodded uneasily. The tale of Macbeth and his disastrous run-ins with prophecies was moderately well-known in the wizarding world, as told from the witches’ side.

“You see, I thought about the prophecy for a while, and I realised something…If something were to happen to me—or for that matter, even if it _doesn_ _’t_ —there’s still a chance that Voldemort could mark _you_ and make _you_ the child of the prophecy.”

Neville stood still for some time processing this. He didn’t speak. After a while, Hermione got worried and said, “Neville, are you gonna be okay?” She drew him closer and wrapped her arm around his shoulder.

“I…I don’t know…” he responded. “Is—is that why you’ve been asking me to train with you?”

“No,” Harry insisted. “We didn’t know the prophecy until last fall. That was just because you’re our friend, and we saw how much it helped your confidence and spellcasting. Erm…helping you get your own wand was partly about the prophecy, though.”

“Oh. Well, that’s been a big help either way.”

“Mate, we don’t want to scare you or anything. I probably am the child of the prophecy. That’s why Mione and I have been training so hard since we were five and six, even before we knew what it was for.”

“And you don’t have to follow us, Neville,” Hermione added. “You can just walk away from this. We won’t think any less of you.”

Neville screwed up his face, thinking about it. For a moment, he looked like he was seriously considering walking away, but then, he got a determined look and said, “No. No, of course I won’t walk away from you two.” He reached up and patted Hermione’s hand on his shoulder. “You’re my best mates. And besides, if You-Know—I mean, V…V…Voldemort… _does_ come back, he’ll probably be after me anyway. And…and I don’t think I’d want to stay out of it, either.”

“That’s good of you, Neville,” Harry said. “You’re a good friend.”

“Hey, you didn’t think I’d leave you, did you? I’m a Longbottom. We’re allies—I’ll even tell Gran to make it official next month. My parents stood by your parents, Harry, and I’m gonna stand by you two. And Merlin help any dark wizard who gets in our way.”


	82. Bonus: Grayson

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I have ever been prone to seek Harry Potter and to investigate and experiment where wiser JK Rowlings would have left well enough alone.
> 
> Bonus chapter! This one is quite short, but I really felt I needed the mini-cliffhanger before the final showdown in Rwanda.

The wizards of the ICW Expeditionary Force in East Africa were on downtime at the moment. They had taken back control of the northern part of Uganda and were planning the next phase to strike the guerrillas at home in Zaire. But the character of the war was about to change drastically.

No one knew the young Ugandan wizard’s name when he Apparated into the camp. But no one who saw him ever forgot the sight. Indeed, many of them had nightmares about it for months afterwards. His entire lower body was severed at the waist.

For most, it looked like the worst case of splinching they had ever seen, but as the Mediwizards ran forward, it became clear that something was wrong. Splinching, for complicated magical reasons, didn’t kill right away, but this man was clearly dying. A single wave of a wand told them the truth: it _wasn_ _’t_ a splinching. Something had _done_ this to him—possibly as he was Apparating, but still, it must have been something disastrous.

But they never learnt what it was. The wizard managed to get out only three words before expiring: “Kampala has fallen.”

A war council was called as the rest of the intelligence got back. The report was the same as it was at the fall of the Burundian Ministry. All of the defenders at the Ugandan Ministry were dead, to a man, ripped to shreds by an unknown force. Everyone knew, though, that Kinani Ngeze had to have been involved. It was about the most demoralising strike he could have made. Kampala was a city they had thought safe. Now, it was overrun by something they couldn’t even name, and Ngeze truly did look invincible, as his name implied.

Albus Dumbledore was there in the war room, looking very grave. Edward Grayson looked furious.

“This is no time for retreat,” Grayson said. “We still control the rest of Uganda. Kampala is the natural place to strike back. The fact that our spies got back alive means that whatever Ngeze did, it’s not there now, and any other move opens us up to flank attacks. After all, what’s left of the Ugandan Ministry is in transitional quarters in Jinja, only fifty miles away from Kampala. Ngeze could strike there at any moment. We need to divert all of our available forces to reinforce the garrison there and use it as a staging ground to hit Kampala back hard and fast.”

“That’s a risky move,” Dumbledore said. “We could lose the north again if we pull our troops back from those towns.”

“The north won’t matter if we lose all of Lake Victoria,” Grayson countered. “I was sceptical of your Zaire strategy already, Dumbledore, but I deferred to you because we thought Uganda was secure, but if we can’t hold it now, we may as well retreat and petition the ICW for a bigger Expeditionary Force. Leaving aside how it would look for us, how would that bode for all of East Africa if we have to do that?”

“You may be right, Mr. Grayson. And I _can_ agree with your assessment that we must hold Jinja…Very well, we will recall all we can spare there and take stock again.”

* * *

Riddle Manor was old, and very dusty—only natural after being uninhabited for so long. But it was a large and lavish house, and it suited Voldemort’s purposes. He had been all for moving in at once, but La Pantera had made a convincing case for being a little more discreet. After all, if they were tidying up the place, they wouldn’t want the local muggles to get suspicious. Voldemort accepted, if reluctantly, and she went about hiding their activity. It was a surprisingly simple procedure. They placed ward stones around the property, and over each one, La Pantera performed a ritual in which she sacrifice a live chameleon and poured out its blood on the stone. This would allow the manor to blend in, and to anyone outside, it would look like the same abandoned property it always had. Now that their movements were hidden, they moved inside.

As Voldemort had predicted, the place was in good condition despite fifty summers and winters of weather-beating. There was about an inch of dust on the floor, and all the furniture was covered in sheets and the valuables locked away, but an aristocrat’s manor was an aristocrat’s manor.

“Nice place you got here,” La Pantera commented as they stood in the large sitting room. “Obviously seen better days, but I can work with it. Hmm…first thing is to get rid of the dust.” She drew her long, black, enchanted knife and flicked it. The picture window flew open. Then, she twirled the knife in a circle and chanted something in Aztec. As she chanted, a whirlwind formed in the room, surrounding her as she flung her arms out like a wild nature spirit and let out a loud, animalistic roar. The three Death Eaters and their house elf screamed and drew back from the sight. The whirlwind lifted the sheets off the furniture and all the dust from the floor so that it was all swirling around her. Then, she swung her arm around, and all the dust and the sheets flew out the open window together. A moment later, the wind stopped.

The sitting room now looked extremely dishevelled, as if a hurricane had blown through it, which it pretty well had, but it was dust free. The Death Eaters stood at the door, staring at her with their mouth open.

La Pantera smirked. “Shut them. You’re catching flies,” she said. They did.

“Impressive spell-work,” Voldemort said in his high voice. Barty stepped forward silently and gingerly placed his small form in a chair.

“Well, of course _you_ _’d_ say that,” La Pantera answered. “But you people have a lot of work to do if you want to make this place livable. You. Elf. Get to cleaning.”

Winky yelled and stepped forward frightfully. “Yes, Madam Jaguar, ma’am,” she squeaked and got started setting things right.

“You too,” she added, pointed at the Carrows. The siblings glanced at each other and nodded. It was hard enough dealing with just the Dark Lord. They didn’t want to make La Pantera mad, too.

* * *

To just about everyone’s surprise, perhaps even Grayson’s, the blitz attack on Kampala was a stunning success. Without Ngeze and his secret weapon there, whatever it was, his forces were unable to stand up to an all-out assault. It didn’t hurt that Dumbledore and Grayson led the attack, fighting side by side. It was a sight to behold. Dumbledore, the transfiguration master, animated all of the furniture in the shops and buildings of the magical quarter of Kampala, and the tables and chairs ran into the street to attack the defending wizards. Grayson, the master of nature magic, had only to sing a traditional Swahili melody, and the trees came to life and swung at them like Whomping Willows. When the defenders came within close range, Dumbledore lashed out with a fire whip, while Grayson sang one of his native chants that raised a smoke-screen that repelled them and their spells.

The rest of the ICW Expeditionary Force, everyone they come commit to the attack, advanced in a line, flanking the two Grand Sorcerers, and the defenders crumbled. Evidently, Ngeze hadn’t thought the ICW would be so brazen as to mount a direct counter-attack, at least not so quickly. After this, Grayson insisted that to keep up their momentum, they should strike south into Rwanda itself as soon as possible. This worried the others much more. Kampala may have been an easy win, but Ngeze’s secret weapon was still out there somewhere, and his home turf was likely to be much more heavily defended. Dumbledore agreed and suggested that they needed a stronger strategic position before making such a move.

In the end, a compromise was reached. The spies would move into Rwanda and survey the scene. Meanwhile, the main force would be divided, with Grayson’s company sent to recapture the Burundian capital of Bujumbura while Dumbledore’s company dug in at Kampala. Then, if all looked well, they would come at Kigali from the north and the south, in the hopes that the two-pronged attack would be enough to overcome Ngeze’s defences.

They thought it was a good plan, but only time would tell if it would pay off.

* * *

All three Death Eaters were very busy after returning to Britain, but Barty Crouch Jr was the busiest, mainly because he was the only competent one. He had to catch and interrogate Ministry personnel to find out about the Quidditch World Cup. At the same time, he also had to find a way to get close to Lucius Malfoy in secret, and he was fast burning through his father’s fortune (thank Merlin the Goblins were discreet and didn’t take sides) paying La Pantera’s fee until he could do so.

Fortunately, his work tonight had paid off. He happened to know one Ministry employee who was too nosey for her own good and didn’t have the sense to snoop around intelligently. And so, Barty returned to Riddle Manor that night with a fairly pretty Imperiused witch in tow.

The Dark Lord sat in an armchair, propped up by pillows, close to the fire to warm himself. It was far less dignified than he would prefer, Barty knew, especially, when La Pantera already had a low-budget throne room set up for her priestess-ing, but his homunculus body had its limitations. Still, when Barty brought his captive before his Master, the Dark Lord was pleased.

“Ah, you have brought a guest, Barty,” Voldemort hissed. “We should be introduced properly. Alecto, let me see.”

Alecto Carrow turned the chair around revealing Voldemort’s tiny body.

“Bertha, _bow_ before Lord Voldemort,” Barty commanded. She did at once, but even through the Imperius Curse, her disgust was visible in her eyes at the strange, infantile creature, followed by terror when she heard its name. “My Lord, this is Bertha Jorkins of the Department of Magical Games and Sports,” Barty said. “She is a consummate gossip and may well know more things that she isn’t supposed to than anyone else in her department.”

“How convenient. Then, Ms. Jorkins, perhaps you would be so kind as to tell us about the Quidditch World Cup…”

Bertha Jorkins spilt everything she knew, which included quite a lot about the security at the World Cup. Unfortunately, security was tight. Fudge was under pressure to show a strong hand after the Greyback fiasco. If Potter attended the final, it would be hard to get close to him.

“Why not just slip the _chico_ a Portkey?” La Pantera asked lazily from her corner of the room.

“Because, Lady Pantera,” Voldemort impatiently, “magical transportation is more strictly regulated in Britain than in Mexico—a combination of a paranoid Ministry and economic protectionism. Slipping Potter an existing Portkey would be easy, but _making_ one would be detected at once and investigated. That is why it is essential that one of us gets Potter alone. Now, Ms. Jorkins, are there any other upcoming events that we, here, should know about?”

“Yes,” she said in monotone. “The Triwizard Tournament at Hogwarts.”

“You’re reviving the Triwizard Tournament? Explain.”

She revealed everything she knew about that, too, but much of the Tournament wasn’t finalised yet, so that wasn’t much. Still, Voldemort was pleased with what he learnt. “Well, Barty, I think you deserve a reward for your work,” he said. He gave Bertha a pointed look. “Be sure to have Ms. Jorkins at work on time tomorrow and with no memory or other clues as to the events of tonight. You are dismissed.”

“Thank you, my Lord.” He began escorting Bertha out of the room, but he stopped. “My Lord? There was one other thing.”

“Speak,” he said.

“I have learnt that one of the werewolves who was captured and imprisoned last month was my cousin, Artemis. I knew her well in my younger days. I believe she will be amenable to your ideas and could be useful to us here. I also believe that it may be possible to retrieve her from Azkaban using the same method my father used to break me out.”

Voldemort raised his eyebrows, then lowered them and gave him a suspicious look. Barty suppressed the urge to quake in his boots. “That’s a bold claim, Barty,” he said, “and if it is true, why should we not retrieve someone who is _truly_ useful to us, such as Bellatrix?”

“Security, Master. Bellatrix is a maximum-security prisoner. She will be watched at every moment during a visit, and the Aurors will not permit her cell to be opened. It would be virtually impossible to take her without a full frontal assault. But my father made me a low-security prisoner. The Aurors believe Artemis has no living relatives, and they underestimate her command of magic, so she is also a low-security prisoner, and her security will be much lighter.”

Barty stayed still while his Master’s eyes (and Legilimency) bored into him. He stood his ground, holding his gaze despite the overwhelming pressure. “Very well, Barty,” Voldemort said, sensing no betrayal in him, “if you can present a detailed plan that meets my satisfaction, you may carry it out.”

“Thank you, Master.”

* * *

“Something is wrong here,” said Albus Dumbledore.

“You mean how Kigali folded like a cheap robe?” Edward Grayson replied. “Yeah, I noticed.”

Dumbledore and Grayson stood in the ruins of the Rwandan Ministry while half of their forces worked to clean up the active magic from the battle so it wouldn’t kill anyone. They had hit hard, expecting a hard fight, but the resistance had been strangely half-hearted, with no sign of Ngeze’s secret weapon at all.

One of the officers ran up to them and saluted. “Grand Sorcerers,” he said, “we’ve looked everywhere. There’s no sign of Kinani Ngeze, or his forces. We’re doing a survey for cartographic anomalies, but they almost certainly couldn’t hide enough supplies for their entire army in the city.”

The two commanders nodded in understanding. If a land survey turned up areas that didn’t obey Euclidean geometry that weren’t on the map, it would indicate either an unplottable area or, if they couldn’t find it by eye, a Fidelius Charm, but the simplest explanation was that Ngeze had read the writing on the wall and cleared out of town. One dark lord was a match for one Grand Sorcerer, but two of them on a tear across East Africa must have been a little more than he had bargained for.

“Find out where he went,” Grayson ordered.

“Yes, sir.”

The spies were sent out again, and within a couple of days, they came back with a report that Ngeze was dug in at Gisenyi on the Zaire border.

“It’s his escape plan,” Grayson said. “He’s building up his forces for a counterattack, but he can escape into the jungle if things get too hot. We’ll never find him in there.”

“We should resume our campaign in Zaire,” Dumbledore reasoned. “Besiege him from the east, but not enough to make him leave. Then, bring the rest of our forces in from the north. With his back to Lake Kivu, he’ll be surrounded.”

“I agree,” Grayson replied. “But we’ll need stealth this time. He saw us coming here. He needs to believe our eastern forces are our only attack.”

“We’ll send all of our covert operatives to take down the guerrilla cells and prepare the path. If we can, send false messages to make it appear that they are still operating.”

“Excellent. Do you want to oversee that, Dumbledore? You have more experience in covert operations.”

“I will see to it at once.”


	83. The Battle of Gisenyi

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Albus Dumbledore, the ICW, and some of the spells and creatures. Oddly enough, the rest of this chapter is mine mine mine!
> 
> Don’t worry, we’ll get back to Harry next chapter, but I just had to finish the epic showdown in Rwanda—and, I might add, it is a taste of things to come closer to home.
> 
> Careful observers will note that I am departing a little from real world history at this point.

It took nearly two weeks to bring Dumbledore’s forces south through Zaire to converge on the north side of Gisenyi without being detected, but it seemed to have worked. Kinani Ngeze’s forces woke on the morning of the seventeenth of July to find themselves hemmed in between the two ICW companies and the shores of Lake Kivu, with Anti-Apparition Wards and even the more complicated Anti-Portkey wards over the entire magical quarter of the city. It was a perfect textbook encirclement.

“It’s too easy,” say Grayson.

“I assure you it was anything but,” Dumbledore replied stiffly.

“Maybe not your campaign, but _this?_ Yes. Ngeze topples three Ministries of Magic with death blows that leave no witnesses alive, and yet we run our entire campaign to his doorstep without ever seeing his face? No, we’ve missed something.”

“Then the most likely conclusion is that he is no longer here and that our intelligence is faulty in that regard,” Dumbledore said. “Either way our strategic position to retake the city could hardly be stronger. And we must do so. The muggles will be here tomorrow.”

“I know. I know. I just hate the thought of that bloomin’ dictator getting away. We take back Rwanda and break his power base; then we’ve run out our ICW mandate and he gets off scot-free with only the Zairean Ministry to hunt him down. That’s not going to solve anything.”

“Unfortunately, that is all too common in war, but we both have obligations elsewhere. We will return East Africa to its pre-war state so far as it is possible. That is all we _can_ do at this point.”

“Alright, but I want sentries around our perimeter,” Grayson ordered. “I wouldn’t put it past Ngeze to have a reserve force about.”

The sentries were posted without argument, and the main body of the Expeditionary Force advanced into Ngeze’s stronghold. They moved slowly, cautiously, unlike their previous assaults. Even with all their intelligence, they still didn’t know what they were up against.

“Look alive everyone,” Grayson said. “We’re still looking for Ngeze’s secret weapon. We don’t know if it’s a spell or something else.”

They could hear a lot of wizards moving around behind cover, but they could see little. A few people on both sides took pot shots at each other when they were seen, but there was no coordinated attack. They seemed to be waiting for a signal, or for one side or the other to be in position.

The ICW forces still had a good perimeter around the area, but they were forced to funnel into the streets to get close, increasing their exposure, one company approaching from the east, the other from the north. It was then that the enemy struck. Two fireballs that could have been mistaken for short-range muggle rockets blasted out of the upper windows of the large manor house where the streets converged, one that overlooked the lake on the other side. The fireballs slammed into the two columns of the attacking forces and sent a dozen wizards flying.

“Well, at least he’s here,” Grayson muttered to himself.

That, evidently, was the signal because spells started flying on all sides. Dumbledore raised a wall of earth to form an embankment around his men. The result was far too much like trench warfare for his own liking—he had been involved in the Great War as well as Grindelwald’s War—but it was the best he could do in a few seconds. Witches and wizard hurled spells over the embankment and ducked as return fire blasted part of the wall away.

On the other side of the battle, Grayson made a similar move at the head of his east column. He knelt down and started chanting—nothing fancy here, just a basic aboriginal defence spell. Granted, it was meant to be cast by a whole team, but he wasn’t a Grand Sorcerer for nothing. There was a rumble, like a great snake thrashing under the Earth, and an embankment was forced up around him. With that out of the way, he tried his trick of animating the trees again, but the rebels were ready. They slashed off the branches with powerful Cutting Curses.

Albus Dumbledore didn’t like killing if he could help it. He permitted it from his troops, of course. It _was_ a declared war, after all. But he tried to avoid it for himself, and magic usually presented many other options to a wizard who was powerful and clever. His opening volley was to animate all the cords and ropes in the neighbourhood, even severed muggle power lines, to tie up the attackers. They fought back by slicing the cords into pieces too short to tie them and burning all they could.

Around them, the rest of the witches and wizards were hurling curses as fast as they could. The air was thick with a dazzling array of flying spells, and the shouts and bangs formed a roar of noise over which one couldn’t hear oneself think. The din was staggering, and they were still fighting at a fairly long range for the most part.

While all this was going on, they still needed to shield themselves from Ngeze himself, who kept throwing fireballs in both directions from the manor. Dumbledore and Grayson did their best to shield the men, but a single blow was enough to knock them off their feet. This, at last, was an opponent who fought on their level, and they could just as well have done without that.

“But there’s one of him and two of us,” Grayson reasoned. “He can’t protect both of his own columns at once.” He started up another chant. The earth rumbled under his feet. Then, the cobblestone street cracked on either side of him, outside his embankment. For a moment, bright, multicoloured light peaked out of the cracks, but then, it was replaced with a rushing torrent of scalding-hot water as springs opened in the street and endeavoured to wash the rebels away. Many of them were swept off, but many others stood their ground, climbing or levitating themselves into trees or onto upper floors of buildings. That gave them a momentary high ground, but it also left them more exposed, and the spells flew with renewed intensity in an effort to force them down.

Dumbledore had been having some success with a deterring wind and fire, but he took the hint and used one of his more exotic spells. Drawing a gold necklace from his pocket—a muggle one, eighteen-karat, which was important—and cast a complicated series of incantations. The necklace dissolved into a golden mist that spread as he directed it out over the rebels. At once, they began tripping over each other, struggling to get a grip on the ground as their perception of gravity was inverted.

Albus Dumbledore may have been the only wizard in the world who could use alchemy in combat.

Limbo Mist would only distract someone with a cool head for a couple of seconds, but in those couple of seconds the rebels could be shot down like ducks in a row, and Dumbledore’s column took full advantage of this. With that move, they broke through the enemy lines and advanced on the manor.

Ngeze stopped shooting fireballs at Grayson so that he could focus all his firepower on Dumbledore. His waterlogged fighters in the east column were still holding their own, but Grayson had another trick up his sleeve. His earlier shifting of the earth had left the ground unstable. Now, he dug down with an appropriate spell and set off a chain reaction, and a large portion of the street collapsed into a sink hole. His company leapt up the embankment and began hurling curses down into the hole. Soon, they too broke through the lines and marched on the manor.

But both columns were stopped when a fresh- and harder-faced company of rebels ran out from around the sides of the manor and surrounded it, except for a wide gap in the front. Apparently, they hadn’t been fighting all of the defenders yet. Things got worse when Ngeze himself took a flying leap from the upper window and landed in the gap in his lines with a deafening crash. He landed so hard that the cobblestone street was shattered in a ten foot radius. A tattoo of an elephant on his body glowed briefly.

Ngeze was large, muscular, bare-chested, and tattooed from head to foot. He held no wand, and he needed none. He looked out with a sneer at his opponents and called in a deep voice, “Albus Dumbledore…and Edward Grayson. So this is the best the wizarding world can offer?”

“Kinani Ngeze,” Dumbledore replied. “You would do well to surrender. You are completely surrounded.”

“Oh, no,” Ngeze said with a ghastly grin. “I’ve only begun to fight.” He chanted a long phrase in that ancient, click-filled language of his, and a large tattoo and several smaller pictographs glowed. It was only partially visible as it wrapped around to his back, but the shape was unmistakable: a roc. A massive swirl of wind formed around him, lifting the broken cobblestones into a cyclone of flying rocks. Then, he banished them at Dumbledore and Grayson at high speed. Dumbledore raised a shield with a layer of a simple transfiguration spell. The rocks bombarded it like a machine gun, but were blasted into sand.

What followed was an odd cross between a close-up battle and a duel—and that a duel for the ages. The rest of the witches and wizards were hurling curses all over the battlefield, making even more light and noise than before, but the three most powerful fighters were mostly focusing on each other. Dumbledore threw a wave of fire at Ngeze, but he blocked it with a torrent of water. Then, Ngeze chanted his most complex incantation yet. His body was covered in glowing tattoos: the erumpent and lightning bird he used to cast fireballs, plus some kind of serpent and hanging vines. He threw what seemed to be a fireball back at Dumbledore.

Dumbledore deflected the fireball into the air, but it exploded and rained down some kind of corrosive poison down on them, filled with tiny threads like stinging nettles. The witches and wizards behind him began screaming as the venom, probably from a magical snake, began eating through their robes and burning their skin, and Dumbledore was forced to resort to alchemy for the second time in the battle. Mixing dust and water and turning it into a fine spray of mud, he neutralised the poison, but this only made things worse. The tiny threads reacted to the mud and grew in seconds into gripping vines that threatened to tie them all down. Dumbledore hadn’t seen a spell this complex in decades, and he and Grayson lost precious time trying to cut through them.

Grayson chanted a spell of his own, and several miniature bolts of lightning leapt out of the puddles around his feet, and then kept leaping from puddle to puddle almost too fast to follow, heading straight towards Ngeze. A nearby television antenna uprooted itself and vaulted into the ground in front of the dark lord, attracting all the lightning and diverting it harmlessly into the ground.

“Dammit, I can’t get close enough!” Grayson spat. Time for plan B, or whatever letter they were up to by now. “Dumbledore, you focus on the soldiers. I’ll circle around behind him and take him from up close.”

“What?” Dumbledore said in surprise. “You want to take him on alone? Surely, I should—”

“No. You fought Grindelwald’s War. You know how to fight an army. But I know more wandless magic than anyone else alive. It has to be me.”

“But how can you get behind him?”

“I have my ways.” Dumbledore blinked, and Grayson was gone. But there was a striped, dog-like animal slinking away through the lines. That was certainly something he hadn’t expected. Edward Grayson was an animagus.

For the next few minutes, Dumbledore’s job became even harder. He had to protect his own men—and he had already lost some—on his own while still striking back against the enemy. He used all the most devastating area effect spells he knew from Grindelwald’s War—everything short of Fiendfyre. That would just be suicidal. He was on the defensive, now, merely holding his ground until Grayson—he hoped—could get through. He raised the embankment around them higher and started hurling centuries-old siege spells that had hardly seen use since the time of Merlin—spells design to fly in arcs like fireworks and rain down from above. The battering of curses against the embankment itself intensified, so he transfigured sections through it to stone and metal. Ngeze threw another of his aerial bombs, which exploded above them, raining down a different payload: a sticky sap that caused blistering of the skin and resisted washing and instead needed to be scrubbed with dry sand. As his own men got clean, Dumbledore transfigured bombs of his own, which he lobbed over Ngeze’s men and which rained down a tangle of fine razor wire that would cut into their flesh when pulled sharply—a sure way to get a crowd to stop moving quickly, if brutal.

Ngeze’s next attack came from a different direction. Burrowing out of their own embankment swarmed millions upon millions of driver ants. Like South American army ants on growth potions, they grew up to half an inch long with wide jaws so strong that some tribes were known to use them for emergency surgical staples. They bit everything that moved, tearing out tiny chunks of flesh. Scouring Charms were the preferred method to get them off your body, but their grip was so strong that they had to be cast again and again until your skin was raw. Fire was the preferred method for killing them on the ground, but there was a lot of stomping as well. Dumbledore might have lost control of the battle, then, but that was when Grayson made his move. He wasn’t built for fast running on four legs, and he had to go far around the enemy lines to get to the steps of the manor, but he made it.

By now, both armies were in shambles, trying to shake off the effects of Dumbledore’s and Ngeze’s attacks more than they were trying to shoot each other, although there was still quite a lot of that going on, too. More than a few of the officers on both sides could throw out big, showy attacks like the Grand Sorcerers and the dark lord, and they did so, but Ngeze himself was still the man to beat.

Grayson moved into position and transformed back to human. By the time he had, Ngeze had already spun around and threw something that looked like a thick, black cloak at him. By the time he realised what it was, it was already wrapped tight around him, trying to suffocate him. It was a conjured imitation of a lethifold—fortunately not a real one, which could only be stopped by the Patronus Charm. Grayson focused with all his might, and the conjured creature was blasted away from him by a flood of rainbow-coloured light from his hands. He briefly lamented the fact that Ngeze was a man. There were a number of quite nasty curses in Australian Aboriginal magic that could only be used on a member of the opposite sex (for both men and women). As it was, though, he did have one thing he could use. He sang a snatch of a sacred song that would be heard as only a painful grinding and screeching in the ears of the uninitiated. Ngeze stumbled, and about a dozen of his closest soldiers clapped their hands to their ears and staggered in pain. Grayson threw another bolt of lightning, directly from his hands, but Ngeze whispered a word just in time, absorbed it with his lightning bird tattoo and threw it back at him.

With Ngeze distracted by a point blank duel, Dumbledore and the rest of the ICW soldiers could focus their attention on the rebels. That was what really turned the tide. With their superior defensive position and Dumbledore on their side, the ICW quickly gained the upper hand, scoring more and more casualties on Ngeze’s army. Blinding lights, a burst of energy that caused muscle spasms, wide Stunners cast in crimson arcs, and hundreds of more mundane spells flew across the battlefield. The enemy lines were in danger of breaking, and the end seemed in sight.

The marble steps of the manor shattered, and the fragments rose up and encased Ngeze, but the shell was blown apart with a spell from a tattoo of an animal that Grayson didn’t get a good look at. The shards swirled around him as he chanted a language that even Grayson wasn’t sure of, but thought was Ancient Egyptian. The shards banged against each other at a blinding speed, sharpening themselves into a hail of stone knives. Grayson raised a shield as they were hurled at him, but when they struck, they seemed to sap its energy and glowed red-hot. His reflexes were just fast enough to raise a spray of water to act as a heat sink, but he lost track of what was happening for a moment as his shield, the hot stone, and the water all swirled around him. He just barely kept the whole mass away from his body, and he was blasted by steam so hard he thought he might be cooked, but when the dust cleared, he was safely encased in a shell. If Ngeze had used sandstone, he would have wound up inside a shell of glass, but since he had used marble instead, the shell was made of something very like mother of pearl—probably very valuable. Grayson smashed it to dust.

Ngeze was gearing up for another attack when he was struck in the back. (All’s fair in war, after all.) Dumbledore and the ICW army had whittled down his forces enough that Dumbledore could spare a few curses for him. That was usually the point where a duel ended quickly.

“It’s over, Ngeze,” Grayson shouted. “You can’t beat both of us.”

“Oh, _I_ don’t have to,” the dark lord said with a grin. He threw a mist at Grayson that smelled like elephant dung, but didn’t seem to do anything. Then, he shouted at the top of his lungs, “ _T_ _’abdal Ennedi Nabr Wat’a_!”

What was left of Ngeze’s own forces turned and ran on the spot.

“After them!” Grayson and Dumbledore ordered at the same time, but the ICW force had only started to move when they heard a distant rumbling that made even the Grand Sorcerers pause. A moment later, it was accompanied by a flurry of wings as seemingly every bird in the city took to the air.

One of the African wizards recognised the signs at once. “STAMPEDE!” he shouted.

An assortment of animals burst through the trees. No herding behaviour here; they were all running together as if from a wildfire—dogs and cats alongside hyenas and a pride of lions alongside a dozen different kinds of antelope and even magical species like Tebo and…

“Erumpents!”

A rampaging erumpent was far more dangerous than a charging rhinoceros, and that was terrifying enough for most people. Anything that got in their way tended to disappear in an explosive fireball. Here, there were a dozen of them. The ICW Expeditionary Force, which had taken down the army of the worst dark lord of the decade, scattered.

With the erumpents, there wasn’t much to do but get out of the way and get their people out of the way. The beasts were faster than humans on foot, so they let them pass, but by the time they did, Ngeze had done a runner.

Dumbledore and Grayson chased him around the side of the manor as he was making a break for the lake, where they saw a shocking sight. The water was a churning mass of foam, stained red with blood, punctuated by deafening explosions around the erumpents. The stampede hadn’t stopped at the water’s edge. The animals had jumped straight into the lake and into the waiting jaws of hundreds and hundreds of crocodiles. The entire shore was a massive feeding frenzy, and lurching up amongst the sprays of blood were dozens of larger, magical mahambas, each one longer than a bus.

The witches and wizards of both armies were in complete disarray, running along the shore in a mob, with no regard for which side they had been on just minutes ago, dodging the lunging crocodiles on one side and the stampeding animals on the other. The frenzy was spilling over out of the magical quarter, out of the wards, and they could see muggles in the distance running in terror. They’d need to commandeer the entire ICW force as Obliviators once this was over, and that wouldn’t be easy because the moment most of the wizards on both sides hit the edge of the wards, they Apparated away. About twenty-five of the nearest ICW people saw Dumbledore and Grayson and flocked to them, but the rest kept running, and the Grand Sorcerers let them. They were more concerned about their people getting to safety first.

Ngeze, however, didn’t stop at the water’s edge. He kept going. It took a moment to realise what had happened, but they soon saw that he was proudly riding away fast on the back of a mahamba.

“Oh, no you don’t!” Grayson growled. He began singing one the Kinyarwanda folk songs he had picked up, invoking the magic not with finesse this time, but with raw power. It was possible to invoke the magic of the songlines while not actually on the lines, but it was very difficult. He could only keep it up for a minute or so, and it gave him a whanging headache. But in that minute, he could run faster than the speed of sound.

Albus Dumbledore wasn’t even sure what had happened. All he knew was that there was a sonic boom that nearly knocked him off his feet— _did_ knock some of the others off their feet—and, seconds later, Grayson threw Ngeze bodily on the ground in front of him.

“Ha! Your secret weapon failed, you ‘invincible’ wanker,” Grayson said triumphantly, exaggerating his Australian accent for effect. But to his anger, Ngeze actually began laughing.

“You fools,” he said. “You think you have seen my secret weapon? No, he has yet to reveal himself.”

“It merits not who or what your weapon is, Kinani,” Dumbledore said sternly, as if he were lecturing an errant student. “Under the authority of ICW Resolution 1994-16, you are under—”

_RRRRRRRUUUUUURRRRRRRAAAAAAAHHHHHH!_

“That’s not a good sound…” Grayson said. He and Dumbledore slowly turned around while Ngeze laughed maniacally.

Albus Dumbledore very nearly had a heart attack when he saw it. He hadn’t felt this frightened since 1981, if ever. Some part of him in the back of his mind reflected that he truly might rather duel Gellert again than face this foe.

Edward Grayson thought his hair might come in white if he survived this. He _knew_ he had never been this frightened in his life. “Crikey! It’s a trap!” he yelled. “It was a buggering trap the whole time! Wankers the lot of us!” The panicked wizard continued to spout colourful Australian phrases that most of the wizards back home would be shocked to hear him utter.

Dumbledore spoke only one word, but considering how rarely he swore, any Brit who heard him would have thought the end of the world had come.

Had Grayson not been in the fight of his life a few minutes ago, he might have paid more mind to what language Ngeze was speaking and what words he was actually saying. He might also have thought to ask, if all the animals were running frantically into a crocodile-infested lake, then what on the Rainbow Serpent’s green and verdant Earth were they running _from?_ As it was, he was cursing himself out for not thinking of it because he was sure that it had just cost him his life.

This was something _no one_ had planned for. A dark lord had to do some pretty nasty things to merit an international response, but one confirmed report of a nundu, and the ICW would have sent a task force instantly.

The nundu, thankfully, is not a natural animal. It is magically enhanced in multiple ways. For comparison, the cub of a male lion and a female tiger is called a liger. The liger is enormous for a mundane cat because of what muggles know to be a quirk of genetics. A male liger can easily grow larger than both of his parents together. Similarly, a _nunda_ is a cross between a male leopard and a female of a rare magical sabretooth cat called an ennedi, which takes this trend to a greater extreme. A male nunda will usually top one ton. Contrary to popular belief, the infamous thief Eldon Elsrickle guarded his house with a nunda, not a nundu, and that ended badly enough for him as it was.

It was ancient Ethiopian wizards who discovered that the application of certain dark rituals could cause a nunda to grow to the size of an elephant, become tougher than any dragon, and gain an ability to incubate virulent and deadly diseases in its mucous membranes and spread them wherever it went. This was origin of the nundu, the deadliest animal on earth. In most African countries, creating one is a capital crime. In many of them, even knowing _how_ to create one is enough to get you put under permanent surveillance, or worse. It is an incredibly dangerous weapon, which usually takes a small army to control. But Kinani Ngeze evidently wasn’t worried about such trivialities.

Dumbledore didn’t hesitate. He flicked his wand and a spell shot out of it so powerful it could make your hair stand on end at thirty paces. He cast it non-verbally. Grayson knew Dumbledore’s wand was powerful, but he hadn’t realised it was _that_ powerful.

The spell stuck the nundu with a deep, oddly gong-like sound. It didn’t seem to do more than ruffle its fur.

Grayson went even further. He raised his wand, which he had used relatively little in this battle, and shouted, “ _Avada Kedavra_!” the deadly green curse struck the beast in the shoulder.

This only made the nundu angry.

The nundu is the only known animal that is resistant to the Killing Curse. Technically, one Killing Curse _will_ bring it down, but you have to hit it in the face, and few wizards ever get close enough to do that and live. The reason is that fur is made of cells that are already dead, and a nundu’s fur is so dense and magic-resistant that it acts like a coat of armour, and heavy enough armour _can_ block the Killing Curse at the cost of being blasted full of holes. Usually, one Killing Curse will merely shave a patch of the nundu’s fur about the size of a Bludger, and then you have to hit it again in the same spot to kill it.

Grayson didn’t even get a chance to aim again as the nundu leaped, landed with a thunderous crash on the shore, and turned to face the wizards. Grayson realised now what the mist was that Ngeze had sprayed on him. It was simply the smell of elephant dung—elephants being the nundu’s primary prey. Ngeze had read the writing on the wall alright, but instead of fleeing, he had set this trap to kill them and then ran for it.

“We can’t let it reach the muggles,” Dumbledore shouted between curses, and everyone knew he meant it. He would stop the nundu or die trying. To their credit, all of the wizards who had flocked to the Grand Sorcerers stood and fought, although that might have been because the nundu could easily pick them off if they ran for the edge of the wards. To their further credit, they were smart enough to switch spells when one didn’t work. Dozens of stunners that would have put a dragon in a coma bounced off its hide. Reductor Curses barely registered a punch. Cutting Curses just bounced off. Dumbledore threw all his power into Snape’s _Sectumsempra_ spell, and it only caused a scratch. Darker curses still forced it back, but only for a moment.

The nundu took another leap and clamped its jaws down around the torso of one of the wizards. It ate him in two bites. It was no use trying to save him. Even if they could have have got him out, he would have died of septic shock. Still, they kept fighting. Dumbledore tried his trick with the razor wire again and succeeded in slicing up the sensitive skin of the nundu’s face, but even that didn’t stop it from eating another wizard.

“Put it to sleep!” One of the African wizards shouted. He later explained he had been part of the task force that killed the last nundu. “Potions in the air, nerve-deadening curses. And shoot for the eyes!”

Powerful fire spells and Conjunctivitis Curses were hurled at the nundu’s eyes and clouded its vision, but it was almost impossible to blank out its hearing and smell—not completely, and it was still homing in on Grayson. They tried nerve-deadening curses, but they barely slowed it down, and they didn’t have any strong sleeping potions (Draught of Living Death was recommended) that they could disperse in the air. It was too big to tie down easily, too. The soldiers evaded the best they could as it kept jumping around the battlefield with startling speed and agility, but one witch failed to get away and was literally slashed to pieces with one swipe of its claws.

Dumbledore kept trying a mix of spells—more methods of cutting and slashing interspersed with other things. He cast more dark magic in a few minutes than he had since Grindelwald’s War. He landed a blow with Dolohov’s Organ-Ripping Curse, but it had no visible effect. Perhaps it would kill the beast slowly, or perhaps not. He tried another dark curse that he had read about, but had never actually seen before, which was supposed to inflame the joints and cause crippling arthritis. That one actually did something. The nundu missed a jump and rolled thunderously, but it got up and kept coming, just a little slower. Grayson was presumably trying similar methods. His best move so far had been to blast it in the eyes with a brilliant rainbow light so it couldn’t see where it was going.

“Grayson, do you have any powerful rituals to make it sleep?” Dumbledore shouted.

“No, do you, Dumbledore?”

“No more than I’ve tried. Is there any chance you can invent one?”

“Invent one? _Fracassa Veloci_!” he cast. “Why me? Can’t you do it?”

“I need Arithmancy. You do not.” A swipe of a paw nearly took out both Grand Sorcerers on the spot. “I suggest you try if you can. _Confringo Maxima_!”

“Alright, alright. Let me think…” There weren’t really any songs in Aboriginal Folklore to put a giant monster to sleep. After all the largest predator Australians had ever had to deal with, even in the Dreamtime, was the saltwater crocodile. No, he would have to improvise this, in his native tongue, which, sadly, was English.

Grayson let the magic flow through him from the songlines, threw it at the nundu, and opened his mouth to sing:

 

_“Rest now, my warrior._

_Lay down, my king._

_Sleep now, eternal._

_Sleep, my precious thing._ _”_

 

It was a slow, grand, sweeping ballad. That last rhyme was a little forced, but the music flowed better than he’d expected. Grayson kept casting nonverbal curses as he sang—the strongest sedative spells he could think of, aiming for the sensitive face while Dumbledore hit the beast with numbing and paralysing curses. The nundu’s reactions began to slow. Two more of their soldiers fell in the battle, but he kept singing:

 

_“Lay down, my warrior._

_Rest now, your hardship is over._

_Lay down, my warrior._

_Lay down, my king._

_Sleep now, eternal._

_Sleep my, precious thing._ _”_

 

The nundu’s eyes were beginning to droop. It took a tremendous exertion of magic, but once again, Edward Grayson wasn’t a Grand Sorcerer for nothing. His song was having an effect where hardly anything else was, aside from a few of Dumbledore’s spells—enough of an effect that the others switched back to Stunners as it held still.

_“Lay down, my warrior._

_Rest now, your hardship is over._ _”_

 

Well over a hundred Stunners and other sleep spells struck the nundu, many of them in the face. It would have been enough to kill the strongest giant outright, even without Grayson’s song, but the nundu merely turned woozy, wobbled, and collapsed to the sand, semiconscious.

Albus Dumbledore cast a shield to guard against the beast’s disease-ridden breath as he approached its head, which was nearly as large as a man. He flicked his wand, and its mouth was wedged open. Dumbledore then pointed his wand down its throat and said the two words that he had thought he would _never_ say and mean them.

“ _Avada Kedavra_.”

The nundu twitched once—only once—and lay still. And considering that no other creature on earth would have even twitched, that was truly impressive.

It was over. The Battle of Gisenyi. The East African War. All of it. Over. Nearly all of Ngeze’s followers were either captured or dead. Ngeze himself, however, had fled across the lake to Zaire, but at least his plan to kill Dumbledore and Grayson had failed. Anyway, there was nothing they could do about that. Like it or not, he was legally Zaire’s problem, now.

Dumbledore and Grayson took stock of the situation. There was a dead nundu on the shore that would have to be disposed of safely and a swath of destruction through the city that would be almost impossible to cover up. They counted the soliders who still stood with them. They had gone against a nundu with only twenty-seven witches and wizards. Five were dead, and one more didn’t look like he would survive the night, but the nundu was no more.

Well, one thing was certain: no one would ever forget this.


	84. Harry's Nightmare

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: When you’ve eliminated the impossible, whatever Harry Potter remains, however improbable, must be JK Rowling.

The Granger family awoke on that Monday morning to a surprising announcement on the morning news, one that indicated that something was up. “The Rwandan Civil War ended early this morning as the remaining Hutu forces in the border city of Gisenyi surrendered without a shot fired,” the newsreader said. “The Tutsi Rwandan Patriotic Front was surprised to find Gisenyi already lying in ruins when they arrived, with a swath of destruction carved through the city filled with exploded buildings, uprooted trees, and delirious townspeople speaking of a stampede of giant monsters. The source of the destruction is unclear, but it is known that it occurred yesterday afternoon, and anonymous sources have blamed a botched airstrike, even though no government or militia has admitted to having had any airstrikes planned in the area. The UN is investigating the incident.

“A humanitarian force is now assembling to go into Gisenyi to help rebuild, as well as to provide medical aid, as the city is experiencing a severe outbreak of cholera. Contamination of the water supply during the airstrike has been blamed.”

“That doesn’t sound like an airstrike,” Daniel Granger said astutely.

“No, definitely not,” Emma agreed. “It sounds like Dumbledore finally won the war, then.”

“Well, that’ll be one less thing to worry about,” Harry said as he finished his breakfast and put his plate in the sink.

“You know, I don’t think it’s gonna be the same for him after the Greyback business,” Hermione said. “A lot of people have learnt they can’t rely on him—a lot more than before—and they’ll put more effort into getting by without him.”

“Still would’ve been nice to have him around,” Harry said. “I care about Rwanda as much as the next guy, but we had to go through the fight of our lives without him—physically _and_ politically— _again_.”

“At least it’s mostly working out,” his mother commented.

“Yes,” his sister agreed. “We got most of what we wanted from the Wizengamot, and Mr. Diggory thinks he can get the Hogwarts Governors to allow werewolves in the school next year.”

“True,” Harry conceded. He petted Hedwig and cleaned her cage with a wave of his hand. Then, he sat on the floor beside Rowena and pulled her onto his lap. She began purring sleepily. He had been doting on the old cat all summer. She was sixteen, now, and noticeably slowing down, so he was doing his best to make things comfortable for her while he was at home. “Hey, speaking of Hogwarts,” he added, “we never did get a chance to talk to Dumbledore about Professor Binns. We ought to contact him now that the war’s over.”

“That’d be nice, considering the kind of education you two are getting in History Class,” Emma said. “Though I’m afraid that might be the hardest part, the way things have gone so far.”

“It shouldn’t be,” her daughter said. “Professor Binns is completely ineffective. He can’t even remember our names. He can’t remember _Harry_ _’s_ name, and that’s saying something.”

“I know, dear, but it’s hard enough to fire a bad teacher in muggle schools. Professor Binns won’t be easy to oust if even death won’t stop him. And there’s seniority to worry about.”

“Well, that’s true. Counting when he was alive, Binns has been as Hogwarts longer than Dumbledore himself.”

“Oh, the paper’s here,” Harry called. He took the _Daily Prophet_ from the post owl and unrolled it. Sure enough, the real story of what happened in Rwanda was on the front page, and it was bigger than he ever expected.

 

_MIRACLE VICTORY! DUMBLEDORE, GRAYSON BATTLE NUNDU TO WIN EAST AFRICAN WAR!_

_SMALLEST FORCE, FASTEST BATTLE WITH NUNDU IN HISTORY!_

_The East African War between ICW forces lead by Grand Sorcerers Albus Dumbledore and Edward Grayson, and the forces of the dark lord Kinani Ngeze, ended yesterday in what is already being called a_ _“battle for the ages’ in the final rebel stronghold of Gisenyi. Survivors of the battle report that Dumbledore, Grayson, and Ngeze were all performing feats of magic that they had never seen before, with some going so far as to call it the greatest duel in the world since Dumbeldore’s defeat of Gellert Grindelwald in 1945._

_But the most shocking events yesterday came after the end of the battle proper. Dumbledore and Grayson had succeeded in trapping Ngeze and overpowering his army, but at that moment, Ngeze unleashed his secret weapon, which he had previously used to overrun three Ministries of Magic so thoroughly that he left no witnesses alive._

_Ngeze_ _’s secret weapon proved to be a nundu, and enormous leopard-like beast created by dark magic, which is immensely stronger and more magic-resistant than a dragon and carries virulent diseases on its breath. Once it was summoned, Ngeze fled the area, while Dumbledore, Grayson, and twenty-five other ICW witches and wizards found themselves trapped between the nundu and a lake full of man-eating mahambas and crocodiles. Despite these seemingly insurmountable odds, these twenty-seven brave witches and wizards succeeded in killing the nundu in a matter of minutes, owing in large part to the Grand Sorcerers’ great knowledge of powerful magic. Six ICW soldiers were killed fighting the nundu and thirty-one more in the battle itself._

_Nundus are banned as an illegal weapon of mass destruction by ICW convention, and every confirmed instance of a nundu is responded to by an ICW task force. In some past instances, nundus have been subdued by staged forest fires or even muggle saturation bombing, if a suitable excuse can be devised to set it up. The one known attempt to breed adult nundus, undertaken by a rogue faction of ex-Grindelwald followers in Algeria in the 1950s, was turned into a muggle nuclear weapons testing ground and remains off-limits to this day. Prior to yesterday, no nundu had ever been subdued in direct combat by a team of fewer than one hundred wizards._

_When questioned on this seemingly impossible turn of events, famed magical creature expert Newt Scamander had this to say:_ _“Well, sure, it’s_ possible _to kill a nundu with only twenty-seven wizards. It_ _’s probably_ possible _with only ten, but you_ _’d be mad to try it with less than a hundred, just like there have been plenty of solo slayings of dragons, but you’d be mad to try to wrangle one with less than ten.” (Emphasis his.)_

_The ICW forces, including Dumbledore, will be kept in isolation for the next three weeks to ensure that they were not infected with any dangerous diseases spread by the nundu. All known nundu attacks have resulted in cholera epidemics, but they are most feared for spreading deadly viral hemorrhagic fevers. The most recent incident, the Sudan Nundu of 1976, is thought to have been the origin of the ebola virus that killed 9 wizards and 431 muggles that year. A second contingent of witches and wizards from the surrounding countries has assembled in Gisenyi to cover up the magical aspects of the damage and attempt to contain any diseases that were released. Muggle authorities have been told that a botched aerial bombing on the muggle side of the war was the cause of the destruction._

 

“Holy cricket!” was Hermione’s only response when she saw the headline. She alone of the family was well enough read to understand the full implications of what had happened, although the mention of weapons of mass destruction was enough for the rest of them to get the gist of it. Dumbledore’s star had faded of late and would remain controversial because of last spring’s werewolf attack, but it would be a point of pride for magical Britain that their Chief Warlock had helped kill the most dangerous animal on earth.

Harry was less impressed, mostly out of ignorance. “Three weeks, huh?” he said disappointedly. “Well, I guess he won’t make it to my birthday party. We’ll have to sort things out with him later.”

* * *

“That old bastard,” Voldemort hissed when he saw the article. “A dark lord who conquered three countries set a nundu on him, and he still doesn’t have the courtesy to die. And he has the gall to accuse _me_ of cheating death.”

“I don’t know. I’d still pick killing a nundu over making five horcruxes for being less crazy,” La Pantera said from her lounge chair.

“Silence! I did not ask you, Pantera.”

“I don’t care. And need I remind you, you still need me.”

Voldemort didn’t reply to that, but he occupied himself with devising imaginative ways to off that aggravating woman as soon as he _didn_ _’t_ need her anymore.

* * *

Harry’s birthday was organised the same as usual: for lunch, there would be a small get-together with his and Hermione’s primary school friends, Paul and Tiffany—really their only remaining connections in the muggle world besides Sensei John, with whom they volunteered each summer. In the evening would be their party with their magical family at Sirius’s house. Sirius, of course, was very busy setting up the Cor Humanum Foundation to be able to supply Wolfsbane Potion to werewolves before school started, but he had bought another, more remote property for that purpose.

“Hey, mates,” Paul said when he and Tiffany arrived. “It’s great to see you. Happy birthday, Harry.”

“Thanks. It’s great to see you, too,” Harry said.

“It’s too bad we only see each other a couple times a year anyone,” Tiffany said. “You just _had_ to go to that gifted school of yours, didn’t you?”

“Hey, d’you think I could keep Hermione away from a gifted school?” Harry said. Hermione glared at him while the rest of them laughed.

“So what’s been going on at that school, anyway?” Paul asked.

“Werewolves, mate,” Harry said. “Werewolves everywhere. You know…the usual.”

Paul cracked up: “How _do_ you come up with these stories anyway?”

“God only knows,” Hermione cut in sharply, preventing Harry from pushing his luck further.

“So, Harry,” Tiffany said, “growing your hair out, I see?”

“Yeah.” Harry now had enough hair to completely cover his forehead, ears, and collar in hopes that it would hide his scar better and that the extra weight would make it behave. “What do you think?”

Tiffany rolled her eyes: “Harry, you should just go with a buzz cut. You couldn’t save your hair with a magic wand.”

Harry and Hermione laughed uncomfortably. “Nah, I tried that once,” Harry said. “It looked terrible.”

It really was too bad that they couldn’t see their muggle friends more often. Of course, many muggle-borns at school said they had a hard time relating to their own families, so in that respect, they were lucky. Paul and Tiffany had started dating last summer, and, surprisingly for a first romance, they were still going strong. This, of course, led Tiffany to ask if Harry or Hermione had their eyes on anyone.

“No, not yet,” Hermione said, but she was blushing as she said it.

Tiffany gasped: “There is! There is, Hermione! Come on, tell me!”

“No, there’s not!” she protested.

“Yes, there is! Harry, tell me who it is.”

“Don’t you dare!”

“Come on, Mione, Neville’s not that bad—OW!”

“Git!” she said punching him in the arm. “We’re just friends; that’s all. Harry and I have been teaching him some basic karate and stuff.”

“ _Oh_ , so you’re getting in shape together?”

“Enough! Ask Harry about his love life.”

Both of their friends’ heads snapped to Harry. He blushed a little, but he took it in stride. “I went out with this girl, Cho, from one of the other football teams a few times,” he said.

“Oh? Good looking?” Paul enquired.

“Well, yeah, but we both agreed we weren’t right for each other.”

“Oh…Anyone else, then?”

“No, not yet.”

“Too bad,” Tiffany quipped. “We could’ve doubled sometime.” She shot a pointed look at Hermione: “Or tripled.”

“So any crazy shenanigans with _you_ last year?” Hermione changed the subject.

“Well, I don’t think we’ll be able to top werewolves…” Paul said. “Unless you count the alien invasion.”

The party dissolved into more laughs.

* * *

The day after Harry’s birthday, the Grangers did their school shopping. This wasn’t too out of the ordinary except for one unexpected item on the list: dress robes for formal occasions.

“I hope it’s a school dance,” Hermione said as they made their way to Harry’s vault for money and for Hermione to exchange books from his parents’ collection. “It’s a real oversight that we haven’t had any.”

“I quite agree,” her mother said. “Hogwarts is really out of touch with extracurricular activities. No plays, no dances, only one sport…”

“Not much for music, either,” Hermione said, “although there’s a choir. Wouldn’t it be great if there’s a dance, Harry?”

“Yeah, great,” he said unconvincingly.

She rolled her eyes. “Boys,” she muttered.

They came to the vault, and Hermione looked over the rare books. Meanwhile, Harry wandered around, looking at his parents’ other heirlooms. He idly opened up the wardrobe—the one that held some of his birth parents’ fancier clothes. He pulled out a set of robes that had belonged to James Potter and held them up to himself. Too long. He had a few more inches to go to catch up with him.

Although…

“Say, Hermione, about those dress robes?”

“What about them?”

“I think some of these might fit you.”

She turned around and looked at what he was indicating. “Harry, I couldn’t!” she gasped.

“Why not?”

“But those were your mum’s.”

“Yeah. I think you’re about her size, from the photos.”

“But…but it just wouldn’t be right.”

“Sure it would. Mione, I’m sure my mum wouldn’t have minded sharing with you. And anyway, they’re only going to be collecting dust down here. You’ve been such a good sister to me, I can’t think of anyone I’d rather see show them off one more time.”

“I…well, I…” Hermione stammered. Her eyes were glistening at the compliment.

“I think that sounds like a lovely idea, Harry,” Emma said. “Why don’t you take a look, Hermione? I’m sure a tailor can adjust them to fit.”

“Um…okay…Thank you, Harry.” She hugged him before taking a look through the wardrobe. She held up a few of the dresses to herself after considering several and consulting with her mother, she selected one that Harry suspected had been Lily Potter’s favourite. It was a long, silky dress in emerald green the exact colour of his eyes. “What do you think?” she asked.

“Brilliant,” Harry said sincerely. “You know, there’s probably some matching jewelry around here, too.”

Hermione raised her eyebrows in surprise: “Harry, when you _do_ find a girl who’s right for you, I think you’re going to make her very happy.”

* * *

Dumbledore returned to Britain on the fifteenth of August, and none too soon, too, as he was expected to help out with the final stages of the Quidditch World Cup. It was all hands on deck at the Ministry trying to handle that. Sirius had got the entire Granger Family top box tickets to the final, along with himself and Remus, plus two more for dates for themselves. Remus wasn’t certain he would be going, though, since he would only have a day to recover after the full moon.

Harry had written to Dumbledore on a couple of matters while the old wizard was in quarantine, and, a little to their surprise, he agreed to come by and speak to him the night he got back. They invited Sirius and Remus over for the evening as well, since they were peripherally involved.

Dumbledore arrived via the door this time instead of the Floo that he used during the school year. He looked to be in surprisingly good shape considering that he had spent months fighting a gruelling war in darkest Africa, but he was dressed perhaps the most outrageous outfit they had ever seen on him. His robes looked like super-sized leopard-print, and it was an easy guess where they had come from.

“Good God, man, do you know how much robes like that are worth?” Sirius blurted.

“I am well aware of how much they _cost_ , Sirius,” Dumbledore replied stiffly.

“Oh, sorry,” he muttered.

“In fact, these were Ambassador Grayson’s idea. Normally, I am not an advocate for revenge, but in this case, I decided to make an exception and have these made from the beast’s hide. And they do have their practical uses.”

“As in they could probably stand up to a muggle hand grenade?” Remus suggested.

“I suspect they could.”

“Ahem, welcome, Headmaster,” Emma said. “Come in. You’re looking well.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Granger. I daresay those three weeks of rest did me some good.” They all settled into the living room, and Dumbledore produced a well-worn notebook—Harry’s draft of a book about his first year in Hogwarts, _Harry Potter and the Philosopher_ _’s Stone_. “I must say I was surprised when you decided to write a memoir, Harry,” he continued, “although I can understand your desire for people to know the real story as opposed to the fiction that is currently published. I take it you still want to publish this?”

“Yes, sir,” Harry said. “I’m tired of sitting through three years of the only things written about me being those silly kids’ books and Rita Skeeter’s articles.”

“I do understand. With all the wild stories that have been written about me, I have often considered writing a memoir myself. And I think you could publish this easily. It’s very well-written.”

“Thank Remus for that, sir. He did a lot of the rewriting.”

“Then my compliments to both of you. I hope you will understand, then, that there are some parts of the story that should not be made public.”

“Yes, sir,” Harry repeated. “That’s why I showed it to you.”

“Yes, and I apologise for not returning it to you sooner. It has been a very busy year. However, I recently had three weeks in which to give it my undivided attention. I have marked my redactions in the text.” He handed Harry the notebook. “I think I have left enough to tell a coherent story. I removed some sensitive details that we do not want publicly known, such as your address here, your wand being a brother to Voldemort’s, and, of course, all reference to the prophecy. I also omitted a personal conversation with Professor Snape, which he requested to be removed when asked, as well as some of your more sensitive political conversations with your classmates and much of the political manoeuvring that went into the passage of the Muggle Protection Act. I also removed your speculation on which of your classmates’ parents are Death Eaters. There is no need to poke that political hornets’ nest. All of those are minor points, though.

“On a more serious note, I naturally had to remove all reference to you being an animagus, which includes significant parts of your investigation into the Philosopher’s Stone. That will leave some gaps in the story, but it can’t be helped. I also inserted our cover story for the capture of Peter Pettigrew, and I took the liberty of removing all mention of the Marauder’s Map and your invisibility cloak.”

“Thank you,” Sirius said.

“You’re quite welcome. Now, the events surrounding Professor Quirrell and the Philosopher’s Stone were the most difficult to parse. Much of that was not made public, for obvious reasons. At risk of sounding self-serving, I have strongly downplayed my ill-conceived interim plan to involve you in the matter deliberately, Harry. I hope you will agree with me that the preventing the damage to the school’s reputation is worth that omission.”

Harry didn’t want to admit it, but he could understand where Dumbledore was coming from on that. After the basilisk and the werewolves, Hogwarts had enough cleaning up to do already, and Quirrell would only add to that even without casting doubt on Dumbledore’s competence. He exchanged a few looks with his family, who all reluctantly agreed, and he nodded to the Headmaster.

“Very good. I naturally had to gloss over how you discovered that Hermione had been kidnapped and how you followed her. And, most importantly, I removed all reference to Quirrell being possessed by Voldemort.”

“What?” the Grangers all said.

Sirius asked the obvious question: “Albus, you’re the one who’s been preaching for thirteen years that Voldemort is still out there.”

“I have Sirius,” Dumbledore said calmly. “However, to announce that he successfully infiltrated Hogwarts and attacked the Boy-Who-Lived again would only serve to cause a panic. It is enough that the public knows that Quirrell was secretly working for Voldemort.”

“How did you finish the story, though?” Harry enquired. “I only beat Quirrellmort because of my birth mother’s protection.”

“Indeed. I adjusted the story so that Quirrell tried to kill you on his own, Harry. You and Hermione defended yourselves, and I arrived in time to save you. This much has the benefit of being true. Quirrell was visibly ill, and Voldemort had promised him healing with the Philosopher’s Stone, so officially, he died of a combination of his illness and his injuries from the fight.”

That actually seemed very sensible once he laid it out fully. It wasn’t entirely true, of course, but it would definitely give people a much better idea of Harry’s role in events than they currently had.

“I think that’s going to work,” Harry concluded. “Thank you, Professor. Mum, Dad, do you think we can look for someone to publish it before school starts?”

Dan and Emma gave each other an uncomfortable look. They had spent the last nine years trying to avoid Harry’s fame. But still, they could understand his logic, and they were proud of their son for developing such a useful skill in writing the book. “I suppose we could if we looked it over one more time,” Dan said. “Sirius, Remus, do you know any good publishers in the magical world?”

“I would recommend Whizz Hard Books in Diagon Alley,” Remus said at once. “They’re the ones who published _Hairy Snout, Human Heart_. That book was my lifeline in those years I was on my own. They really understand people who are different or on the margins of society.”

“They’re not the ones who published _The Harry Potter Adventures_ , are they?” Harry checked.

“No that was Little Red Books. They have some good titles, like most of Bathilda Bagshot’s histories, but they were also Gilderoy Lockhart’s publisher. They nearly went under when he went to Azkaban.”

“Oh. Alright, then. And if you don’t mind, Professor, Remus and I have something else for you.” Harry handed over a notebook of his own.

Dumbledore looked at this new manuscript with a raised eyebrow, and then he smiled: “I should have known: _Harry Potter and the Heir of Slytherin_.”

“We just finished editing it,” Harry said proudly. “I even talked to Ginny to get her side of it and ask what she was comfortable including. That was Hermione’s idea.”

“I see you are being very thorough. Very well, I will recommend edits for this book, too.”

Of course, that wouldn’t be the last book. Harry had already started writing _Harry Potter and the Year of the Wolf._

“Now, I believe you also wanted to discuss the teaching of History of Magic at Hogwarts?” Dumbledore continued.

Harry deferred to Hermione on this one. “Yes, Professor,” she said. “Frankly, Professor Binns should have been sacked ages ago. We never learn anything in History class. Most students use the period as nap time and pass the exams by copying notes off the older students. A N.E.W.T. option isn’t even offered, as it easily would be in muggle schools. We need a real teacher in there.”

Dumbledore sighed. “Unfortunately, you are correct, Hermione,” he said. “I have thought of doing something about the class for a long time, but it has never seemed to work out. Since Professor Binns died in the middle of the school year and kept teaching, Headmaster Dippet judged that he could continue on in the following year, and there was no great effort to find a qualified replacement for him. His poor memory in his final years carried over into his death and lowered the overall quality of his class, so the problem only grew worse over time. By now, I fear the only person who is qualified to teach History of Magic is Bathilda Bagshot, who is far too old to do it herself.

“And for another thing, as ineffective as he is, Professor Binns is the most dedicated teacher I have ever seen.” The Grangers snorted at that, but Dumbledore said, “I do not mean that in jest. Consider what it means when a man dies and then rises from his chair the next day and keeps going right along to class. Ghosts only stay behind in this world because they cling to the life they had over the undiscovered country of death. For Binns to continue in his job means that the only satiation he had in life or death was in teaching, and I confess I haven’t had the heart to dismiss him.”

Hermione’s face softened with concern for the ghost. That wasn’t a story they had heard before. Most students joked that Binns was so old and absent-minded that he never even noticed he was dead. She wasn’t sure what to say to that.

However, Emma, ever the practical mother, wasn’t swayed. “That’s very unfortunate for him, Dumbledore,” she said, “but you can’t compromise the education of the entire country’s children for the sake of one man, be he dead or alive. We encouraged Professor Snape to improve his teaching methods in exchange for his protection at Hogwarts, and he did. If Professor Binns can’t do the same, I don’t think you can justify keeping him.”

“You may be right, Mrs. Granger, but with whom can I replace him? It must be someone familiar with European magical history and qualified to teach.”

“That’s why I wrote to you, Professor,” Harry jumped in. “We had an idea about that a while back, but we never got a chance to tell you. We don’t have a problem with a ghost teaching in general. It’s just that Binns isn’t actually able to. And we realised that there are a bunch of other ghosts in the castle who know more about history than any history book and _can_ teach.”

“Or lecture, anyway,” Hermione clarified. There are enough that we could get one for each century or so.”

Dumbledore’s bushy eyebrows merged with his hair, as if he had never thought of that before. “That’s a very interesting idea,” he said. “I think there is some merit to it, and at least some of the ghosts would be interested.”

“More than enough, I’d bet,” Sirius spoke up. “I’m sure Nearly-Headless Nick would do it. Let’s see; he died in 1492; then there was the Cavalier in…Moony?”

“1651,” Remus said. “And the Highwayman in 1739, Jacob Marley in 1836—”

“ _Jacob Marley?_!” the Grangers all gasped, except Hermione.

“What, you haven’t met him?” Sirius asked. “Weird bloke, that one, but I think he’d be up for it. And of course, there’s the Quidditch ghost, Edgar Cloggs—1920. That has you covered for everything since the Renaissance, at least.”

“Hmm, yes. I can see a rotation working very well,” Dumbledore said. “Although I do not think I would trust all the ghosts to teach well and especially unbiased. I do not think I could in good conscience set Dick Turpin on an unsuspecting class of first-years alone.”

“We were thinking you’d still need an actual teacher to moderate the class,” said Harry. “The good thing is that with the ghosts knowing all the history, they wouldn’t have to be an expert. It would just have to be someone who has a decent background knowledge and some natural talent for teaching…” He trailed off in thought and then flashed a grin that made Remus pale when he looked at him. “Say, Moony,” he said, “you sound like you know your history…”

* * *

Probably the last person Timothy Drucker of Whizz Hard Books expected to come through his doors was Harry Potter. Drucker was a keen reader of the written word, and he could easily read between the lines of the slop the _Daily Prophet_ put out. He could tell that Harry Potter was a very private person who didn’t like a lot of attention.

So why was he here? Could it be about those children’s books? Surely, he must know that those were printed by a different publisher.

“Excuse me, sir,” the boy said. “I’d like to speak with the manager, please.”

“I—I am the manager,” he stuttered. “Timothy Drucker, at your service, Lord Potter.”

“Excellent. I have a book I would like to sell you, Mr. Drucker.”

“A—a book?” Drucker’s voice broke.

The Boy-Who-Lived said nothing. He just laid a typeset manuscript on the counter. Drucker wasn’t used to typeset manuscripts, but he appreciated the readability. Sirius and Remus, who had tinkered with such things years ago to help out Lily, had bewitched a typewriter to take dictation, so Harry could get through the whole thing in a couple of days.

The title page of the manuscript read:

_Harry Potter and the Philosopher_ _’s Stone_

_The True Story in His Own Words_

_By Lord Harry James Potter_

Timothy Drucker fainted.

“Wow, I never thought you’d have that effect on a grown man, Harry,” said Hermione.

When he came to, Drucker’s concerned assistant manager was standing over him, wand out. However, Priscilla needn’t have worried, as the first words out of his mouth were a slurred, “How do you feel about a Christmas release, Lord Potter?”

* * *

The phase of the moon had to be just right for this, and the man dressed as a DMLE bureaucrat would only get one shot. He wouldn’t have time after this month, and he couldn’t afford any mistakes. Fortunately, he knew very well from his father just how the system worked, and he made it to the right door.

“Hello, cousin,” said a whispered voice.

“Cousin?” a woman said shakily from inside her cell to what looked like two Ministry officials. “What’re you talking about? I don’t have a family.”

“Come, now, don’t you remember me? The times we went swimming in the pond behind my late father’s manor? Do you remember that one time you caught a frog in your teeth? I never did figure out how you did that.”

“Barty Junior?” Artemis Crouch gasped, leaping up and pressing against the bars to clasp his hands. The man outside didn’t look like the man he claimed to be, but there were ways to fake that. And only one living person knew about that particular incident. “You’re supposed to be dead! And if you’re not, you’re supposed to be in here with me.”

“Things are not always as they appear, Arti.” He reached up and plucked a hair from her head.

* * *

Frank Bryce had been the gardener for Riddle Manor for fifty-two years, even though no one had actually lived there for thirty-seven of them. The Riddles themselves had died in 1944 under mysterious circumstances. Actually, “mysterious’ didn’t even begin to describe it. Frank himself had been arrested for their murder, since he was the closest to the Riddles and the only person seen near the manor that fateful day. But the police couldn’t even figure out _how_ the Riddles were killed, let alone who did it. The official word was that they had been _frightened_ to death, but even that should have produced signs of a heart attack, which they didn’t show. It was as if they had simply dropped dead that day.

Frank knew that the real murderer just _had_ to be that dark haired teenage boy he had seen at the Manor that day, but the police were convinced Frank had made him up. Still, they had to release him, and he defiantly stayed in the gardener’s house from then on, no matter what the people of Little Hangleton thought of him or how much those annoying bobbies tried to harass him.

The house went through a succession of owners who never stayed long, perhaps because they heard the rumours about Frank, until 1957, when some wealthy gentleman named Jeremy Jaffe bought the place and then apparently forgot about it, as it had stood empty ever since. But Frank was still being paid to tend to the gardening, so he wasn’t complaining.

And then, one night in August, Frank saw something that he had not seen in thirty-seven years. There was a light on in Riddle Manor. Or at least, he thought there was. It was strange: a thin, shimmering sort of light, as if it weren’t completely there. He wasn’t sure what was happening, but he limped up to the house to investigate. When he got into the kitchen, he was in for a shock. Not only was Riddle Manor in pristine condition—no dust, no rust, no clutter—but it actually looked _lived in_ , as if someone had moved in a couple months ago and cleaned the place up. But that was impossible. He would have noticed.

The only activity he could hear came from upstairs so he crept up to take a listen.

“Master Dark Lord, sir, there is still being more in the bottle.”

“Not now, Winky. Milk Nagini to refill it when she returns.”

Frank stopped in confusion. The first voice—Winky—sounded like a little girl and sounded very frightened. She had called the other one “Master”—“Master Dark Lord,” no less. That wasn’t a good sign. The second voice was also high, but sounded more like an effeminate man, if he didn’t miss his guess.

“I’m surprised you’re trusting Barty with such an important mission two days in a row, Voldemort.” It was a third voice, this one clearly a stern-sounding woman. She had a foreign accent—Latin American, maybe—but she sounded like she had more control of the situation than either of the others. That just raised more questions. Why would she tolerate that treatment of a little girl? Was she in on it? The wife, perhaps?

“Barty has proved by far my most faithful servant, Lady Pantera,” the high, cold voice said. “His Polyjuice Potion has been tested to last many hours, and I made it clear that his first priority was to return without getting caught. He will not stray from the true mission.”

Voldemort? Pantera? Polyjuice? Frank thought his hearing was going. These people weren’t making any sense.

“You know how tight security is all over the country right now,” the woman said.

“Because of the Quidditch World Cup, of course. I remind you that I questioned and Legilimised Barty _very_ carefully about his plan. Witches and wizards are pouring in from all over the world, and the Ministry is on high alert—at the World Cup. _Azkaban_ will be on alert, but understaffed, as security will be diverted, and Barty was to be in and out hours before moonrise. A human-to-werewolf Polyjuice transformation during the full moon is lethal. That has been known for some time.”

“And Barty makes sure Bertha can’t talk no more.”

That was a fourth voice! A deep-voiced man. Frank was reeling. These people were talking about magic—like witches and broomsticks magic—and it sounded like they were trying to kill someone, too. He had to do something. He was about to move, but he was stopped when he heard the spine-chilling howl of a wolf in the distance. He wasn’t sure why it halted him so, but the people in the upper room reacted.

“Ha! Looks like his plan worked, Jaguar Lady!”

Christ! There were five of them now, plus apparently one or two others who were out of the house—something to do with that wolf. This one was another woman, but crasser and less cultured than the other, more like the deep-voiced man. Her jibe was followed by a growl that sounded like it could have come from an actual jaguar.

“Do not insult our…guest, Alecto,” the high-voiced man said. “But she is correct. Barty has succeeded in his mission, and we have another player available. Hmm…Most unfortunate that Potter foiled the attempt to alienate werewolves, or we would be in a better position to recruit,” he mused.

“Well, with this many of us, why don’t we just go for a direct attack?” the foreign woman said. “Why this convoluted plan with the Tournament?”

“Because it would elicit a swift and harsh response,” he replied sharply. “If it matters, I assure you we will not be idle during this time. I will recall my followers one by one while we wait and build up my resources and recruiting. By the time I have Harry Potter in my grasp, we will be ready to fight.”

The foreign woman sighed loudly. “I still think you’d be better off without bothering with the boy, but fine, you’re the one paying.”

This was too much. It wasn’t just a couple of murderers. It was a whole damn crime ring! Frank could only understand about half of what they were saying, but it was like they were gearing up for a war. Against whom? The police? He might take them up on that, but not if they were going to kill a kid. This Harry Potter boy, whoever he was, seemed to be at the centre of it.

It was time to act. He started to creep back down the stairs and—SNAKE!

The snake that was slithering up the stairs was huge—easily twelve feet long. It looked like a python, but Frank caught a glimpse of fangs the size of steak knives in the dim light. He pressed himself against the wall, certain he was about to die, but the snake slunk on by him and into the criminals’ room. The high-voiced man began hissing, and the snake was hissing back.

With a start, Frank realised that maybe this really _was_ magic. _That man could talk to snakes._

“How interesting,” the man said. “We have another guest. Winky, please let him in.”

“Yes, Master.” It was the little girl again. Frank snapped out of it and prepared to act. He would grab the girl when she opened the door and get out of there as fast as he could.

Then the door opened.

 _It_ wasn’t a little girl. It _was_ little, and possibly female, but it was definitely not human. It was three feet tall, with big, pointed ears like a bat, huge brown eyes the size of tennis balls and a clown nose the shape and colour of a ripe tomato. It was scarred and downtrodden and appeared to be wearing a pillowcase, and Frank considered grabbing it and running on general principle, but it opened its mouth and squeaked, “Please be coming in, sir.”

Too confused to do anything else, Frank obeyed. He surveyed the room. A surly, lumpish-looking man and woman sat against one wall. A tall, Latin-looking woman—middle-aged, but still very elegant—lounged against the opposite wall like she owned the place. The remaining man must have been sitting in the chair in front of the fire with his back to him, and he must have been almost as small as the Winky-creature, for Frank couldn’t even see the back of his head. The snake was curled around his chair.

“Ah, Mr. Bryce, I believe,” the high-voiced man said from the chair.

Frank paused and replied, “Who wants to know?”

“You _are_ Frank Bryce,” he asserted.

“How would you know?”

“Oh, but we have met before. You know me as Jeremy Jaffe.”

“Jaffe? Bloke who bought the house? You finally moved back in?” Frank was so surprised that he momentarily forgot about the murder bit.

“The location recently became convenient for me. But it is supposed to be hidden. How did you get in?”

“I saw a light in the window. I thought it was some kids broke in.”

“Damn.” It was the Latin woman. “Chameleon Ward must be wearing off. Must be the cooler climate. I’ll have to reset it.”

“See that you do,” the man—apparently the leader—said. “You heard everything, Muggle?” he asked Frank.

The apparent insult reminded Frank of what was going on: “I heard enough to interest the police. I’m calling them. And if I don’t get back, my wife will.”

“Do not lie to Lord Voldemort. He always knows. You have no wife, Muggle.”

Frank was getting angry rather than frightened, now. Strangely, he was itching for a fight for the first time in years. “Oh, you think you’re so smart, Lord I-Talk-About-Myself-In-The-Third-Person? Why don’t you turn around and face me like a man?”

There was a long pause from the chair. The lumpish pair and the little creature sucked in a breath. “Amycus, turn the chair around,” he hissed.

The lumpish man stood and nervously walked forward and turned the chair around. Frank was frozen in terror when he saw what sat in it. The… _thing_ pointed a stick at him. “As you can see, I am far more than a man, Mr. Bryce,” it said. “I’ve been meaning to make my sixth horcrux for some time. You’ll do.”

“You’re making a mistake,” the Latin woman said in a sing-song voice.

“I did not ask your opinion. _Avada Kedavra_.”

* * *

“AHHHHH!”

“Harry! Harry! Wake up!”

Harry Potter jolted awake and sat bolt upright in bed. He winced and clapped a hand to his forehead before he knew where he was.

“Harry, what’s wrong?”

“Huh?” Harry opened his eyes, squinting into the light. “Hermione? Mum? Dad?”

“We’re here, Harry,” his mum said. “Is it your scar?”

“Ugh…yeah.”

“You were screaming fit to wake the dead,” Hermione said worriedly. “I thought a werewolf had broken in. It’s full moon, after all.”

“No, no,” he said, still rubbing his head. “It was…I had a dream.”

“A dream?”

“Or maybe a vision. I don’t know.”

“Here, let me see that.” Emma pulled his hand away and lifted his fringe to see his scar. “Well, it _looks_ normal.”

“Felt like someone touched a hot wire to it, though.”

“That doesn’t sound like a normal dream, son,” Dan said. “And the last time your scar hurt like that was when Voldemort was around in your first year,” he added urgently. “Do you think he’s around?”

“What? No, it couldn’t be. It was…” He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to remember. The dream was fading so fast already. “He was in a house somewhere—fancy house. Nothing like around here.”

“You saw him?” Dan gasped.

“No. No, I didn’t. I…I heard him, though. There were people with him, and I heard…” He trailed off, not wanting to repeat it out loud: _Avada Kedavra_. Most people flinched at the name of Voldemort, but Harry much more sensibly flinched at those words. “He killed someone, I think…He killed an old man.” His family gasped. “And…and I think he was planning to come after me, too.” They gasped again, although Harry thought they should have expected that bit.

“We should call Dumbledore,” Hermione said.

“Yes, definitely,” Emma agreed.

“Do you think we need to?” Harry didn’t want to disturb the old man at this time of night.

“Dumbledore said to contact him right away if anything strange happened, and I think this definitely qualifies,” Emma said. “He says there are disturbing rumours floating around. Dan, go call him, please.”

Dan went downstairs to call Dumbledore through the Floo while Emma made sure her son was alright. He returned a few minutes later: “We’re fine. He says there’s no danger here. Harry, he said to write down everything you remember before you go back to sleep. He’ll bring Sirius over in the morning to talk to you. Remus will probably sleep through it.”

* * *

Harry obeyed and wrote down every detail he could remember. It was surprisingly little considering how vivid the vision had seemed at the time. It may not have been a dream, but it was certainly slipping away like one. Dumbledore and Sirius arrived before breakfast, both looking very concerned. They read over his notes before questioning him.

“I remember seeing four people in the room,” Harry explained. “I didn’t know any of them, though. There was this really ugly couple, and a woman with a foreign accent, and the old man. I think there might have been an elf or something, too. And I heard a snake. It was speaking Parseltongue.”

“Then you didn’t actually _see_ Voldemort?” Dumbledore asked.

“No, I didn’t,” he replied. “I couldn’t see him, but…it was like he was close. Actually, it was like he was talking right in my ear.”

Dumbledore frowned harder. “Where, exactly, were you positioned in the vision?” he asked. “Were you standing with the others in the room? Or perhaps floating above the scene?”

“No, no it was weird. Like I was three feet tall and looking up at all of them—but I don’t think I was the elf or anything. I mean, that wouldn’t make sense, would it?”

“No. No, not the elf,” Dumbledore mused, seemingly to himself.

“Albus,” Sirius whispered. “You think this has to do with you-know-what?”

“Most likely—later, Sirius,” he whispered back. Harry was about to ask what that was about when Dumbledore said, “Harry, I am sorry to say that I believe what you saw really happened.” Harry nodded. He had more or less expected that by now. “I told you a year ago that your Parseltongue ability was transfered to you when Voldemort tried to kill you. From this incident, it is clear that he unwittingly did more than that. You share a kind of psychic link with Voldemort, by which you sensed his surroundings when he was feeling strong emotions—likely emotions associated with killing the old man.”

“You’re sure you can’t describe any of them any better?” Sirius pressed.

“No, sorry. I’d know them if I saw them…but wait, couldn’t we use a Pensieve for that, Professor?”

Dumbledore shook his head: “I’m afraid not. The magic of the Pensieve shows your physical surroundings—information gained by your physical senses. A Pensieve memory would merely show you lying in bed.”

“Oh.”

“This is a serious matter,” he insisted, and Sirius showed how serious it was by not interrupting with a joke. “If Voldemort has access to your mind, it could be very dangerous. Why did you not use your Occlumency?”

Harry looked down at his shoes: “I’m sorry, Professor. I didn’t realise I needed to until I woke up. I could do it if it happened again.”

“Do so. If you should happen to have another vision like this one, use your Occlumency at once, and inform me afterwards.”

“Yes, Professor.”

“I want to make this very clear. Any information you may gain is less important than keeping Voldemort out of your mind.”

“I understand.”


	85. The Quidditch World Cup

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: These theories were based on the hypothesis that all the Harry Potter in the universe was created in one big JK Rowling at a particular time in the remote past.

_“A pleasure doing business with you, Mr. Fudge.”_

_“I admit I’m surprised to be saying this, but likewise, Mr. Major.”_

* * *

The Quidditch World Cup was a marvel of modern magical engineering, logistics, and diplomacy. Fully ten percent of the witches and wizards in the world were set to attend the final, with a large minority of them arriving by Portkey in the final two weeks, all set up and provisioned in a tent city outside a large, custom-built stadium that had to go up in a week and be torn down in a week when it was all over, leaving no trace behind.

This year, there was a big change to the Quidditch World Cup. The muggle Prime Minister, John Major, had insisted on getting involved, and the long-forgotten name and title of Maxwell Barnett, the Royal Court Magician, also enjoyed…a small amount of attention in the magical press. The British Wizengamot and the International Association of Quidditch were hesitant at first to get the muggle government involved, but the opposition quickly faded when it was announced that the Statute of Secrecy would not need to be enforced at the site. And that was before they even considered the actual reduced enforcement costs.

The muggle government had closed off a large tract of publicly owned land for the summer under the pretence of a military exercise, which would neatly cover up any strange goings-on there. The British Ministry rented out the land at a fair price, converted directly from galleons to pounds by the goblins for a “reasonable” fee, to be recouped in ticket sales and campsite rentals. That meant the witch and wizard attendees could pay in magical money, making everything run much smoother. The muggle government got some nice windfall cash, the wizards of the world could show off their magic to each other, and Fudge looked good for negotiating such a great deal. Everyone would win.

Sirius Black, being rich, influential, and godfather to the Boy-Who-Lived, naturally bought eight Top Box tickets for the final—four for the Grangers, two for him and Remus, and two for their dates, Victoria McKinnon and (over Remus’s protests) Tonks. Sirius and Tonks would be “on call” for general security, but they could write that off as providing security for Harry. Indeed, Dumbledore had requested tight security around Harry for this event, since it was a public event where his schedule was known in advance. He had been reading the signs, and Harry’s vision the previous night was only the latest clue added to an alarming list.

Sirius got a Portkey at a decent hour—after sunrise. The Grangers had only travelled by Portkey a couple of times, and they weren’t enthusiastic about it, but it was the only way into the camp they could use. The outgoing Portkey wouldn’t be until the next day, so Sirius had brought two magical tents—bigger on the inside. Remus had shown up, walking on his own feet, albeit leaning on Tonks’s arm for support. The werewolf wasn’t sure whether to be thankful or angry at Harry for volunteering him for a job teaching _History_ , of all things, and as he frantically tried to put lesson plans together in the middle of a full moon hangover yesterday, he was leaning towards annoyed, but he set that aside today for the sake of their mutual love of Quidditch. Everyone was excited for the day. They barely even noticed the death notice for Artemis Crouch in the _Prophet_ , and they certainly didn’t think anything of it.

The campground was one of the most fantastic places the Grangers had ever seen. Multicoloured, magical tents covered the landscape, and in between, every type of magical wares was on display. Tiny children rode around on toy broomsticks while their parents cooked on obviously-magical grills. Salesmen were Apparating all over the place with trays of arcane merchandise. The Grangers bought some fancy Omnioculars to watch the match. Large sections were reserved for particular national groups (or more strictly, language groups, which was the easiest way to break things down in the small magical world), each bedecked in their national colours. Now that it was down to the final, though, Irish green and Bulgarian red overshadowed them all. Most of the world’s magical schools and a lot of professional Quidditch teams also had tents to represent themselves.

Harry and Hermione saw quite a few of their friends there. Probably most of Hogwarts was around somewhere. They ran into Seamus Finnigan and Dean Thomas in the Irish section, said hello to Luna Lovegood, who was running around, chasing invisible creatures with a butterfly net, and had a nice talk with the Weasleys who had managed to get tickets for right below the top box. Sirius introduced them to Ludo Bagman, the Director of Magical Games and Sports, who had sold him the tickets. Bagman was a former Beater, like Sirius, but had also played professionally. He was tall and blond and had a boyish face, but had gone a bit to seed in his middle-age. He was taking bets on the match, but he got nervous and excused himself when Remus asked, apparently knowing something of his reputation, if he was actually good for them.

The most interesting meeting came when they walked by the French section of the campground and some of the few people who could recognise Harry without his scar showing spotted them. They first noticed when a young, female voice cried out, _“C’est ‘Arry Potter! C’est ‘Arry Potter!”_ and a little girl with silver-blond hair ran out to greet them. Sirius and Tonks started to draw their wands at the disturbance, taking their job seriously, but they relaxed when they saw it was only a child, and a very cute one at that. Harry himself was momentarily confused, but Hermione was the first to recognise her.

“Gabrielle Delacour!” she said.

“Oh, Gabrielle,” Harry recognised her. _“Comment ça va?”_

“I am…very good,” the little girl said slowly. “I ‘ave been…practising…my Eenglish.”

“So you have,” Harry grinned. “It sounds very good.”

Three other people were walking towards them: a very beautiful teenage girl, her even more beautiful mother, and a little, round-faced man: the Delacours. Two years ago, the Grangers had run into the Delacours in France and felt refreshed to have a conversation with people who did not buy into Harry’s fame. One year ago, they had helped them acquire mandrakes to cure Hermione when she was petrified by Slytherin’s basilisk, so they were certainly counted as friends.

“‘Arry Potter, eet ees good to see you,” said the teenage girl, Fleur. She kissed him on each cheek in the traditional greeting, and Harry made and effort to return the greeting without blushing, which wasn’t easy, since she was part veela. “We wondered eef we might see you ‘ere. You have grown a lot.”

“Thanks. I couldn’t very well stay away from the World Cup final, could I?” Harry replied. “We would have come to more matches, but we’re always so busy in the summer. How have you been? Have you graduated yet?”

“No, I ‘ave one more year. I am very well. I finished our sixth-year exams first in my year.”

“Oh, I’ll let you talk with Hermione then.” Fleur giggled while Hermione blushed and glared at him.

“Hello, ‘Arry Potter, Monsieur and Madame Granger, ‘Ermione,” Fleur’s and Gabrielle’s mother said. “I ‘ope you are all well. I see you are ‘ere wis friends?”

“Oh, yes,” Harry said, “this is our godfather, Sirius Black, his date, Victoria McKinnon, our honorary Uncle, Remus Lupin, and my cousin Tonks—just Tonks.”

The Delacours exchanged some excited words in French, and Madame Delacour approached Sirius and said, “Lord Black, we ‘ave been following ze British politics, and we would like to zank you and ‘Arry for your work to ‘elp werewolves. Veela are not treated so badly, but we care about anyone working to ‘elp non-’umans.”

“Well, thank you, Madame. Obviously, it’s an issue that is very close to us.” He tilted his head towards Remus.

“Of course. We wish you luck in your continued efforts.”

They moved on to their campsite and settled in until evening. The stadium itself was like something out of fantasies of Paradise. Seemingly made of glowing gold, it was equal to the largest of muggle stadiums and much taller, towering fifty stories high and wrapping around the pitch, giving everyone a close-up view of the action. On a tip from the Prime Minister, magical lifts had been installed around the perimeter—handicap accessibility and all that. A huge, magical blackboard opposite the Top Box displayed advertisements, making the stadium look almost unsettlingly normal. A handful of other witches and wizards came into the Top Box over the next half hour, but the main party arrived with Minister Fudge.

“Ah, Harry, my boy,” the Minister said, shaking his hand warmly. “It’s so good to see you and your family. How are you?”

“Er, just fine, Minister,” Harry said stiffly. Fudge was obviously trying to make it look like they were on good terms, which they weren’t, what with Fudge being so much in Lucius Malfoy’s pocket and opposing Harry on his most important political issues.

“Harry, I’d like to introduce you to our two honoured guests,” Fudge said, motioning to two wizards beside him. The man on his left was pale with dark hair and heavy eyebrows and was dressed all in red. “This is Mr. Oblansk…Obalonsk…”

“Oblonsky,” the second man said.

“Thank you. He’s the Bulgarian Minister for Magic, anyway. Doesn’t speak a word of English. Fortunately, the Ambassador, here, is as brilliant with languages as poor old Barty Crouch was.” He motioned to the second man, who was dressed conspicuously in green and yellow. This man had brown skin, grey hair, and piercing amber eyes that seemed to stare into Harry’s soul when he looked at him. “This is Edward Grayson, Ambassador-at-Large for Australia. Gentlemen, this young man is Harry Potter. I’m sure you know who he is—the boy who survived You-Know-Who—he killed a basilisk last year—”

The Bulgarian Minister’s eyes flicked up to Harry’s forehead as Grayson translated. Harry sighed and lifted his fringe. He normally wouldn’t bother, but he would make an exception for foreign dignitaries. The Minister pointed at his scar and started gabbing excitedly. Fortunately, Grayson was more sedate and shook Harry’s hand calmly. “G’day, Mr. Potter,” he said. “It’s good to finally meet you. I’ve read a lot about you.”

“And some of it might have even been accurate,” Harry quipped. Fudge’s eyes widened worriedly, but Grayson just chuckled. “Too right, Mr. Potter. The written word often gets things wrong. But is there any truth to the rumour that you are one of the most gifted wizards in Britain at wandless magic?”

Harry smiled: “Oh, _that_ part’s right. Although my sister is better…Hey, Hermione come here. This is my sister, Hermione.”

“Holy cricket, you’re the Australian Grand Sorcerer,” Hermione gasped when she shook his hand. “You helped Dumbledore defeat Kinani Ngeze and slay a nundu!”

“I see you’ve been reading about me, too. It’s a pleasure to meet you, Miss Granger.” He kissed her hand. Harry was surprised that he knew her correct surname. “I’m sure you know, then, that I’m a practitioner of wandless magic myself. If we can find the time, I’d like to discuss it with you sometime.”

“I know we’d both enjoy that, Ambassador,” Harry said. He was just introducing the guests to the rest of his family and the two dates, when Fudge pointed out another set of guests.

“Ah, here’s Lucius,” he said.

All of the Grangers and Sirius and Remus stopped and turned towards the entrance to the Top Box. They had all met before at one of Sirius’s New Year’s parties, but it was always a tense moment when you put the biggest purebloods around in the same room with muggles.

“Lord Black, Lord Potter,” Lucius Malfoy said, conspicuously not addressing any of the others.

“Lord Malfoy,” Sirius replied with a wary gaze.

“Aunt Narcissa,” Tonks addressed Mrs. Malfoy, knowing full well she was forced to recognise her as family by Sirius.

Unfortunately, it backfired when Narcissa replied with, “Nymphadora.”

“I thought you were trying to invest responsibly these days,” Lucius needled Sirius. “These seats must be very pricey, given your self-imposed ‘obligations’.”

“I know how to manage my own money, thank you,” Sirius bit back.

Fudge seemed to have misheard or wasn’t listening at all, because he cheerfully told his guests, “Lucius is here as my guest tonight. He just gave a _very_ generous contribution to St. Mungo’s Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries.”

Suddenly, Harry got an idea. Hermione gave him a warning look when she saw his grin, but he went ahead anyway. Putting on an exaggerated air, he said, “My godfather, Sirius, has been branching out into the Healer’s field as well. He just opened a clinic to supply werewolves with Wolfsbane Potion free of charge.”

The comment worked like a charm. Malfoy and Fudge looked like they’d bitten into a pair of lemons, not wanting to criticise the policy that they so vehemently opposed in front of the guests. Draco wisely restrained himself to giving Harry and Hermione a contemptuous look.

As the evening went on, the Grangers weren’t sure Grayson was translating at all. From the look of them, he and the Bulgarian Minister seemed to be having a conversation of their own, periodically grinning at Fudge over some joke he wasn’t getting.

The last two wizards to enter the Top Box were the Ministry organisers: Ludo Bagman, and David Monroe, the Director of International Magical Cooperation. Harry did a double-take when he saw Monroe. When he had seen him in the Wizengamot meetings, David Monroe had always looked a little uncomfortable, but now, he seemed perfectly at ease in some kind of leather robes and a broad-brimmed fedora that made him look like a dead ringer for Indiana Jones. He was sure there had to be a story behind that, but he didn’t have a chance to talk to him. They introduced themselves quickly and began the match right away, Bagman announcing.

“And now, put your hands together for the Bulgarian National Team Mascots!” he roared.

Harry didn’t know what the mascots would be, but his question was quickly answered when a hundred beautiful, silver-haired cheerleaders strutted onto the pitch. He wasn’t sure what was so delightfully otherworldly about them until Sirius called out, “Brace yourselves, they’re Veela!”

Dan looked noticeably light-headed at the sight, and Emma gripped his arm a little tighter to keep him grounded. Sirius was experienced enough as a ladies’ man that he looked completely unaffected. Harry wasn’t entirely sure how he would react to the veelas’ allure himself. When they had run into the Delacours in France, Fleur had thought he might be immune, but he was two years younger, then, and she wasn’t full-blooded. He felt that the veela were very attractive, and he would like to get closer to them, but that wasn’t saying much. After all, how would any teenage boy react to a hundred beautiful women?

Then, the veela started singing and dancing.

 _Nope, nope, nope, not immune. Just resistant_ , Harry thought. A sudden thought of doing a swan dive from the Top Box for sheer impressiveness flashed through his mind. He could slow his fall with wandless magic, and cats were good and surviving falls from great heights, and— _Occlumency! Occlumency! Occlumency!_ He wasn’t even sure whether Occlumency would help in this situation, but it seemed to do. Maybe it was just the mental distraction, but his irrational lustful reaction was forced down.

Harry looked around and found himself getting impressed looks from the women in the box, every one of whom was now physically restraining the man she was with, besides Hermione. “Occlumency,” he whispered, and his mother and sister nodded in understanding.

A male roar of anger rose up from the stands as the veela walked off the field, but the Irish fans quickly got over it as their own mascots appeared, a green comet made of leprechauns that flew in surprisingly fancy formations and rained down fool’s gold on the stands. Once they had finished their show, the teams took to the field.

“Dimitrov! Ivanova! Zograf! Levski! Vulchanov! Volkov! Aaaaaaand _Krum_!” Bagman announced. Half the crowd cheered as the Bulgarian Team flew a lap around the stands. Harry was nominally supporting Ireland, but he was especially interested in the Bulgarian Seeker, Viktor Krum, who had taken the Quiddith World by storm over the past two years. Widely regarded to be the best Seeker of his generation—and that at only eighteen—he had swept Bulgaria through the Tournament all the way to the finals, despite what had previously been called a weak offence. He took his opening lap with manoeuvres Harry had never dreamed of: flying backwards, upside-down, one-armed handstands, and more.

“Don’t even think about it, Harry,” Emma said.

“Oh, come on, Mum, the Firebolt’s obviously doing half the work,” he protested.

“Connolly! Ryan! Troy! Mullet! Moran! Quigley! Aaaaaand _Lynch_!” Bagman introduced the Irish team. Ireland had a brilliant Chaser Squad, but their Seeker, Aidan Lynch, was considered not to be anywhere near Krum’s level. This would be an interesting game.

“I think Mullet must be muggle-born,” Hermione said.

“Why?” asked Harry.

“Just look at his hair.”

Harry zoomed in with his Omnioculars and laughed. Mullet was sporting the most outrageous mullet he had ever seen.

“Hey, that looks neat,” Sirius commented. “Maybe I should try it.”

“Don’t even think about it, Sirius,” Remus said. “That hair went out of style in 1990.”

Everyone turned and stared at him.

“What? I spent most of the eighties in the muggle world.”

“See, this is why we’re so good together,” Tonks said, grabbing him and kissing him. They knew well her interest in muggle heavy metal music. Remus only squirmed a little. He still wasn’t sure if there was any hope for the two of them together, but she had been working hard to make sure he would be comfortable being seen with her, and she definitely wasn’t about to let him leave on grounds of being a werewolf. Maybe…

The game was Quidditch at a speed that Harry had never seen before. Bagman could barely keep up with the passes in his announcing as the players pushed their brooms—Firebolts all—and bodies to the limit. Harry knew from experience that the Firebolt, pushed to its full capabilities, was about as much broom as the human body could handle safely. Ireland scored three times before Bulgaria got on the board. Then, Krum pushed those limits still further as he dove for the pitch at top speed, daring Lynch to match him. Krum pulled out in time. Lynch didn’t.

“Oh my God, how is that legal?” Emma said.

“He’ll be okay,” Sirius claimed. And, indeed, he was right. It took a few minutes, but Lynch not only got up, but he started flying again.

“In the muggle world, you’d be pretty much _required_ to send in a substitute after a fall like that,” Dan said, “even if he could still walk.”

“I think you’ll find wizards are made of sterner stuff, _sir_ ,” Lucius Malfoy said smugly.

The match was short—certainly by Hogwarts standards. The whole thing was over in thirty minutes. The regulation Snitch just wasn’t fast enough for a game where the Seekers were on Firebolts. During that time, Ireland scored seventeen times, Bulgaria scored once, the referee tried to send the veela off the field for being too distracting, the veela got in a big fight with the leprechauns, transforming into their harpy forms and hurling fireballs across the pitch, and Krum took a Bludger to the face and kept flying.

Despite this Harry said, “It’s over.”

“Not if Bulgaria gets lucky,” Hermione said.

“Krum _might_ wait for Ireland to get ahead one more goal, but that’s it. After that, he’ll save his team’s dignity and swoop in and grab the Snitch.”

“Once he sees it.”

“He’s seen it,” Harry said with a faraway look in his eyes, directing his stare intently at the pitch.

“How do you know?” his sister demanded.

Harry smiled: “Because I spotted it two minutes ago.”

Everyone in the Top Box turned to face him in surprise, even Bagman. Even the Malfoys.

“It’s down there at the two o’clock position, about thirty feet up.”

Everyone stared. Draco Malfoy looked with his own Seeker skills and muttered, “Dammit, he’s right.”

“What? It’s easier when you’re not moving,” Harry said to their amazed looks. “Lynch’s seen it!”

All the heads in the Top Box snapped up and watched Lynch dive. Krum flattened himself along his broom and dove after him, somehow catching up and snatching the Snitch from under his nose. Lynch promptly crashed again and was nearly killed by a horde of angry veela.

“IRELAND WINS!” Bagman shouted. “KRUM GETS THE SNITCH, BUT IRELAND WINS! Good Lord, I don’t think anyone saw that coming!”

Harry’s, Sirius’s, and Remus’s keen hearing picked out shouts of glee from directly below them that sounded suspiciously like the Weasley Twins.

Both teams came up to the Top Box to greet the Minister. Most of the praise went to Ireland, of course, but everyone shook hands with both teams. Harry was eager to meet Krum. He was surprised to find he looked less imposing in person. True, Krum was taller and broader than Harry was, and wore a surly look (which was exaggerated by his bloodied face), but he was awkward and slouching on the ground. Harry wasn’t expecting to really be able to talk to him, but when the Bulgarian Minister embraced him, he muttered something to him that caused him to take a close look at Harry. Walking up to him, he said, “You, you are Harry Potter, _da_?”

Harry fixed him with an unblinking feline stare of surprise. “ _Da_ ,” he said. “I mean, yes, I am.”

“Den it is good to meet you,” he said, shaking Harry’s hand firmly. “I have been folloving your career. You sound very good.”

“Y-y-you have?” Harry stammered, nearly choking with surprise.

“Of course, Mr. Potter. I pay attention to all young Seekers who could become competition.”

“Competition?” he gasped. “You think _I_ could…”

“You are champion in your school, correct? Nine games and nine catches?”

“Well, sure, but that’s not a big…” Harry stopped as he realised that it _was_ a big deal. Even after all these years, he still forgot how small the magical world was. The professional Quidditch league in Britain included pretty much everyone who had played in school and wanted to continue, and almost all of them did at least a couple years because the time commitment was similar. And anyone who could anchor a champion House Team for multiple years was easily good enough to make one of the four national teams. Harry realised with a start that he was _already_ playing at a national level.

“Not many Seekers can catch Snitch every game,” Krum told him. “And your record is more dan numbers. I heard dat you caught Snitch once vit broken arm and another time vit faulty broom. And last year, I heard you dove half mile in hailstorm and landed safely vit Snitch and your opponent.”

“I still contend I could have made it down on my own,” an ingratiating voice cut in. “Draco Malfoy, Mr. Krum. I’m sure you’ve heard of me.”

“ _Da,_ Mr. Malfoy, I have. From game transcripts, it sounds like you are nearly as good as Mr. Potter.” Malfoy turned pink at being called second-best, while Harry was surprised that the game transcripts were accurate enough to assess that. Krum let no visible annoyance show, but he made his disapproval of the interruption known by excluding Malfoy from his next statement: “Mr. Potter, perhaps I vill even have pleasure of facing you in 1998 World Cup.”

“The “98 World Cup? But I’ll barely be out of school by then.”

“You vill be same age I am now. I deferred enrolment and took correspondence courses during group stage.”

“You had time to do school work on a world Quidditch Tour?” Hermione said in surprise.

Krum turned to her: “You are Mr. Potter’s sister?” She nodded. “I came out one year behind in school, miss,” he said. “I vill be finishing sevent year dis year, but if your broter is as good as reports say, I tink it may be vort it.”

“Damn, Harry, Britain’s youngest national player?” Sirius said with glee. “Your dad would be so proud.”

Harry was sure he would, he thought in a daze. He couldn’t believe Krum would praise him like that. Although, his mum might not be so pleased. Certainly, his adoptive parents didn’t look it. “Wow…Um…I’ve never really thought about that before, Mr. Krum,” he said, “but I’ll definitely give it some thought. And that was really brilliant flying, Mr. Krum.”

“Tank you, Mr. Potter. I hope ve vill meet again soon.”

* * *

Harry was beaming as he and his family made their way back to their tents. He’d never imagined competing in the 1998 Quidditch World Cup. He’d had a vague notion of spending the usual few years in the professional league, maybe trying for the national team, and _possibly_ making it to the tournament stage of the 2002 World Cup, but this opened a whole new world to him, even if his parents wouldn’t let him skip that year of school. Either way, Viktor Krum regarded him as a serious competitor. That was beyond his wildest dreams. He was sure he would sleep well that night, but alas, it was not to be.

With his feline ears, the sound woke him first in his family’s tent. In the distance, he could hear screams, people running, and explosions that could be mistaken for gunfire. It wasn’t a celebration; the singing had stopped. At best, it was a celebration gone horribly awry.

Harry was on his feet at once, fully alert. Grabbing his wand, his glasses, and his shoes, he strapped his holster onto his arm while he was already in motion, going to his sister’s room.

“Hermione!” he whispered, nudging her.

“AH!” There was a crack as Hermione, not used to Harry coming into her room, shot a wandless spell at him, which he blocked.

“SHH!” he said. “Listen!”

She stopped and heard the screams. “Oh my God, are they rioting?” she said.

“I don’t know, but I think we need to go.”

“Good idea.” Hermione grabbed her wand, shoes, and handbag while Harry rushed to their parents’ room.

“Mum, Dad, get up, quick!”

“Huh?”

“What?”

“What’s going on?”

Before Harry could answer, Sirius’s shout came from outside the tent: “OUT! OUT! EVERYBODY OUT! FIRE!”

That got Dan and Emma moving fast. They ran out of the tent into the arms of the rest of their group. “What’s happening?” Emma demanded, but a look around told the story.

The camp was burning. Tents were ablaze, and people were running for the woods in the distance. A tight group of wizards were marching through the campsite in formation. They didn’t seem to have faces, but on closer inspection, they could see they were wearing masks painted like skulls.

“Death Eaters!” Sirius said.

“Hope you didn’t pack anything breakable,” Remus yelled. He flicked his wand, and the tent rolled itself up into an irregular bundle, luggage and all.

All of the Grangers were worried enough, but Sirius’s date was in the worst shape. “Oh, Merlin, what do we do? What do we do?” Victoria said.

“Calm down, Vicky,” Sirius said. “We’re Harry’s security. We have to get them out of here. If they get their hands on a pair of muggles, they’ll kill them. Now, there’s four of us and four of them. Can you do Side-Along Apparition?”

“Yeah.”

“Good. Everybody, run for the field where we Portkeyed in, and _stay close_. As soon as we’re outside the wards, we’ll Apparate to my place. Dora? Remus?”

“We’re good,” Tonks said. “Dan, Emma, in the middle. Harry, Hermione, you stay between us, too, but defend yourselves as needed. Now, move!”

They ran. The campsite was mostly open ground, but they blended in well enough with the streaming crowd. Few of the curses that were being cast about came near them. They ran as fast as they could with the adult magic users in a tight protective formation. Dan and Emma were the weak links. They were in decent shape for their age, but they were the oldest and not in a physically active career. More curses began to fly as the rest of the Ministry security intercepted the Death Eaters. From the sound of it, things were getting pretty rough.

“Oh, hello, Harry,” a breathless voice sounded. Several wands swung in that direction, but were lowered when they saw it was just a small teenage girl with long, blond hair. On her opposite side, a tall, white-haired wizard was pulling her by the hand.

“Luna, are you alright?” Harry called.

“I’m—fine—” she called back, puffing, “but I think—I may need—to exercise more…This is tiring.”

“It’s alright, Moonbeam, we’re almost there,” Xeno Lovegood said, pulling her in a different direction.

“See you at school, Harry,” Luna called before both of them vanished with a pop.

“Good. We’re here, too,” Tonks said. “One to one, everybody hold on tight.” She grabbed Emma by the arm, and Dan, Harry, and Hermione each paired up with one of the others. “Go on three…THREE!”

There were four loud cracks, and, after a very unpleasant sensation of being squeezed through a tube, they all landed in a heap on Sirius’s front porch. The Grangers had never Apparated before and after that experience, they really didn’t want to do it again.

“ _Confundus_!” Tonks said, and a passing muggle on a late-night dog walk blinked in confusion and moved on. “Alright, we’re clear. Everyone still have all their fingers?”

Amazingly, they did.

“Was that one of those “signs’ Dumbledore mentioned he was reading?” Dan asked. No one answered.

“I have a bad feeling about this,” Harry said.

* * *

“Idiots,” muttered Barty Crouch Junior as he watched the party of Death Eaters advance. There were surprisingly many of them. It looked like perhaps all that was left of the inner circle, or nearly so. Sure, one more romp for old times’ sake, he thought. No thought of the Dark Lord actually returning. It made him sick. Still, his target was in sight, and he had perhaps his best chance to get close to him. He transfigured a skull mask of his own, slipped around the lines, and fell in from behind.

Lucius was getting sloppy in his old age, not having had the Dark Lord around to whip him into shape for so long. His long hair peaked out from under his mask, making his identity clear to anyone who cared to look. Barty made a beeline for him at once, pushing through the ranks and coming alongside him.

“Hello, Luci,” he whispered in his ear, grabbing him tight by the arm, “aren’t you forgetting something?” As Lucius stiffened, Barty raised his wand skyward and shouted, “ _Morsmordre_!”

Suddenly, the character of the spells changed. A barrage of ward-breaking curses punched a hole in the Anti-Apparition Ward, and the Death Eaters Apparated away in a panic before the DMLE could move in. Barty Apparated away, too, but he took Lucius Malfoy with him back to Riddle Manor.

* * *

“Lucius, my slippery friend.”

 _This is not good,_ Lucius Malfoy thought.

“How nice of you to send a message on my behalf.”

_How the hell is he still alive?_

“Tortured a few mudbloods, I hope? I see the muggles wised up and kept their own people away.”

_All dark lords claim to be immortal. It_ _’s supposed to be just talk._

“It’s too bad none of your “messages’ have had much effect,” said Voldemort’s tiny, constructed body. “Opposition to a Muggle Protection Act, which failed. Support for a bill for strict regulation of werewolves, which also failed.”

A feral-looking young woman crouching at the side of the room hissed angrily. Her cousin patted her on the shoulder to calm her down.

 _And how the hell is Barty Junior still alive?_ Lucius thought. There were two Azkaban escapees in this room, both of whom were supposed to be dead. Dead and buried. Bodies identified by Aurors and buried on Azkaban Island, and yet here they were. So who was in those graves?

“And I heard a most interesting rumour, Lucius, about the famed Chamber of Secrets at Hogwarts,” Voldemort continued lazily.

_Bugger._

“Ah, I see you have heard of it. Perhaps you have also heard how the Chamber was opened, and the monster inside was killed by two twelve-year-olds, a songbird, and an old hat?”

A tall, stately, and wicked middle-aged woman scoffed derisively. Lucius looked over and saw her polishing a wicked-looking black dagger.

“Oh, but where are my manners?” Voldemort said. “You know the Crouches and the Carrows, of course, Lucius, but allow me to introduce you to High Priestess La Pantera de Veracruz, who is assisting me on my current project.”

Lucius was well-versed in international politics, and he knew exactly who La Pantera was: a dark lady considered equal to his Master. _This is getting out of hand,_ he thought. _Now, there are two of them._

“So, given your poor track record acting on your own, perhaps your energies would have been better directed towards finding and aiding your Master.”

“My Lord, I was constantly on alert,” Lucius tried the only gambit he had. “Had there been any sign from you, any whisper of your whereabouts—”

“Do not lie to Lord Voldemort,” he was cut off. “My signs were enough, two years ago, to draw the Carrows out of hiding to search for me. I never thought I would see the day when they showed more intelligence than the Lord Malfoy.” The Carrow siblings both grinned smugly, then frowned as they thought through what he had said. “Your inaction is quite clear. What excuse have you?”

 _Double bugger._ Lucius said nothing.

“Fortunately for you, I must remain discreet at this time, and _you_ must remain above suspicion. Your sins will be punished when I have the luxury of being able to do it openly. Serve me faithfully until then, and I may be persuaded to lessen your punishment.”

“Of course, my Lord. You are merciful, thank you. What do you require?”

“First, Lady Pantera’s services do not come cheap. She has a taste for gold and exotic animals. You have both. Second, you will personally contact my other fickle followers in secret and bring them back into the fold. See that you do not arouse the suspicion of the Ministry, or Dumbledore, or, indeed, of Potter. When that is done, we will begin recruiting again so that by the time I am returned to my full strength, we will be ready to strike at full force. Our first move, or course, will be Azkaban. Breaking out two low-security prisoners is but a small feat compared with liberating the faithful in the high-security wing. Once reunited, we will be returned to our former glory.”

 _Is it just me, or is he talking even more like a demigod than he did before?_ “It shall be as you say, my Lord.”


	86. Fourth Year

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Many a small thing has been made large by the right kind of JK Rowling.

_“We can’t cancel Quidditch, Albus. It’s not fair to the players who want to stay in practice to play professionally, especially the seventh-years. This is their recruiting year.”_

_“And the fact that Gryffindor has won the Quidditch Cup three years running has nothing to do with it, Minerva?”_

_“That’s not the point, Severus. I contend that the entire Tournament arrangement is unfair. We’re bringing in over two dozen guests, and only one student from each school will be able to participate. If we’re to encourage international cooperation and friendly competition, shouldn’t we be holding more events instead of reducing our six Quidditch matches to three Tasks?”_

_“If Remus doesn’t mind taking over the Duelling Club, we can hold an interscholastic duelling tournament at the end of the year.”_

_“I’d be happy to, Filius.”_

_“These are all excellent sentiments, but consider the time costs. Minerva, what you are proposing would consume an additional fifteen Saturdays if we are to do it fairly, and there are also Hogsmeade visits and the new monthly seminars.”_

_“Is it really that bad, Albus? One of the most common complaints I hear from my muggle-born Hufflepuffs is our small selection of student clubs. In sports alone, I’ve heard that as many as half of muggle students participate in various sports compared with ten to fifteen percent for our students in Quidditch.”_

_“From what I’ve heard, I think muggle schools have more staff than we do to handle that sort of thing.”_

_“Well, we may not be able to do anything about that this year, but really, the Ministry’s been acting like this Tournament is already this big a deal. We may as well meet their expectations.”_

_“Very well. Very well. I do appreciate your enthusiasm. If you present me with a manageable schedule for holding and supervising these events, I will be happy to authorise them."_

* * *

There were a number of discussions of what was happening in Britain over the next week, none of them very productive. Everyone agreed that it was very suspicious that Death Eaters attacked the World Cup so soon after Harry’s vision, but they couldn’t agree on what it meant. Dumbledore wasn’t even convinced they were related, although he confided that there _was_ renewed Death Eater activity in the country such as he had not seen since the early eighties. All he could say was to continue to be vigilant and to trust in the improved security of for castle for the coming year.

People certainly were _not_ trusting the Ministry’s security right now. Rita Skeeter wrote a scathing article twisting the attack to reflect as poorly on the Ministry as possible, and Sirius and Tonks were working overtime all week to clean up the damage.

The morning of the first of September was cool and rainy. The Grangers were soaked by the time they made it into King’s Cross Station. Hedwig and Crookshanks were both very unhappy. Platform Nine and Three-Quarters was shrouded in mist in the humid air, casting an ominous tone on the whole affair. Harry and Hermione were just about to get on the train when they heard a voice shouting their names.

“Harry! Hermione!” Neville Longbottom was running towards them flat-out with the biggest smile they’d ever seen on his face. His grandmother was a dozen or so paces behind him, struggling to keep up. It was so incongruous that they had no idea what was going on. Then, it got even more surprising as Neville skidded to a halt in front of Hermione and, with no hesitation, grabbed her face in his hands and kissed her three times…on one cheek, on the forehead, and then the other cheek.

The Grangers stared in shock. Sirius wolf-whistled. Hermione barely noticed. “Neville?” she whispered with wide eyes. “What was that?”

* * *

The day before, in his final visit of the summer, Neville and his grandmother walked into the Janus Thickey Ward at St. Mungo’s the same as always. They didn’t see Alice pacing back and forth along the ward, but that wasn’t so unusual, so they didn’t think much of it until they got to the back corner and saw that her bed was also empty. They spun around in worry and were greeted by a surprising sight. Alice Longbottom was lying in her husband’s bed, wrapped around him, with his arm around her shoulders. Augusta and Neville could only stare.

“Oh, she’s still there?”

They spun around again to see Healer Strout standing behind them.

“When did this happen?” Augusta said.

“Oh, she’s been doing that for the past couple of days, Madam Longbottom,” Strout said. “I know Hospital policy is not to let mentally-compromised patients share a bed, but they _are_ married, and they looked so sweet together that I just didn’t have the heart to separate them.”

Augusta looked back at her son and daughter-in-law. Each had a slight smile on their faces. “They do look sweet together,” she said.

Healer Strout gently woke the pair, though, so they could see their family. “I know it’s not much, but Alice has been sounding like she’s trying to talk lately.”

“She has been off and on for a while,” Augusta said.

“Hi, Mum. Hi, Dad,” Neville said. He sat on the foot of the bed as Alice murmured something unintelligible.

“My wand is up a tree,” Frank said. He was speaking a lot more clearly than he used to, but still not saying anything that made sense.

“Sure it is, Dad,” Neville said indulgently. “I’m going back to school tomorrow.”

“Nnnnnn…” said Alice, tilting her head.

“My wand can climb trees,” Frank replied with a smile.

Strout sighed: “Poor dear. Sometimes, he acts like he really understands what he’s saying.”

Sadly, most of the conversation went like that. Neville told his parents everything that was going on, though glossing over the riot at the World Cup. His parents didn’t react in any coherent way. The most pertinent response came when Neville mentioned he was going to enjoy exercising with Harry and Hermione again in the evenings, and Frank interrupted, “ _Mens sana in corpore sano_ ,” which meant, “A sound mind in a healthy body.” Everyone was surprised at that, but the moment passed as soon as it came, and they ignored it. They stayed there for a while until Neville ran out of things to say, and he and Augusta got up to leave.

“Cherry tree!” Frank yelled in a tone like he was trying to call someone’s name. Neville looked at him. “ _Carpe diem_!”

Neville forced a smile: “Sure thing, Dad.”

As they walked away, Alice rose from the bed, with her hand outstretched to Neville.

Augusta sighed: “Again, Alice? Alright, Neville, take it, whatever it is.”

Neville reached out to take the candy wrapper from his mother’s hand, but as he did, to his horror, she pulled her hand back. He froze, staring at her with a pained look. Healer Strout and even Augusta were shocked.

“Alice?” Augusta said.

But Alice wasn’t listening. She tilted her head to one side, as if deep in thought. She tilted it further and further until she was nearly looking at him sideways, and then tilted it back again.

The candy wrapper fell from her hand to the floor. Neville struggled not to cry.

Alice still looked confused, but at length, she spoke again: “Nnnn-N-N-N-Nevvillllle?”

“Mummy!” Neville hugged his mother so hard that they both toppled to the floor.

St. Mungo’s was briefly locked down that afternoon on fears of a contagious outbreak of mass hysteria. After all, when multiple Healers reported Augusta Longbottom sitting on the floor of the Janus Thickey Ward, crying like a baby with her entire family clustered around her, and Alice Longbottom, the most infamous hopeless case in the building, _talking_ again, what were they supposed to think?

* * *

“My mum recognised me,” Neville said.

Hermione’s eyes grew to the size of saucers. She had never imagined Neville’s parents would recover so well with the muggle medications they’d been giving them. “Oh, Neville, that’s wonderful!” she exclaimed. She hugged him back and kissed him once—on the cheek. “Come on; let’s find a compartment, and you can tell us all about it.”

Once they were seated, Neville explained to them a little more about his parents than he had before—like how his mum gave him a candy wrapper every time he visited, as if she were trying to connect with him and couldn’t figure out how. And how his dad would babble incoherently and get mad when no one responded to him. Even Hermione started to tear up when he spoke about how his mum, after twelve years, had suddenly pulled her hand back, but had instead spoken her first word since that fateful night.

“It was great,” he said. “It was like…well, like you could actually tell they’re my parents for the first time. Dad, too. He didn’t make any sense, but he acted like he knew what he was saying.”

“Really?” Hermione said with interest. “That sounds kind of like aphasia, Neville.”

“Like what?”

“Aphasia. It’s a speech disorder. It’s just possible that he really _does_ understand what he’s saying, but his brain is making it come out in some kind of code. I’ll write Mum and Dad and ask them to find a book about it. If they’ve come this far, then maybe speech therapy would be of some use to them.”

“Speech what?”

“Speech therapy. It’s…uh…it’s a type of muggle healing to help people with mental problems like them communicate better.”

“Muggles have Healers just for that?” Neville said incredulously. “How do they manage all that stuff?”

“Um…well, it’s kind of awful to say, but with muggles outnumbering wizards five thousand to one, it means there’s actually money in it,” Hermione explained.

“I’m really surprised they’ve come this far,” Harry said. “There usually isn’t much that can be done for traumatic brain injuries.”

“It must be magic,” Hermione reasoned. “It can do plenty of things that are supposed to be impossible. Plus, the doctors said the drugs might help them form new memories. If that’s true, it would be more about relearning than recovering.”

They promised to look into it and tell Neville what they found, and they settled in for an enjoyable train ride. Malfoy and his goons didn’t bother them this year, which was a bit of a shock. The one time they caught a glimpse of him, he looked like he had something else on his mind, and he barely sneered at them. The most antagonism they experienced—and that of a friendlier sort—was when Anthony Goldstein stopped by their compartment.

“So, Potter, I saw the grades came out for last year,” he said smugly.

“Yes, we saw them too, Goldstein,” Harry replied. Goldstein had narrowly beaten Harry in the grade average after Harry had edged him out last autumn. The implied gloating really didn’t become Goldstein, Harry thought, so he turned it around: “No hard feelings, I hope?”

“Huh? Why would I—”

Harry inclined his head towards Hermione.

“Oh, right. Of course, not.” The two boys were second and third in the class, not first and second. “And, er, you made a pretty good showing, yourself,” Goldstein added graciously.

“Thank you,” Harry said. He smiled a little and said, “Of course, you know I’ll have to beat you again this year.”

He grinned and replied, “You can try, Potter.”

Hermione rolled her eyes: “You boys and your rivalries.”

“You wouldn’t be saying that if either of us had a chance of catching up with you,” Harry teased. Hermione pointedly ignored that one.

The weather grew darker as they steamed north, and by the time they reached Hogsmeade, they were trudging through pouring rain and lightning to get to the carriages. Everyone was soaked when they got to the castle and none too happy about it.

There were two new faces at the High Table this year. One was expected, but the other was a surprise: an old, battle-scared man with a creepy false eye that seemed to have a mind of its own.

“Is that Mad-Eye Moody?” Harry said. “I thought he retired.”

“He did,” Hermione said. “He must be teaching Defence this year.”

“Has he gone mad? Cousin Dora says he’s super-paranoid. Why would he take a job that keeps killing people?”

“I don’t know. Dumbledore must’ve said something really convincing.”

“Maybe he _is_ mad,” Ron said from nearby. “My dad says he’s gone kinda barmy.”

“I dunno, but Snape doesn’t look happy,” Fred observed. Indeed, Snape was conspicuously glaring at both Lupin and Moody from his seat, looking much angrier than usual, especially for the Welcome Feast.

“No complaints there,” Harry said. “He could use someone to cut him down to size again.” He hoped Remus wouldn’t be above pulling a few pranks on the overgrown bat after he’d tried to screw over him and Sirius at the Wizengamot.

The Great Hall filled up slowly, what with everyone trying to dry off, not slip on the floor, and avoid Peeves. There were a lot of whispers this year about the inclusion of werewolves in the school, with people talking about Remus, Cedric Diggory, and Colin Creevey quite a bit behind their backs. Despite the political gains over the summer, none of them were very popular with their student body right now. One conspicuous incident came when Harry noticed a shuffling noise, and he looked over and saw Colin sitting at a distance from his house mates who had clearly just removed themselves in a fit of juvenile dining hall cliquishness. Harry stood up.

“Harry, what are you—” Hermione started nervously.

Harry raised his voice loud enough for a large part of his house mates to hear it and called, “Some Gryffindors _you_ are. Hey, Colin, come sit with us.”

Everyone stared at him. It was an unwritten rule (and probably written in Slytherin) not to call out one’s house mates in public, but in this case, it worked. The other Gryffindors were appropriately shamed as Colin smiled and hopped up to join them. Colin wasn’t looking very well. It had to be hard to be a muggle-born werewolf. The two scratches he had received from Greyback were prominent on his face, and he had lost weight, so that his face was gaunt and his eyes seemed to pop from his head. He was recovering, but slowly. Ginny patted the bench next to her, and he sat beside her, to her brothers’ surprise. However, they wisely didn’t say anything about it, and Ron was more preoccupied with complaining about what taking so long with the Sorting.

Harry was starting to wonder that himself as he surveyed the Great Hall. The place was looking more dreary, empty, and ominous than ever before, the house tables sitting half empty under the flashing lightning and dark, swirling clouds on the enchanted ceiling. Even the candles seemed dimmer than usual. It was as if a dark pall had been settling on Hogwarts for the past three years and had now reached its deepest shadow.

But everything changed when the doors burst open, and Professor McGonagall led the smiling first-years in, and they kept coming, and coming, and coming.

“Blimey, look at them all!” “This is gonna take all night.” “Where’d they all come from?”

“What is this?” Ron joined the whispers. “There’s like a hundred of them! How’d we get so many firsties?”

“Ron, think about it,” Hermione said. “When were all these kids born, minus nine months?”

Ron counted back on his fingers, and his eyes widened. “Oh.”

There had been a lot of celebrating after Voldemort was defeated the first time, and for months and even years afterwards, couples who had been holding off on having children (or more children) had at it, so it was unsurprising that the birth rate skyrocketed nine months after victory was announced. That day was the first of August 1982, which meant that the largest chunk of the subsequent baby boom was starting Hogwarts this year. Ron was right: there _were_ about a hundred of them. Many of them were waving to older siblings at the tables. From the awkward waves back, it seemed like practically everybody had a younger brother or sister in this year.

At the front of the line was tiny little Dennis Creevey, who was soaked from head to toe and had Hagrid’s moleskin overcoat sitting heavily on his shoulders. He waved to Colin and mouthed, _I fell in the lake!_ He looked absolutely thrilled about it. The rest of the first-years looked nervous, although many were enchanted by the sight of the Great Hall.

A thin girl with limp, brown hair and square glasses pointed up at the ceiling and said to anyone who would listen, “It’s enchanted to look like the real sky. I read about it in _Hogwarts, A History_.”

Harry laughed and said, “Look, Hermione, we found another one of you.”

“Ha ha,” she said sarcastically.

The excitement in the Hall rose to a fever pitch as the three-legged stool was brought out. Even the Sorting Hat looked excited, as if it had been waiting for this day for years. Its point was twitching, and as the tear opened in its side, it made a big first impression with its song:

 

_“WEEELLLLCOOOOOOOOOOOOME!_

_“Welcome, all of you, to Hogwarts!_

_“Welcome, all of you, to school!_

_“Did you know that here at Hogwarts,_

_“We’ve got a hidden swimming pool?”_

 

“We do?” Harry whispered.

“Sure. It’s in the prefects’ bathroom,” George answered.

“Why’s it telling the first-years?”

“Shhh!”

 

_“Welcome to spells and enchantments, potions, and friends,_

_“To Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, Slytherin!_

_“Welcome to the place our story begins, at Hogwarts!”_

 

The Hat had a few more verses that were closer to its usual fare of describing the houses, but it kept its song shorter than usual this year to get straight to the Sorting.

“Ackerly, Stewart!”

“RAVENCLAW!”

“This is gonna take a while,” Harry admitted.

A few students later, Dennis Creevey joined his brother in Gryffindor and was immediately introduced to Harry, who tried to remain polite upon receiving yet another fan. Professor McGonagall tried to move things along quickly, but the Sorting Hat couldn’t be rushed, and the older students, spoilt by several years of quick Sortings, were growing impatient by the time she got to the M’s.

“McDonald, Natalie!”

Harry’s ears perked up as the girl with the square glasses stepped forward and sat on the stool. The Hat took a minute before it said, “GRYFFINDOR!”

Harry applauded loudly and shot a mischievous grin at Hermione, who glared back at him. He waved the girl down and motioned for her to sit near him. “Hello, Natalie,” he said. “I’m Harry Potter.”

“Holy cricket!” Natalie squeaked. “I’ve read all about you! You’re in _Modern Magical History_ and _The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts_ and _Great Wizarding Events of the Twentieth Century_!”

“Oh…” Harry’s smile faded a bit, and Hermione giggled and nudged him back. “Um…I’m afraid none of those are very accurate,” he said.

“They’re not?” Natalie said in horror. “Oh, no. I was trying to read up on the magical world as much as I could.”

“Oh? You’re muggle-born?” Hermione said with sudden interest.

“Yes. No one in my family’s magic at all. My parents were ever so surprised when I got my letter.”

Harry sniggered. This girl sounded so much like his sister at that age. “Natalie, this is my sister, Hermione,” he said. “I think you two will get along great.”

“Robins, Demelza!” McGonagall called.

The Great Hall grew eerily quiet. Amid a background of whispers, a sickly-looking girl with reddish-brown hair, two scratches on her face, and a permanent limp walked towards the stool. Despite her obvious weakness, she sat straight with determination as McGonagall lowered the Sorting Hat over her eyes.

“GRYFFINDOR!” the Hat roared at once.

With a shout, Harry, Hermione, Colin, and Dennis shot to their feet, applauding loudly. For a couple of seconds, they were the only ones clapping besides the teachers, but soon, Neville, the Weasleys, the Quidditch team, and a few other Gryffindors caught on and joined them, and a smattering of people in Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw started clapping as well. Harry waved to Demelza and motioned for her to sit next to Natalie. Natalie didn’t understand what all that was about, but she introduced herself normally.

The rest of the alphabet ended quickly with Kevin Whitby in Hufflepuff and Nigel Wolpert in Gryffindor, and at that, Dumbledore stood up at the head of the Hall and said, “Tuck in!”

Natalie’s and Dennis’s eyes bugged out as the golden dishes were filled with food, and they eagerly loaded up their plates. Natalie must have been one of those people with a really high metabolism, Harry thought, given how much she was eating. Harry and Hermione both loaded up on protein, as usual for carnivorous animagi. So did the two werewolves.

“So, Natalie,” Harry asked, “any relation to Mary Macdonald?”

“Er, no, I don’t think so. Is she a witch?”

“Yes, but she was muggle-born, too. She was a friend of my mum’s.”

“Really? How’s it spelt?

“M-A-C?”

“Oh, no, I’m M-C. Sorry.”

“It’s alright.”

“How are you doing, Demelza?” Hermione asked the other girl.

Demelza swallowed and said, “Better. I’m fine most of the time, and I don’t feel so wiped out the morning after anymore. The long train ride was hard, though. And the Healers say there isn’t anything more they can do for my leg.”

“What happened?” Natalie asked, her curiosity getting the better of her.

Demelza lowered her gaze. “I was bitten by a werewolf last autumn,” she said.

“You’re a werewolf?” Natalie gasped.

She nodded.

“Cool!” Demelza looked up and gaped at her. “Or not cool!” Natalie said quickly. “I’m sorry. It’s just so exciting to see all the magical creatures here.”

Demelza was still gaping at her, but for a slightly different reason, now.

“Muggle-born,” Harry reminded her.

“Oh, of course. It must be perfectly normal to you,” Natalie replied. “Are there other creatures at Hogwarts? I saw the ghosts, and that poltergeist. And Mr. Hagrid must be some kind of giant—”

“Calm down, Natalie,” Harry replied with a smile. “There aren’t many. Professor Flitwick up there is part-goblin, Professor Lupin is also a werewolf, and there are house elves working in the kitchens.”

“And I’m a werewolf, too,” Colin admitted. “The same one got me last spring. And he got Cedric Diggory in Hufflepuff.”

“He was biting a lot of people on purpose,” Harry explained, “but the teachers finally caught him. Anyway, most werewolves are nice, normal people.”

“Oh, I’m sure they are—you are,” Natalie replied. “It’s only on the full moon when you have a problem, right?”

“That’s what _we_ keep telling everyone,” Harry said.

The feast was delicious and fun, as always, and he was glad to see Demelza warming up to Natalie despite her initial _faux pas_. He’d been worried about Demelza, and most muggle-borns had some trouble fitting in, so it was good that they hit it off. However, he blushed when Demelza told the story of how he and Hermione had saved her life and how much they had helped her over the past year.

After the puddings had disappeared, it was getting very late, but Dumbledore still had his announcements to make. “Welcome to Hogwarts,” he said with a smile that hid more worry than in past years. “It’s good to see all your smiling faces, especially this bumper crop of first-years. I must ask your attention for just a few minutes, for we have a very busy and exciting year ahead of us with many changes coming to our halls—”

But Dumbledore was cut off by a roar of thunder as the doors of the Great Hall banged open, and in walked a man with brown skin and amber eyes. He was chanting audibly, and the water that was soaking him steamed off, leaving him perfectly dry by the time he reached the High Table.

“Ah, Ambassador,” Dumbledore said. “So glad you could make it.”

“G’day, Dumbledore,” he replied. “Sorry I’m late. The weather held me up.”

“Quite understandable,” the older wizard said. “May I introduce Edward Grayson, Grand Sorcerer, Ambassador-at-Large for Australia, former Minister for Magic of Australia, and former Headmaster of Uluru Academy of Song and Dream.” There was excited whispering at the name as those who didn’t know were told about the pair’s exploits over the summer. “Given the various events of interest in Britain this year, Ambassador Grayson has taken a visiting professorship at Hogwarts in order to stay close to the action, and he will be giving a series of seminars on a topic that I suspect will interest many of you…” He paused as the school began imagining what super-powerful magic that might be. “The now-Professor Grayson is the world’s leading authority on wandless magic.”

Half the school gasped excitedly. They had all been dually impressed by Harry’s and Hermione’s shows of wandless magic over the past year, and by their claim that it wasn’t as hard to learn as everyone thought. With a world expert on the subject lecturing, maybe they could all learn a bit of it.

“We also have two new full-time professors here this year,” Dumbledore continued. “First, Professor Alastor Moody, retired Auror, will be the Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher.” There was some scattered applause, most notably from students like Susan Bones, whose families Moody had helped avenge. “And second, Professor Binns has agreed not to return to teaching History of Magic this year and to retire to a career of haunting the library.”

There were scattered cheers, some very enthusiastic, mostly from the Ravenclaw Table, but they were drowned out by a majority of groans. Too many students didn’t want to give up their nap time.

Dumbledore ignored the protests and continued, “History of Magic will now be taught by Professor Remus Lupin, who will be aided by a team of ghosts from various centuries who lived through many of the events you will be studying.”

That got some interest. There were some unhappy murmurs about a werewolf teaching, but the new format sounded interesting. Wizards didn’t normally pay much attention to ghosts, but many of them were fascinating to talk to if you got them on the subject of history. And _all_ of them were better than Binns, they agreed—including the Grey Lady, whom some believed was mute.

“As always, the Forbidden Forest is forbidden to all students without staff supervision, and Mr. Filch has asked me to inform you that his list of forbidden items now includes Screaming Yo-yos, Fanged Frisbees, and Ever-Bashing Boomerangs. The full list is posted outside his office.

“Now for our other special events: the Duelling Club and the end-of-year all-school Duelling Tournament will continue this year under Professor Lupin. However, the Inter-House Quidditch Cup will not take place this year—”

He was cut off by loud shouts of protest from the students, but he raised his hand for quiet at once.

“Careful listeners will note that I did _not_ say Quidditch had been _cancelled_ ,” the Headmaster said. “For this year’s Quidditch season, a special Northern European Academic League has been formed, which will be holding its own tournament here at Hogwarts. All four house teams will be able to participate. Team captains, please note that we will be running a tighter Quidditch schedule than usual, with the first match scheduled for the first of October.

“All this is due to a far more prestigious event that is starting in late October and continuing through the year: Hogwarts has been selected to host a revival of the Triwizard Tournament!”

“You’re JOKING!” the Weasley Twins shouted in unison.

“Oh, no, Messieurs Weasley,” Dumbledore called them out. “I am quite serious. The Triwizard Tournament is a very old tradition of the three Northern European schools of magic: Hogwarts, Beauxbatons, and Durmstrang. Beginning in 1294, the schools would take it in turns to host a tournament in which each school would select a champion to compete in three magical tasks. It was long considered an excellent way to establish ties among the participating magical nations. However, the Tournament was discontinued in 1792 because the death toll had mounted so high.”

“ _Death toll_?” Hermione whispered with alarm.

But Dumbledore answered her fears at once: “While there have been several attempts to revive the Triwizard Tournament over the past two centuries, this is the first that has received the backing of all three schools and the hosting Ministry, and with our joint preparations, you may rest assured that no champion will find himself or herself in mortal danger this year.”

“Mione, I have a _bad_ feeling about this,” Harry said.

“But Dumbledore says it’s safe,” Colin protested, overhearing.

“Yeah, that’s why—” Harry started.

“Shhh!”

“The heads of Beauxbatons and Durmstrang will be arriving with their candidate contenders _and_ their all-school Quidditch teams and interested duellists in October. An impartial judge will examine the entrants to determine which of them is most likely to succeed in the Tournament and will select the three champions on Halloween.”

“Now I have a _really_ bad feeling about this,” Harry said. Hermione rolled her eyes.

“The winner of the Tournament will receive a prize of one thousand galleons,” Dumbledore said.

“I’m going for it!” Fred said at once.

“Me, too,” said George. Indeed, a lot of students in the Hall suddenly seemed very interested in entering the Triwizard Tournment.

“However, in order to ensure the safety of the champions, it has been decided that only students who have passed their O.W.L. examinations may enter the Tournament. Additionally, entrants who will not be of age as of the thirty-first of October must have the written permission of their guardian—that is, their magical guardian—to enter.”

“Bad feeling hat trick, Mione,” Harry hissed.

“Harry, you haven’t passed your O.W.L.s!” she said.

“So?”

“So, you’re being paranoid.”

“Every time I’ve been paranoid, I’ve turned out to be right!”

“And now, bedtime! Chop chop!” Dumbledore said, oblivious to the Boy-Who-Lived’s concerns, although with plenty of his own.

“Wow, a thousand galleons,” Ron said to no one in particular as they climbed the stairs to Gryffindor Tower. “Wouldn’t that be great?”

“Uh huh,” Harry said absently.

“Too bad we can’t enter, eh, Harry?”

“Hmm?”

“Especially you. I reckon you could pull it off. What do you think?”

Harry gave him an annoyed look: “Oh, yes, Ron, I could win the Triwizard Tournament, and then, I’d be rich and famous, and all the girls would like me.”

Every girl in earshot giggled, except for Hermione, who glared at him.

“Well, you don’t have to be a jerk about it,” Ron huffed.

Harry sighed: “I’m sorry, Ron. It’s just that I get in enough trouble as it is. I don’t need to go looking for more. It’ll be nice to have everybody paying attention to somebody else for a change.”


	87. History Professor Remus

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: One JK Rowling, speaking truth, is a greater force than fleets and armies, given time; plenty of time.

“They’re called Blast-Ended Skrewts,” Hagrid said proudly.

Hagrid’s latest animal was a weird one, to say the least: ugly little lobster-looking things with underdeveloped shells that smelled like rotting fish. They were about six inches long—hatchlings, apparently—had no visible heads, and acted like they were completely blind. They could also produce sparks from their (presumably) back ends that propelled them forward. Hagrid also didn’t seem to know much of anything about them, even though he loved them just as much as the rest of his “interestin’ critters.”

“And just what is the _point_ of Blast-Ended Skrewts, Professor?” asked Draco Malfoy. “Do they do anything useful?”

Hagrid paused for a few seconds in thought. “Er, that’s next lesson, Malfoy. Today, yeh’ll jus’ be feedin’ ‘em. I ain’t had ‘em before, so I got a bit o’ everythin.” Yeh’ll want ter try ‘em on a few things.”

“You don’t even know what to feed them?” Draco said. “Aren’t you supposed to be the one teaching this class?”

“Now don’ give me that attitude, Malfoy. This is yer class project, it is.”

 _Stupid oaf,_ Draco thought. He grimaced at he reached for one of the little monsters. It shot a blast of fire from its arse, and he thought better of it and donned his dragon-hide gloves first. _He usually at least knows about the creatures. These things, he can_ _’t even tell us what they eat. Was Dumbledore Confunded when he hired him?_

Granger was prattling on about something, as usual. Draco would have shut her out, but something caught his ear. “I’ve never heard of Blast-Ended Skrewts, Professor,” she said. “Do you know any references on them?”

“Er, no,” Hagrid said. “Can’t say I do. Really rare, they are.”

“Really?” She sounded genuinely surprised. “I would think figuring out how to take care of undocumented creatures would be a N.E.W.T.-level project, at least.”

 _Say, this could be an opportunity,_ Draco thought. He had tried to start a campaign last year to get Hagrid replaced by someone competent, but with Fenrir Greyback dominating the headlines, he hadn’t got very far. “I can’t believe I’m agreeing with Granger, but she’s right,” he spoke up. “This class covers feeding and care of magical creatures and management of those that aren’t bred by wizards up through O.W.L. level. Even basic veterinary care doesn’t start until N.E.W.T. level, and actual magizoology research is done almost exclusively by professionals. You’re way off the curriculum.”

Draco became aware that the entire class was staring at him. That wasn’t so unusual, but not for this reason. He got good grades, of course, but he was careful to take an aloof attitude most of the time, as if anything besides the magic itself was beneath him. Talking like that, he was starting to sound like…well, Granger. Ugh.

Predictably, Hagrid still didn’t appreciate his attitude. “And jus’ what make _yeh_ such an expert, Malfoy?” he growled.

“Excuse me? _My_ family has been breeding exotic animals for generations, Professor. Even Malfoys need a hobby.” True, Father had never been very interested in that sort of thing, but he had made a snap decision to pick it up again last week and ordered some new animals from overseas, surprising both Draco and Mother. It was odd.

“Well, this’ll be good hands-on experience, then, won’ it?” Hagrid told him. “Shouldn’ be too hard, now. Jus’ try ‘em on a few things, and see what they like ter eat.”

Draco grumbled and got back to work, but this was definitely good material, he was sure. He just needed to get it to the press. Hmm…Rita Skeeter was sure to be skittering around the school for the Tournament (Father had told him all about that, of course). Perhaps she could be persuaded to do a feature on the incompetent instructor—and maybe call attention to his suspect ancestry, as well.

He grinned to himself when he saw Potter. The Golden Boy looked stuck—not sure whether to defend his outsize friend and oppose Draco on principle, or to agree with his sister’s surprisingly reasonable points.

Oh, how he’d like to nail Potter this year—somehow—but he remembered what Father had told him: _Wait, watch, listen, and learn, Draco. There is more going on this year than either of us suspect. The whispers are growing louder than ever, and many things will change. Make sure you understand the situation before making your plans, like a good Slytherin._

Draco could admit he hadn’t always been as careful as a Slytherin should be with his plans, but Father’s warning was alarming all the same. The last time he had said anything like that, the Chamber of Secrets was opened. Mother had made Father sleep in a guest bedroom for that debacle—the indignity! But Father was right so far. Edward Grayson’s arrival was definitely unexpected, and that was a bad sign. The man was practically another Dumbledore.

So Draco would wait, watch, listen, and learn. Until Halloween, he decided. Things always seemed to happen on Halloween when Saint Potter was around.

* * *

The weekend was busy, mainly because of Quidditch tryouts. They weren’t earth-shattering, except that Angelina Johnson, to the team’s horror, was suddenly channelling Oliver Wood as the new captain: “Alright, people, we need to make this quick! The season starts a month earlier than usual, and we’ve got all four houses trying to hold tryouts this weekend. Move!”

The tryouts were quick and brutal. Harry was glad to see some up-and-coming talent from the lower years, but there was no one who could challenge the current lineup. Angelina, Alicia, and Kate would stay on as Chasers, Fred and George as Beaters, Harry as Seeker, and Ron was thrilled to be the new starting Keeper. With the team pushing him hard to improve last year as a reserve, he had gradually become more consistent and was getting really good. He still choked sometimes, but he was usually better than the reserve Keeper, Cormac McLaggen. That was a very good thing because McLaggen wasn’t a very good team player. In short, he was a prat. It was only on raw skill that they kept him on as reserve Keeper and Beater. Hermione also stayed on as a reserve Chaser, and Ginny as reserve Chaser and Seeker.

It was a great team. If they fielded a team like this in the professional league, they would be competitive, and they needed to be; they had more competition than the other houses this year. Beauxbatons and Durmstrang would both be bringing all-school teams with the best players from their several in-school teams. Angelina wasn’t about to let them get complacent.

The Gryffindors relaxed on Sunday, though. With the other houses having tryouts, there wasn’t much for the Quidditch team to do, and they had had only one day of classes. It was time for a certain group to get back into their routine.

Neville had resolved to join Harry and Hermione every day for their exercise routine this year. The frequent workouts had done wonders for his health over the past three years so that, while he still had an awkward, fourteen-year-old look about him, you never would have pegged him for the pudgy, bumbling boy he was as a first year.

They changed into their exercise clothes—something closer to the muggle version than the restrictive school robes—and made their way to the disused corridor near Gryffindor Tower where they usually exercised. Before they even started, though, they stopped when Harry heard something.

“Do you hear that?” he said, barely above a whisper.

Neville and Hermione both listened. “I don’t hear anything,” Neville.

“No, there’s definitely something,” he insisted.

“Your feline ears, Harry,” Hermione said. “What do you hear?”

“I’m not sure, yet.” He turned his head one way, then the other, to pick out the direction. “This way,” he said. He led them on, and almost immediately, the sound got louder, so they could all hear it. It was a strange, distant sound drifting through the halls—a sound that was rarely heard at Hogwarts—a mournful song played on a violin.

“Come on, we’re getting closer,” Harry said. With another turn, and another, they passed by the Infirmary and soon saw the source of the sound.

It was a small girl silhouetted against the windows, pacing back and forth in the Clock Tower as she played—not on the balcony, where students sometimes hung out, but up in the mechanism, the sound echoing off the stone walls. As she turned, Harry caught the glint of a pair of large, square glasses. He approached her slowly, not wanting to interrupt her song, but when she saw him, she froze up, and her violin made a loud _Scritch!_

“Eep! Harry Potter!” she squeaked.

“Hi, Natalie,” he said.

“H-H-Hi.”

“That was beautiful music.”

“Really? Thanks, Mr. Potter! It wasn’t that hard a song, but—”

“Calm down, Natalie. It really was. And you can just call me Harry. We were both raised in the muggle world. You know I’m just a regular kid, like you.”

“No, you’re not. I could never slay a basilisk with a sword.”

Harry sighed dramatically: “You kill _one_ giant, terrifying monster…” Natalie giggled in spite of herself. “But really, you might be surprised what you’re capable of as a regular kid.”

“Was that from _Les Mis_ _érables_ , Natalie?” Hermione cut in.

“ _Les_ what?” Neville asked.

“It’s a muggle play. It’s about a revolt in France. It’s very sad. I think that one was ‘Empty Chairs at Empty Tables.’”

“Erm, yes,” Natalie said sheepishly. “I’m not really sure why I was playing it. Maybe it’s because this castle is so empty. So many empty rooms…”

“Yeah, there are,” Harry agreed. “It’s been like that when we came here. Because of the war, you know.”

“Oh, I know. Did you know there are fourteen girls in my dorm, but only four in second year and four in third year?”

“Fourteen?” the fourth-years gasped.

“How do you all fit in there?” Harry added.

“The line for the bathroom must be murder,” Hermione said.

“They squeezed seven bunk beds in there,” Natalie explained. “It’s a tight fit. That’s why I came out here. It was too crowded.”

Harry was still incredulous: “But there are really that many of you out of—how many first-years are there?”

“Ninety-seven, by my count,” Hermione said. “It _is_ a little out of proportion.”

“I wonder how Gryffindor got so many,” Neville mused.

“I think maybe it’s because…” Natalie started, and then trailed off. The older students gave her and expectant look, and continued, “a lot of them tried to be more Gryffindorish because they’re named after you, Harry.”

“ _What_?”

“You or one of your parents,” the small girl said nervously. “I thought you’d noticed. I asked around, and out of twenty-eight first-year Gryffindors, fourteen have some form of Harry, James, or Lily as either a first name or a middle name. There’s a lot of Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs, too. I’ve heard Harry, Henry, Harold, Harriet, James, Jamie, Lily, and Lilian, _and_ there’s one boy whose _first_ name is Potter.”

“Merlin’s beard! How did I miss all that at the Sorting?” Harry groaned.

Hermione started giggling, and he glared at her. “I’m sorry, Harry,” she said between giggles. “It’s really not that funny…”

“It’s a little funny,” Neville defended her.

Even Harry had to admit it was a little funny. He was chuckling soon enough, and Natalie looked a lot more comfortable at that point. “It’s too bad there aren’t more music groups at Hogwarts,” she said. “I’ve only seen the choir.”

“Yes, Hogwarts isn’t the most social scene,” Hermione agreed, “but you could always start one.”

“Hmm…Maybe I will.”

* * *

First thing Monday morning was fourth-year History of magic with the Gryffindors and Slytherins together.

 _This will be interesting,_ thought Remus Lupin.

Remus had already got some dirty looks and some angry comments about his teaching there as a werewolf, and not just from Slytherins. In fact all four houses were represented, though more so Ravenclaw and Slytherin, which didn’t have any werewolves in their own ranks. But the fourth year Slytherins included Draco Malfoy and Theodore Nott the sons of the two most likely Death Eaters in the Wizengamot and the biggest opponents of werewolf rights. Meanwhile, the fourth year Gryffindors included Harry Potter and Neville Longbottom, representing the two biggest werewolf supporting-families and sons of some of the greatest opponents of the Death Eaters of all time.

It was a miracle they hadn’t killed each other in Snape’s classes.

“Good morning, class,” he said once they had taken their seats. “Welcome to your first lesson of a proper History of Magic class—”

“Proper! Ha! That’s rich,” Theodore Nott interrupted.

 _Public show of disrespect,_ Remus thought. _Classic dominance move._ But this was a little more sophisticated than a beta wolf challenging his alpha. Remus could clearly see Draco Malfoy strategically positioned to signal Nott what to do. Oh, Nott certainly had his own opinions on how to do things, and for Malfoy to let him off the proverbial chain was a calculated risk, but it was clear who was the _real_ alpha of the Slytherins.

Remus simply played his part—he wasn’t a natural alpha himself—and said, “Is there something you’d like to say, Mr. Nott?”

Malfoy turned to look at Nott with a comfortable expression.

“Only that Dumbledore must be losing his marbles to expect us to take lessons from a dark creature.” The last part was true. Despite greatly improved rights for werewolves under the new law, they had not been able to strip the “dark creature” classification.

“Need I remind you, Mr. Nott, that my appointment also had to be approved by the Governors, as well as the Headmaster,” Remus said. “I am a duly certified teacher, and you are to respect me as such. Five points from Slytherin for disrespect and disrupting class.”

“Professor Snape won’t stand for that!”

“Won’t he?” He let the words linger. “Professor Snape and I may not get along very well, but he _is_ obligated to uphold discipline in this school, and maintaining the integrity of the teaching staff is paramount to that. Keep pressing your luck on this, and you may discover what it’s like to be on Professor Snape’s bad side. I can tell you it was unpleasant when he was sixteen, and I can only imagine he’s…refined his technique since.”

Nott didn’t wait for Malfoy’s signal. This was getting too high-stakes for him if Snape couldn’t be counted on, and he shut up at once. He wasn’t about to call that bluff without evidence.

“Now, if there are no other questions…?” Remus asked. “Excellent. As it happens, I will _not_ be your primary teacher for this material. That duty will be undertaken by a number of the castle ghosts who have graciously agreed to assist me, and all of whom can carry on a conversation far better than Professor Binns.” Not that that was difficult. The class looked divided between people excited to learn real history and those who were disappointed that they would actually have to pay attention.

“I looked over Professor Binn’s notes—the ones that hadn’t disintegrated with age—and I dismayed to find this course was exceptionally poorly designed apart from the quality of his teaching—a curriculum more outdated than Muggle Studies that bounced around seemingly at random between witch burnings, goblin rebellions, and giant wars in what was probably a misguided attempt to make it more interesting a century ago. I will be restoring this class to the up-to-date curriculum supported by the Board of Governors and the Ministry. Unfortunately for you and the other fourth years, that means covering five years of material in the two years you have left to prepare for your O.W.L.s.”

There were loud groans at that announcement. In the few classes he had taught on Friday, that news had been more unwelcome than learning from a werewolf _or_ actually having to pay attention. “Obviously, we will only be able to touch on the highlights,” he explained. “I deeply regret that everyone but the first years is still stuck with a substandard education in the subject this year, but we have to make do.

“The standard curriculum for History of Magic is as follows: focusing mostly on British or at least European magical history, in first year, you were to learn about the early history of magic, from the Druidic era to just before the Norman Invasion and the formation of the Wizard’s Council. Second year covers the height of magical society from the Wizard’s Council to the fall of the House of Plantagenet in 1399. Third year covers the age of witch hunts from 1399 until the Statute of Secrecy was implemented in 1692. This year’s curriculum was to cover the modern period from the Statute of Secrecy to 1900, but I have chosen to extend it through Grindelwald’s War. At that point, you will be up to date. Next year, you will study recent history after Grindelwald’s War, including the British Civil War of the 1970s, as well as other key topics of citizenship, such as government, politics, and economics.”

Draco Malfoy perked up his ears at once. If students were going to receive “better” instruction in politics and citizenship—especially from this clearly biased source—Father would want to hear about it. The House of Malfoy had had it easy in recent decades with easily corruptible public figures, but a more informed electorate, though still pliable, would require more finesse.

“Also,” Remus continued, “There has not been a N.E.W.T. option offered in History of Magic since Professor Binns died. A ghost simply doesn’t have the mental agility to handle it. However, if all goes well, beginning next year I _will_ be offering a N.E.W.T. option.” He was delighted to see Hermione’s eyes light up. “The N.E.W.T. class will study international history and historical scholarship and will be valuable for many Ministry jobs in the Department of International Magical Cooperation and jobs in the international business markets that are in need of fresh blood.”

He could see he was succeeding at justifying the new course structure. Now, it was time for the final piece of the puzzle to win back some respect from the Slytherins. “I would like to introduce my first co-instructor today, although he will mostly be speaking towards the end of the first unit. Britain’s history up to the Norman Invasion will be taught with the help of The Much Honoured Waldo Jernigan, Thegn of Caerphilly, or as he is better known, the Bloody Baron.”

The class gasped as a ghost in blood-stained eleventh-century robes and bound in chains with a dour expression came floating through the door. The Slytherins were the most shocked of all. The Bloody Baron hardly ever spoke and was rarely friendly even to his own house. “Professor,” he said with a terse nod.

“Caerphilly,” Remus replied. He turned to the class again and said, “The Thegn is properly addressed as ‘Thegn’ or ‘Caerphilly’ in oral address. He has asked me to inform you that he will _not_ answer any questions about the founding or early years of Hogwarts under any circumstances. This is not negotiable, and anyone ignoring this rule may find the consequences to be…unpleasant.” The class shivered.

It was a small miracle that he had pulled this off. The two oldest ghosts in the castle, the Bloody Baron and the Grey Lady, were also the least talkative. He’d only signed them on by lying to both of them and saying the other had already agreed, and _oh_ how he had paid for that, but it had worked. They Grey Lady would teach the first two years so as not to scare the younger students, while the Bloody Baron would take the next three. The only conditions were that they would not speak about Hogwarts, and they would not reveal the Grey Lady’s real name. Remus hoped that the Grey Lady would agree to teach both first-year classes next year.

After a brief introduction by the Baron—or the Thegn, rather—Remus launched right into the material, starting with the ritual practises of the Druids, which were reflected across Europe as the earliest form of magic with standing stones and stone circles.

 _So, the werewolf managed to get our house ghost in on the act,_ Draco Malfoy thought. _This class might be more interesting than I thought._

* * *

Potions class later that day was also a Gryffindor-Slytherin class, and thus not a very enjoyable day. Worse, the relationship between Harry Potter and Professor Snape had reached an all-time low. Snape resented the presence of Alastor Moody in the school, upstaging himself as Albus Dumbledore’s most trusted confidant, and the reason Moody was here was the growing threat to Potter. (Plus, Moody hated him, for obvious reasons.) He resented the presence of werewolves in the school, especially Remus Lupin. He didn’t like werewolves and never would, and he resented Potter’s efforts to make sure they would be allowed in the castle. Meanwhile, Harry resented Snape, with whom he had tried to be civil before, for throwing his lot in with the anti-werewolf crowd and trying to get Sirius in trouble to undercut support for werewolves.

With all these conflicts, there were an inordinate number of glares passing between Snape and Harry.

“Potter! Pay attention to your potion before you melt your cauldron like Longbottom is certain to.”

“Sorry, Nev,” Harry muttered.

Unfortunately, perhaps because of the extra scrutiny, Neville really did melt his cauldron and got a detention for his trouble. Harry considered confronting Snape about his attitude, but he wasn’t feeling very conciliatory, so that would probably make it worse. And Snape still needed to meet appropriate standards of teaching quality, so it wasn’t a total loss. He had gone over the safety guidelines again and explained the principles of the potion they were brewing, just like he was supposed to. He was just being a bigger git than usual.

If it became a bigger problem, Harry thought, he would do something, but for the moment, he didn’t think there was anything to say.

* * *

“Wands out!”

Harry and Hermione both snapped their fingers, drawing their wands from their duelling holsters in under a second, ready for anything as their first Defence Against the Dark Arts lesson started with a bang. Most people reached for their pockets.

“Ah, Potter, Granger, ten points each for a quick draw,” said Mad-Eye Moody. He surveyed the room with his magic eye. “Anyone who’s reaching for their bag right now, minus five points. If I’d wanted to hex you, you never would’ve stood a chance.”

Well, that certainly made a big first impression. Everyone said Moody was brilliant, but paranoid, and he was apparently bringing that into his lessons. He took out a ledger and called the role, keeping his normal eye on the parchment while focusing on each student in turn with his unsettling blue one.

Harry had a strange urge to make an Edgar Allen Poe reference, but he figured that would be a bad idea.

“Right, then,” the old Auror growled. “Since two of your last three instructors in this class were murdered on the job and the other was a complete fraud, you could be forgiven for reaching this point with a substandard education…Unfortunately, dark wizards are not forgiving. They won’t hold back because you’re young, or you’re uneducated, or you need to reach for your wand in your bag—and put that away, Miss Brown.”

Lavender Brown jumped with a squeak and turned bright red as Moody spotted the horoscope she was showing to Parvati Patil through the solid wood of her desk.

“A dark wizard will kill you if he damn well feels like it, and he won’t care about all that other crap. The best way to protect yourself is to get the drop on him first. CONSTANT VIGILANCE!” he shouted, making the entire class jump. “That’s why the smart witch or wizard wears their wand in a holster, like Mr. Potter and Miss Granger, here. I won’t require you to have a holster, but next class, I want all of you to have your wand on your person so you can draw it without fumbling around to find it. Next time, I might actually hex you.”

A shudder went through the students. If Mad-Eye Moody’s attitude so far was any indication, his hexes were sure to be nasty ones.

“Now, good news is, from Auror Williamson’s notes and the exam scores, it looks like he did a good job of bringing you up to snuff. Makes my job easier. I’ve only got a year to teach you how to protect yourselves “cause I ain’t fool enough to even _think_ of staying here any longer, so I’ve got my work cut out for me. By now, you ought to be able to defend yourselves from muggles, mundane animals, and magical creatures up to class four-X. Am I right?”

There were a few nods and a murmur of assent.

“But you’re behind—very behind—on curses. A dark wizard is far more dangerous than any beast you’ll ever encounter—Yes, Mr. Finnigan?”

“What about a nundu, Professor?” Seamus asked. “It took Professor Dumbledore _and_ Professor Grayson to take down one of those.”

Moody fixed Seamus with both eyes: “You followed the East African War, I see. Tell me, how many witches and wizards died fighting that nundu?”

“Six.”

“And how many died before that fighting the bastard who set it loose.”

“I think it was about thirty—oh…”

“Yes, Mr. Finnigan: “Oh.” Any beast, even a nundu, is still a beast. It may be more powerful than any dark wizard, but a dark wizard is smart. A dark wizard can think his way out if you trap him. A dark wizard can inspire followers to fight by his side. You might have to send an army against a beast, but they’ll come home safe the next day. Not so with a dark wizard.”

Moody’s voice had grown gradually more ominous throughout his speech, making Seamus quake in his seat, but he immediately snapped back to his normal gruff tone as he resumed his lesson: “The curriculum says you’re not supposed to see demonstrations of illegal dark curses until N.E.W.T. level. I say hogwash, and so does Professor Dumbledore. How are you supposed to defend yourselves if you don’t know what you’re up against? So…do any of you know which curses are most heavily punished under wizarding law?”

Several nervous hands rose, including Harry’s and Hermione’s. Practically everyone who had lost family in the war knew the answer. “Miss Turpin?”

“The Unforgivable Curses, Professor.”

“Very good. And why are they called that?”

“Because they’re, er, unforgivable, sir.”

Some of the class giggled, but Moody just scowled and said, “That’s not an answer, Miss Turpin. The Unforgivable Curses are called so because they’re the only three curses on the books that are punishable by life in Azkaban with no parole if you use them on a human being—including a muggle.”

Harry and Hermione noticed that mention of other races like goblins and elves was conspicuously absent.

“Many other curses are illegal, but the Unforgivable Curses are the only ones punishable with a life sentence. Three curses—all exceedingly cruel, all with no counter-curse, and all unblockable by any magical shield. They live up to their name. Who can name one? Mr. Weasley?”

“Er, my dad told me the one they were always worried about,” Ron said. “The Imperius Curse.”

“Aye. He would know. Do you like spiders, Mr. Weasley?”

Ron’s voice broke: “ _No, sir_!”

Moody ignored his protest. He pulled a colourful, magical-looking spider from a cage and enlarged it to the size of a hamster. Without warning, he pointed his wand at it and incanted, “ _Imperio_!” Harry and Hermione shivered. Even just hearing the incantation spoken was something they could do without. The spider leapt across the gap and landed on Ron’s desk, where it proceeded to crawl up his arm. Ron whimpered and shook his arm, but it held tight. It reached his hair, where it proceeded to tap dance on top of his head. The class laughed uproariously, except for Ron.

“Ha ha! Think that’s funny, do you?” Moody said with a grin. “What should I make her do next? Jump out the window?” The spider leapt again and smacked against the glass of the nearest window. The laughter died instantly. “Drown herself?” Moody added for emphasis. The spider stood on the rim of a pitcher of water and dipped its legs in before hopping back to Moody’s desk.

“Many witches and wizards have done terrible, unspeakable things under the bonds of the Imperius Curse,” he explained darkly. “It’s almost— _almost_ —undetectable. Years back, the Ministry couldn’t tell who was cursed and who was really guilty. A lot of ‘alleged’ Death Eaters got off claiming to be under it, but we never knew for sure…But unlike the other two Unforgivables, it can be fought. It can be _broken_ by a powerful act of will—but it’s not easy. Not everyone’s got the right stuff. Best not to be hit with it in the first place. CONSTANT VIGILANCE!” The class jumped again.

“The Imperius Curse is legal to cast on human beings if and only if the target consents to it.” Some people murmured surprise that it was ever legal at all. “This most commonly happens in Auror training, where we train people to fight it, if they can. _However,_ Professor Dumbledore and I have agreed that it would benefit you if we offer training to resist the Imperius Curse to all students fourth year and up.”

Half the class gasped. To use an Unforgivable Curse on minors, even if it was all by the book, was unheard of. Moody waved his wand, and a stack of parchment slips floated to the students. “Don’t worry; we got it all cleared,” he said. “In order participate in this training, these permission slips must be signed by both you _and_ your parents—or your magical guardian, to be more precise. Hand them in by the end of the month if you want to do it. It just might save your life.

“Now, then, how about another one? Mr. Longbottom, another Unforgivable Curse?”

Neville turned pale, but he took a deep breath, set his jaw, and said, “The Cruciatus Curse, Professor.”

Hermione frowned at Moody. The man was an Auror. He must know how much this would hurt Neville—and probably others in the class, too.

“I apologise in advance for this,” Moody said. “I won’t keep it up for long, but you’ve got to _know_.” He pointed his wand down at the spider, at an angle where it was clear he wasn’t pointing it at a student, and cast, “ _Crucio_!”

The spider collapsed and writhed, its legs folding up, its exoskeleton buckling in ways that didn’t seem mechanically possible. It was emitting pitiful squeaks. Moody kept the curse up for five seconds, and even that was enough that most of the students were sure they never wanted to see it again. There was a cracking sound as Neville gripped the edges of his desk so hard that they disintegrated into splinters. Accidental magic—at _his_ age. Moody seemed to ignore that, too.

“Pain,” Moody said. “Pure, undiluted pain. The Cruciatus Curse floods the nervous system with energy, sets every pain nerve on fire, so all the victim can experience is pain. Within minutes, it starts to permanently damage the nerves. With prolonged exposure, it starts to eat into the brain and spinal cord—where prolonged can be under an hour. For many people, it’s more effective than the Imperius Curse at getting them to do what you want.

“There’s one more. Mr. Potter?”

Harry suppressed a groan. Of course Moody would ask _him_. “The Killing Curse, Professor,” he said in barely more than a whisper.

“Yes, the Killing Curse,” the scarred man repeated. He pointed his wand again and paused, his magical eye seeing the fear creeping onto Harry’s face in anticipation of what was about to come. Most people flinched at Voldemort’s name. Harry Potter much more sensibly flinched at the incantation for the Killing Curse being spoken aloud. “Brace yourself, Potter,” Moody mumbled. “ _Avada Kedavra_!”

There was a blinding green light of a sickly pallor, a sound of rushing death that was more felt than heard, and the spider dropped dead, to the silent awe of most of the students. Harry and Hermione both felt like they might be sick—Harry on account of his birth parents, and Hermione because she had once seen Quirrellmort narrowly miss hitting Harry with that curse. So that was what it looked like when…

“The Killing Curse,” Moody growled. “Quick, clean, precise, and unstoppable, or rather, _almost_ unstoppable. Only one person has ever survived the Killing Curse, and I’m looking right at him.” He fixed Harry with both of his eyes. Harry desperately wished he could wandlessly Disillusion himself.

“The Killing Curse is legal to cast on a human being only in self defence or defence of other human beings—or by sworn soldiers in a declared war. But even for self-defence, it’s a hard sell in court. The Killing Curse is more than just pointing your wand and saying the words. You have to _mean_ it. Some part of you has to _want_ them dead for the sake of killing them, not just as a means to an end. They’ll let you squeak by if it’s a clear case, but not always.

“ _But_ the _Cruciatus_ Curse,” Moody said with the greatest seriousness yet, “is legal to cast only on cold-blooded animals, for demonstration purposes—by Aurors only—or for research purposes—by Unspeakables only. The Cruciatus Curse is not legal to cast on a human being under _any_ circumstances. Not in self-defence, not under duress, _not even under the Imperius Curse!_ And why? Because you have to _mean_ it. You have to _want_ to torture. You have to _want_ to cause immeasurable suffering. Not even Imperius can _make_ you feel that kind of hate. That has to come from inside yourself.”

Neville and Harry were both still staring at the dead spider.


	88. Edward Grayson

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: It is the invariable lesson to JK Rowling that distance in time, and in space as well, lends focus.

September passed quickly. Despite the excitement of the Tournament and Edward Grayson being in the castle, things were oddly calm, except that the Quidditch Teams were practising frantically to get ready for the early season. Slytherin successfully lobbied Snape to move their first match later, so Gryffindor would be facing Ravenclaw on the first of October. Professor Lupin’s history lessons were fascinating, but the fourth years were moving at a lightning pace, looking to get to the Norman Invasion by Halloween. The Bloody Baron lectured more and more each week, telling fantastic tales of battles between Andros the Invincible and Herpo the Foul passed down through the generations. And Hagrid’s skrewts grew shells and seemed to get nastier every time the students saw them.

Professor Grayson scheduled his first seminar on the afternoon of the twenty-fourth of September. Sign-up sheets were posted, but half the school signed up so the teachers stopped keeping count. Most people were surprised when Grayson announced that the seminar would not take place in the Great Hall, but instead, on the lake shore.

So after lunch on the twenty-fourth, the majority of the school assembled on the shore of the Black Lake. Draco Malfoy and his gang were there, of course. Anything that could help him even the score with Potter was good in his book, even if Grayson was another goody-two-shoes like Dumbledore. Most of Ravenclaw was there out of academic interest. And the few muggle-raised students who already knew some wandless magic were front and centre. But Grayson himself was nowhere to be seen.

“Where is he?” someone said.

“He _did_ say two o’clock, didn’t he?”

“Maybe it’s a test. We have to find him.”

“What does _that_ have to do with wandless magic?”

“Hey, what’s that?”

They looked out across the lake, and the sharper-eyed among the students saw something coming towards them from the far shore. A mere pinpoint, at first, a mile off, it closed the distance in seconds and took the form of a man, walking across the surface of the lake, kicking up a spray of water behind it. Yet it was shadowy and indistinct, its appearance a blur even apart from its motion. It came at them faster than any broomstick, and the students began to scatter in fear, but the moment its foot touched the soil, it stopped. Its features remained blurred for a moment, as if it were somehow still in motion, then solidified and resolved into those of Edward Grayson.

He was singing “Scotland the Brave.”

A few people applauded, but the majority just gawked.

“The songlines,” he spoke in that Australian accent that many of the older girls seemed taken with, “or as they’re called in Europe, the ley lines, are an integral part of Australian magic. They are foundational to our culture. They are what let us navigate the land, preserve our common heritage, and tie our many tribal cultures together. They were later adopted by many of the white colonists, including my mother’s family, though the practice has waned in recent years. They’re most easily navigated using the local music.”

The assembled students watched with rapt attention. None of them had ever scene magic like this before. Few had even heard of Australian magic, and not even Merlin was said to walk on water. It wasn’t supposed to be possible, like flying without a broomstick.

“The songlines are also how we attune ourselves to natural magic. In Australia, we understand that our magic is closely tied to the land—and the water,” He chanted a snatch of a tuneless song, and a great ripple formed in the lake behind him, as if from the passage of an enormous serpent just beneath the surface. “For the most knowledgeable of Australian witches and wizards, nature magic is as integral to their knowledge as the wands and incantations of the West.”

“How did you walk on water?” one of the older students finally worked up the nerve to ask. He was shushed by his classmates, but Grayson took it in stride.

“The songlines don’t let you walk on water,” he explained. “They let you walk _fast_ —as fast as a muggle aeroplane, if you’re a good runner. If you walk faster than about sixty miles an hour, you can go so fast across the water that you don’t fall in.”

Another student asked a question, but she actually raised her hand: “Why didn’t you fully switch over to wands? Even Potter says they’re better for more advanced spells.”

Harry turned red. That wasn’t what he had said. He said it took longer to learn wandless magic, and it was harder to cast upper-year spells that way. He thought it was a lot easier and quicker for simple spells.

“Well, that depends on what you mean by “better,” doesn’t it?” Grayson answered. “Nature magic has its advantages. The muggle Australian Aborigines lived close to the land and with few tools. They never invented the bow and arrow, which was known in all other parts of the world, nor many of the more elaborate stone tools of the early farmers in Europe. Because of this, many see my father’s people as “primitive,” but what they don’t understand is that they found other ways of developing in wisdom and sophistication. In particular, the Aboriginal wizards found ways of channelling their magic without the use of tools, through the ancient songs handed down from generation to generation for over ten thousand years—learning to feel the natural magical energies and work in harmony with them.

“Our magic may not be as fast nor as flashy as Western magic, but it is strong. It is strong because it is ancient—refined over millennia—and because we work with nature and not against it. You’ve seen the songlines, and that is only a small sample of what Australian magic can do.

“Now, in the Outback, wandless magic is learnt slowly, over many years of meditating and learning to live and breathe in the magical energies of nature. We don’t have time for that here, which is unfortunate, but we do have a passable substitute: a concentration of magical energy, mostly powered by the currents of energy flowing along the songlines, and so strong that even a squib can feel it. I’m speaking, of course, of the wards of Hogwarts.”

There were a few murmurs of surprise, but Harry, Hermione, Nathan Boot, and Annabel Entwhistle, who had already learnt to attune their senses to magic, nodded their heads. The first years understood right away, too. For them, it had only been a few weeks since they had first passed through the Hogwarts wards and felt their power wash over them. Most of the older students stopped paying attention after the first time and rarely remarked on it.

Grayson led the crowd of students along the perimeter of the lake, where it didn’t extend too far from the castle along carriage path. They soon came to the front gates, where Grayson stood between the two winged boars and turned to face them again.

“This is the most powerful concentration of magic in Britain,” he said. “It doesn’t take special skills to sense it. Most of you can probably feel the magic from where you’re standing now.” Many of the students nodded. “To use magic—wandless magic—you have to reach for it, draw it to yourself so you can control it. Even your personal magic is naturally latent. You have to call it up to use it. Otherwise, it would be running all the time, and that tends to end badly. With a wand, you don’t have that problem. A wand is enchanted to conduct magic. It draws it out for you. But it comes at a cost. You never learn to feel for your magic and control it normally. I say ‘normally’ because it _was_ normal for thousands of years before wands existed.

“Wands are quicker. They’re easier. But they’re lazy. They’re meant to be a tool, not a crutch. They let you do a lot of things very simply, but they hold you back in a lot of ways with their rigid incantations. _True_ magic,” he said, “is limited only by your imagination.” He turned and reached out a hand behind him. There was a shimmering in the air, and lines of energy seemed to appear in his hand. They could feel the magic charging in the air. Grayson pulled a section of the wards towards him like a piece of a giant net. With one shake, they snapped away. Ropes of energy from the wards flailed until they reconnected and sealed the breach. Grayson waved his hands, and strings of magic wove patterns in the air before him like a giant’s version of cat’s cradle. Then, he thrust his hand forward and _threw_ it at a nearby bush.

The bush twisted and mutated into something out of a nightmare. It looked like some kind of animal, but only in the loosest sense. The branches morphed into tentacles and the trunk into a huge, barrel-like structure, as tall as a man. A head grew, shaped like a starfish, and two fan-shaped wings burst from its back. Finally, it stood on five sturdy roots and began shuffling through the trees at a surprising speed. Half the students screamed in terror, and Colin Creevey fainted on the spot, but there was also one high squeal of delight that rose above the noise.

Luna Lovegood broke ranks, ran up to Grayson, and _hugged_ him without warning. “It’s an umgubular slashkilter!” she cried. “How did you know how to do that?”

That was enough to confuse even Edward Grayson. “Um…I found it in an old book, miss,” he said, gently pushing her back. “Er, you see here what real magic can do. You won’t be able to pull off anything like that without many years of practice, but you will be able to feel the weave of the magic and hopefully manipulate it right away. You may or may not know that the wards extend a few feet out from the walls to protect the stonework, so what I want you to do is to come out through the gates and line up along the wall, and just focus on the feeling of the magic in the wards. It should be similar to the feeling when you can a spell with your wand, but you’ll need to work more to pull the magic to yourself. Many of you should be able to pull it hard enough to move the cords, although very few of you will be able to snap them. Prefects, stay back and watch to make sure none of the other students get overwhelmed. Pull them away if they start to look out of it.”

That sounded a little worrying, but most of the students didn’t notice. They eagerly passed through the gates and lined up along the wall. They so easily forgot, even when they passed through them several times per year, how powerful the wards felt. Even Hermione and Harry were starting to get dulled to the sensation; yet the wards of Hogwarts felt like a splash of water on a hot day, like waking up fully rested after a hard week, like seeing a cherished friend after a month away. You could get drunk on them.

It wasn’t long before one of the first years started spinning around and laughing giddily, and one of the prefects pulled him away at once. The rest of the students could sympathise. Even Harry and Hermione felt it. It was like standing under a waterfall of magic. Most of the students needed to take their time just to understand the sensations, but those two were able to draw magic out of the wards and spin it around them almost as easily as Grayson did, although they didn’t know how to manipulate it to achieve a desired effect like the Grand Sorcerer.

He was right about how the wards affected them, though. After a few minutes of standing directly within them, a lot of people felt dizzy, euphoric, and hyper, and Harry and Hermione, with their practised sensitivity to magic, were starting to develop sensory overload. The prefects had to drag away quite a few more students before they were done, and some of them were not happy to go.

“Obviously, this isn’t the kind of thing you should try without a spotter,” Grayson said when they were all back inside the gates. “I don’t recommend learning this way period if you have a choice. It’s a good first step to develop you magic sense quickly, but you’ll never progress without careful meditation to learn to call on your own magic.” After this, he lectured the students on some much less interesting things like guidelines for practising the art and led them in a few meditative exercises similar to the ones Harry and Hermione had developed by trial and error years ago. Feeling the wards, the children of Hogwarts learnt, was easy. Sensing your own magic without a wand—and without strong emotions—was much harder, and only a minority were able to make any headway over the course of an afternoon, though many resolved to practice. Even so, that night, a lot of the students in the castle would remember for the first time since their first night there how warm and comforting the magic of Hogwarts felt when they laid down to sleep.

When he dismissed them back to the castle, Harry and Hermione were finally able to approach Grayson for a conversation.

“So, Mr. Potter, you think a wand is better than wandless magic, do you?” he asked.

Harry shook his head: “No, sir. They misinterpreted what I said. Wandless is definitely better for first and second year spells, but for more powerful spells, it starts to take a lot more work—at least, that’s what we’ve found.”

“And it’s a big help to be able to sense magic around us, Ambassador,” Hermione added. “That’s saved us more than once.”

“Ah, that it can. I’d be interested in hear how you learnt wandless magic so well yourselves.”

“Not too differently from how you explained it,” she answered, and she eagerly launched into a brief recounting of their studies over the years—how they had taught themselves to feel and manipulate the magic before they had wands.

Harry wasn’t feeling quite as enthusiastic now that he saw Grayson up close. The way the man carried himself was…odd. There was a certain grace about his movements—a confident, trotting gait, a relaxed attitude—and a predatory gleam in his eye that wouldn’t quite go away. Hermione picked up on it some, but Harry had a lot more experience than she, and it made him nervous.

“And how did you come onto the idea to learn wandless magic in the first place?” he asked.

Harry snapped out of his musings. They had to be careful how they answered this, as it skirted around his secrets. He was all too aware of the piercing, slightly suspicious look Grayson was giving him. “Well, we’d already had a few bouts of accidental magic, sir,” he said. “I…er, I had a really bad one when I ran away from my old guardians when I was five. And then, when I was seven—Hermione was eight—there was a really terrible storm where we live, and we both got so scared we had accidental magic for half the night. We repaired a shattered window when a branch came through it, and we flipped the sofa over, stuck it to the floor, and hid under it.”

“Crikey,” Grayson said chuckling lightly. “But that doesn’t actually explain _why_ you learnt it.”

“Well, that’s just because Hermione’s an overachiever. Professor McGonagall came by in the morning to set things right, and Hermione asked her about learning wandless magic properly. And then she decided we should learn it despite McGonagall saying how hard it was. And after that night, we had a pretty good idea of what to feel for.”

“I see. Very impressive,” Grayson said, still eyeing Harry carefully.

Harry made an effort to look as human as possible—blinking normally, keeping his arms relaxed, not trying to puff himself up, and so forth. It didn’t succeed.

“So, Mr. Potter, how did you and your sister become animagi at your age?”

Hermione tripped and fell flat on her face. Harry simply groaned and said, “I was hoping you wouldn’t see it.”

“Son, I’m a Grand Sorcerer with decades of experience. It takes a lot to pull one over on me. You’re form is some kind of cat, isn’t it?”

“Yes, just a house cat,” Harry admitted.

“And yours, Miss Granger…something in the weasel family, I think?”

“R-river otter,” Hermione stammered. “But how? None of our other teachers ever noticed. Not even Moody.”

Grayson gave Harry a prompting look, and Harry answered, “Because he’s one, too.”

Hermione’s eyes widened with understanding. “ _That_ _’s_ what I was seeing!” she gasped. “I thought I noticed something odd about you, sir, but I thought we would have already known.”

“I’m surprised it wasn’t in the papers,” he said. “I had to use it in the battle.”

“Well, the _Prophet_ didn’t report a lot of details,” Hermione said. “Their journalistic standards leave a lot to be desired. We’re waiting for someone to put out a proper _Memoirs of the East African War_.”

“Hmm, intriguing idea,” he said. “Anyway, the animal instincts can give you a leg up over even someone as observant as Moody. _Or_ he could suspect after all and doesn’t want to tip his hand by saying so.”

That was not a comforting thought, even with Moody on their side. “I can’t quite place _your_ species, though,” Harry said. Hermione gave him a questioning look. “With Sirius or Professor McGonagall, I can see the dog or the cat right away,” he explained. “It’s easiest with Professor McGonagall, I think, because I’m the same species. But you, Professor…it’s like you’re a little bit dog, a little bit cat, and a lot of something I’ve never seen before. I can tell your form is a mammal, and a predator, but I don’t know what.”

“I’m not surprised,” Grayson said. “I doubt you would have seen one in person. Have a look, then.” Grayson transformed, shrinking down and falling onto all fours. His form was furred, light grey, as big as a medium dog, and to Harry’s discerning eyes, it looked roughly like the front half of a dog attached to the back half of an over-size cat. But the most distinctive feature was the dark stripes across its back, beginning between the shoulder blades and continuing to the base of the tail.

Hermione gasped: “That’s a Tasmanian tiger! Those are extinct! I didn’t think that was possible.”

Grayson swiftly changed back to a man. “They’re not extinct,” he said. “We’ve let muggles think they are, although they still spot them once in a while. Australian wizards have been breeding them for thousands of years, including on the mainland. They’re our answer to the cat in the rest of the world. They’re not magical _per se_ , but they’re good at sensing magic.”

“Oh, that’s right,” Harry remembered. “On the cover of _Harry Potter Down Under_ , it has a picture of me with a Tasmanian tiger.”

“ _Harry Potter Down Under_?” Grayson said in confusion.

“It’s a rubbish fictional book about my childhood. Long story.”

“Of course. I understand. I’ve had my share of unauthorised biographies myself. Now, it might interest you to know that it wouldn’t have mattered if the thylacine really were extinct because they still _would_ have existed, and I saw them in person when I was a boy. That seems to be the requirement for a transformation to be possible—and that it be a non-magical animal. But I _would_ like you know how you two managed it so young.”

“Oh, well, my dad and his friends did it when they were only a year older than us, and one of them taught Hermione last year,” he said, “but for me…it was accidental magic.”

“Accidental?”

“When I ran away from my old guardians,” he added reluctantly.

“Becoming an animagus by accidental magic? Rainbow Serpent, that’s one even I’ve never seen before.”

“The Sorting Hat told me it had happened twice before to Hogwarts students,” Harry offered, “but we never found out anything more.”

“You’ve never heard of anything like it, sir?” asked Hermione.

“Only in old legends. There’s the story of Old Tjilbruke, an animagus who changed into an ibis. One of the wizarding versions of the tale says he first became one as a child because of his overwhelming desire to fly with the birds. But on the other hand, there’s another version that says both of Tjilbruke’s parents were ibis animagi, and when they had a child—” He saw both teens pale a little. “In human form,” he clarified, “he was born with their gift.”

“Oh?” Hermione said with interest. “There’s a similar legend in Britain about Morgan le Fay. I wonder if there’s some truth to it.”

“Hmm, maybe. I’ll look into it the next time I’m at home. I take it you’re keeping this skill under wraps?”

“Yes, sir,” Harry said. “Professor Dumbledore thinks Voldemort is still out there, and it’s better if he doesn’t know about our advantage.”

“Yes, he mentioned that. I’ll keep your secret, of course. And I’ll help you if I can, within my diplomatic discretion.”

“Thank you, Professor.”


	89. The Imperius Curse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Harry Potter as deep as this is past possibility without JK Rowling as well.
> 
> JK Rowling says the hardest things to write in Harry Potter were Quidditch matches, and I wholeheartedly agree. However, Quidditch fans may rest assured that I will be fully documenting the important ones.

Things went smoothly as the year continued. The most worrying things on the grounds were Hagrid’s Blast-Ended Skrewts, which were growing at an alarming rate. By the end of September, they had grown shells and were starting to get some definition in shape, although what that shape was was still a mystery. They were about the size of a cat by now and had also taken to killing each other.

“I can’t believe we’re still working on these beasts,” say Draco Malfoy in the last class meeting of the month. “And that oaf still hasn’t told us what they’re good for. It’s not like we’ll ever have to work out something like that for ourselves. Father ought to just shut down this operation.” Draco had complained to Father in his letters, but he had seemed strangely distant in his replies. Lucius had of course expressed disdain for Hagrid personally and for the poor quality of instruction in the class, but he hadn’t taken much action, and he had asked a surprising number of questions about the beasts themselves.

Privately, Draco thought Father was becoming a little too absorbed in his newfound passion for magical creatures. It was a fine hobby, but too much of it was unbecoming of a lord.

“Lay off about your father, Malfoy,” Potter sneered at Draco. “Nobody else around here has to spout off about their rich family all the time.”

“Jealous, Potter?” Draco sneered back. “Looking to move up from the muggles, are you?”

“As if! But if _you_ ever want to move up from Death Eaters, let me know.”

“Harry,” Draco heard Granger hiss in warning.

“My father is a well-respected member of society, Potter,” Draco said. “Say that again, and I’ll call you out.”

Potter looked like he was about to do just that, but Granger held him back, saying, “Harry, don’t provoke him.”

 _Smart girl,_ Draco thought. _At least she_ _’s good for something._

“Well, Mr. Malfoy, if your father shows his left arm in public, I’ll publicly apologise,” Potter said.

He wasn’t the first to issue that challenge, nor would he be the last, and Draco did what Father always did to such a challenge: scoff at it as if it were utterly beneath him—which it was. He was a Malfoy, after all; never mind the truth of the matter.

“I’m still trying to figure out what these things _are_ ,” Granger said a little while later. “The back end looks like it’s covered in an arthropod-type shell—”

“The back end?” Weasley said stupidly. “How can you tell which end’s the back? They look the same!”

“They only walk one direction, Ron,” Granger replied. “And there are some differences. The back end look like an arthropod-type shell, like an insect—or a scorpion. The tail is a lot like a scorpion’s tail. But the front end is covered with these little hexagonal scales, and they’re shinier—almost metallic.”

Draco looked at the Skrewt in front of him for himself almost automatically. She was right. The back and the many legs of the animal had a smooth, jointed armoured shell, like a scorpion, but the bulk of the animal was a solid piece of shell covered with hexagonal plates—smaller than a tortoise’s. In fact, they looked almost like—“Fire crabs!” he blurted.

“What?” the class looked up. Granger stared at him questioningly.

“Fire crabs, Granger,” Draco said smugly, revelling in being able to say something smarter than she for a moment. “The humped backs of the Skrewts resemble fire crab shells, if they were made of iron and not jewels.”

Granger’s eyes widened, and she looked closer at the skrewt before jumping back with a childish squeak when it shot a blast of fire at her. “I can see the resemblance,” she said. “I could pin them as a relative of the fire crab except for the legs and tails. The legs and tails are definitely from a scorpion.”

“Can’t be a mundane scorpion, though,” Potter jumped in.

“Why not?”

“Remember why all those old movies with giant bugs wouldn’t work in real life? The Skrewts’ legs shouldn’t be able to support their weight. They’re too big.”

“Hmm…maybe. It’ll be clearer if they get bigger, which I really hope they don’t. If they are, they must be magically stronger. But the only magical creature I know with scorpion-like features is the manticore. I have no idea what kind of creature would look like a cross between a fire crab and a manticore.”

Draco nearly dropped his wand. “He wouldn’t!” he spat to no one in particular.

“Wouldn’t what?” Pansy said, sidling up beside him.

“Cross-breed them!”

“Cross-breed? Wait, you mean these things are _actually_ cross-breeds?” Pansy said.

“Well, let’s ask Hagrid, why don’t we? Cross-breeds, are they, Professor?”

Hagrid suddenly looked very uncomfortable. “Well, er, that’s not all that important,” he said, wringing his hands suspiciously.

“Wait a minute, you think they’re cross-breeds?” Granger said. “What’re you talking about, Malfoy?”

“Oh, don’t be daft, Granger. You’re practically a Ravenclaw. What’s the most logical explanation for a beast that looks like a cross between a fire crab and a manticore?”

To his surprise (and delight), Granger and Potter both looked completely lost, but Weasley figured out the “dumb” answer: “Blimey, they’re _actually_ a cross between a fire crab and a manticore?”

“Ron, that’s ridiculous,” said Granger.

Oh, _that_ was interesting, Draco thought. Granger was contradicting Weasley, and _Weasley_ was right? This he _had_ to see.

“What’s ridiculous?” Weasley snapped.

“You can’t just cross fire crabs and manticores. The genes are completely different.”

“Jeans? Aren’t those muggle clothes?” said Weasley.

“No, Ron, genes with a G. They’re the…they’re the thing that lets traits be inherited from parents to children.”

“You mean like blood?”

“No, I mean…um…what wizards might call blood, I guess, but only in colloquial terms. The point is, they don’t mix between species, especially very different species.”

“Course they do,” Hagrid rumbled. Everyone stared at him, and he added, “I shoudn’ta said that.”

Potter and Granger looked genuinely disturbed. So muggles thought they knew a thing or two about blood, but they called it geans—? Genes? Geens? They called it something different, and they understood it completely differently. That might be worth looking into if Draco could find a suitable sap to ask around.

“Bloody hell!” Pansy yelled. “You mean we’ve been working with dangerous hybrids all year?”

“They’re not that dangerous “s long as yeh take proper precautions,” the great oaf protested.

Draco couldn’t let that one slide. “Not that dangerous?” he sneered. “Hello? They have completely unknown capabilities, and one of the parents is a class _five-X_ creature. Their poisonous stings won’t have ever been tested, and we don’t even know how big they’re going to get.”

Hagrid could tell he’d lost control of the class. Even most of the Gryffindorks turned on him with that realisation. Potter looked really uncomfortable, though he was still the most supportive.

“Hagrid, _please_ tell us you at least have a permit to breed these things,” Granger pleaded.

“Course I have a permit. Don’ yeh fret abou’ that, Hermione. The Ministry said they wanted fer…uh…well, fer a special project.”

 _That project_ _’s the Tournament, or I’m a troll,_ Draco thought. _I wonder if Father knows. He seems to have his fingers in a lot of this kind of stuff lately._

Granger looked relieved at that, while Potter was staring at the Skrewts contemplatively. “Aren’t manticores intelligent, Hagrid?” he asked. “How did you convince them to mate with the fire crabs.”

“Mate?” Hagrid gasped. Most of the class and even Hagrid himself looked disgusted. Draco felt nauseous. Was _that_ how muggles would do it? “Show some decorum, now, Harry,” Hagrid replied. “Yeh can’t just mate a fire crab ter a manticore. That’d _never_ work, even if the manticore didn’t eat it. Yeh gotta use magic.”

“Oh, magic. Right…But what were you so worried about if you have a permit?” Potter asked him.

Granger had the answer: “They’re still not on the curriculum, Harry. Not even close. I hate to agree with Malfoy, but he’s right. They’re too dangerous for fourth-years to study. In fact, since we don’t know anything about them, I’m not even sure the N.E.W.T. students should touch them.”

“Just wanted ter make the class more interestin,’” Hagrid said sadly. “Should prob’ly ask Dumbledore ‘bout it, maybe.”

* * *

“Fire crabs and manticores?” La Pantera said in an almost erotic tone. She sent shivers down Lucius’s spine even more than Bellatrix. “Intriguing. Ambitious…I want one.”

“I will see to it, Lady Pantera,” Lucius Malfoy replied as smoothly as he could. He turned towards the Dark Lord, forcing himself to look full on the ugly, mutilated construct in the chair. “If it pleases my Lord, I will bring Macnair to you at once. He works as the executioner for the Magical Creatures Department. He will be able to requisition one with less suspicion.” _And it_ _’ll give you someone else to order around for a while._

“Ooh, even better,” the Aztec priestess cut in. “I could use an experienced altar boy.”

_Why does that sound inordinately creepy coming from her?_

“An excellent idea, Lucius,” Voldemort hissed. “Bring him as soon as you are able.”

“Yes, Master.”

To be honest, Lucius wasn’t sure why he didn’t know about the Skrewts before, but he wasn’t complaining. This assignment would be relatively easy. The only downside was that Draco would be disappointed. If Hagrid could cross-breed creatures like that, then he hadn’t outlived his usefulness after all.

* * *

“So, Harry, tough season this year, isn’t it?” asked Cho Chang on the way out to the Quidditch pitch for the first match of the year. “Five games instead of three, and we’ll be up against the best Seekers Beauxbatons and Durmstrang have to offer.”

“Oh, I think I can hold my own, Cho,” Harry told his one-time girlfriend. “Besides, you’ll be a good warm-up.”

“Ooh, you’re going to eat those words, Potter. I’ve been practising.”

“Alright then, show me you have a better strategy than just marking me, and I’ll believe you.”

“You’re on!”

Harry really did think Cho had the makings of a good Seeker, but she had a bad habit of marking the other Seeker when she went up against someone better instead of playing for herself. From what he had read in Ron’s Quidditch magazines, it was a good way to up your catch percentage, and several of the professionals used that strategy, but it didn’t help you improve. And in the school league, there were so few games that statistics didn’t matter very much. She needed to improve her strategy now, while she was at Hogwarts, to eventually do well in the professional league.

“Hello, and welcome to the first ever Northern European Academic League Quidditch match,” Lee Jordan’s voice boomed over the stands and over the Wizarding Wireless. “Bright and early on the first of October because we have a big, action-packed season this year: fifteen games and featuring all-school teams from Beauxbatons and Durmstrang arriving later in the month for the Triwizard Tournament. Today’s match is Ravenclaw versus Gryffindor!” The crowd cheered. “Gryffindor is undefeated the last three years thanks to the efforts of their stellar Seeker, _Harry Potter_!” More cheers. “We’ll see if they can keep up their perfect record…”

Cho put up a good fight. Harry was pleasantly surprised. She brought out some new moves to aid the Chasers, as Seekers often did by interfering with the opposing players. Their usual small, light builds gave them a different niche to fill as opposed to the larger Beaters. As a result, the Ravenclaw Chasers did a good deal better than they had last term. She patrolled apart from Harry, finding her own pattern, but she still kept a close eye on him. It was too easy to pull a feint on her. He confused her and made her second-guess herself that way, a fatal disadvantage in Quidditch. When Harry finally did spot the Snitch, she was too slow in responding, and he easily beat her to it. He didn’t even need his Firebolt’s superior capabilities.

“Not bad, Cho,” he told her after the match. “Another year or two, and you might be a serious challenge.”

Cho gasped indignantly, but before she could say anything, Hermione sneaked up behind Harry and whacked him in the back of the head.

“Ow! What was that for?”

“You’re letting Sirius rub off on you too much, Harry. You’re better than that.”

“Hey, it’s just Quidditch. It’s all good fun.”

“Really? You know how Sirius was in school, Harry.”

“Mione, I wouldn’t do half the stuff he and my dad did,” he assured her, “but we take the mickey out of each other on the Quidditch team all the time.”

“It’s alright, Hermione,” Cho agreed. “I can handle Harry Potter for myself.” _Merlin, did I_ really _just say that?_ She thought. That would be taken as a far bolder claim than it sounded in her head.

* * *

“I’m surprised how many of you handed in permission slips for training with the Imperius Curse,” said Professor Moody. He sounded almost cheerful, but his tone turned dark again as he said, “I’d say I’m _pleasantly_ surprised, but I don’t like surprises. Ever. For those of you who requested private sessions, I’ll be happy to oblige after classes. Not laying out your strengths and weakness is good practice.”

Harry and Hermione stared at each other. They hadn’t even considered that, and Sirius hadn’t suggested it.

“For those of you who didn’t think to request another teacher to stand witness in those private sessions, minus ten points for being an idiot. Training with the Imperius Curse _always_ requires a witness qualified in Defence to ensure that the caster doesn’t abuse his power. Professor Lupin will be the witness for this class.

 _Ah, that explains it_ , Harry and Hermione thought. They had been wondering why Remus was there.

“Now, Miss Brown, I see that your parents sent in a signed permission slip for you, but you didn’t bother to sign it yourself,” Moody continued. “Would you like to sign it now, or are you sitting this out?”

“Er…I didn’t think it was that important, Professor,” she said.

“Not important?” he barked. “You think it’s not important, Miss Brown? How will you feel if you get cursed by some wizard who means you harm. You clearly know you’re an attractive girl with as much effort as you put into your makeup. People notice looks like yours…”

Hermione’s jaw dropped. Did he _really_ just say that.

Lavender paled dramatically, but she kept up a protest, more for peace of mind than actual objection: “But are we really in so much danger?”

Moody fixed her with both of his eyes in that unsettling way of his: “Miss Brown, do you remember what I said in your first lesson?”

“Er…” she started flipping through her notes.

“I’ll save you the trouble. I said that two of your previous three instructors were murdered on the job.” A chill went through the classroom. “Dark wizards are out there, and they’ve come within the walls of this castle several times. If you’re smart, you’ll remember that and go the extra mile to protect yourself. And that goes for all of you.” His false eye roved around the room again as he placed the permission form on her desk. “Now, I ask again, would you like to sign?”

Lavender nodded mutely and jotted down her name.

“Good. Now, Mr. Boot, you’re first alphabetically. Front and centre, now, on the double.”

As a muggle-born, Terry Boot’s magical guardian was Dumbledore, so he had no obstacles to signing up, which he did on Harry’s and Hermione’s advice. They weren’t as paranoid as Moody, but Harry had gone up against dark wizards multiple times, so they understood the importance of the training. Under Remus’s watchful eye, Moody pointed his wand at Terry and cast, _“Imperio.”_

The class laughed as Terry started dancing disco. There was more laughter as a nervous-looking Lavender imitated a squirrel, and so on through the rest of the class who had permission forms.

No one had any luck resisting until Hermione. When Moody cast the curse, she screwed up her face, gritted her teeth, and stuttered a little before she launched into a poorly-sung rendition of _both_ parts of “Don’t Go Breaking My Heart,” which had topped the muggle charts last spring. Harry laughed hysterically, and she glared at him.

“That’s a good start, Miss Granger,” Moody told her when he was done. “I could actually tell you were resisting. That’ll be a big help. If people can tell you’re under, you won’t be so useful to a dark wizard.”

Neville had no such luck. He didn’t hesitate as Moody made him perform a series of quite astonishing gymnastics that left the class dizzy.

“Professor, how did you do that?” Hermione gasped.

“Excuse me?” Moody said. “I used the Imperius Curse.”

“Yes, I know, sir, but Harry and I have a pretty good idea of what Neville’s capable of, and frankly, he’s not that coordinated, and he doesn’t know how to do any gymnastics like that.”

“Ah, but I _do_ , Miss Granger,” he replied. “The Imperius Curse isn’t a blunt instrument to order someone around. It’s _total_ control. A skilled practitioner can control his victim as well as his own body and make them do things they could never do normally. Don’t underestimate someone who’s under the Imperius Curse. They may be a better fighter than you think.”

When Harry’s turn came, the command Moody gave him was tame compared to some of the others, but the curse itself was one of the most insidious things he had ever felt. He felt really _good_. A wonderful, floating sensation came over him. All thought and worry fled from his mind, leaving only a vague, untraceable happiness. It was like being on…well, some muggle drug. He wasn’t sure which. He didn’t have any firsthand experience, and he didn’t care enough to think it through just now.

But he also heard Moody’s voice, not so much through his ears, but echoing from a distant corner of his mind: _Jump on the desk_ _…Jump on the desk…_

By now, Harry’s normal, conditioned response to any force intruding into his mind was to employ Occlumency. He tried to picture his wall—his mental image of Hogwarts Castle and the grounds that he employed to stop an intruder accessing his memories, but there were two problems with this. One: the euphoric feeling of the curse had dulled his wits, making it harder to picture it clearly. And two: the “intruder” didn’t want into his memories. He wanted him to…

_Jump on the desk_ _…Jump on the desk…_

_No, I don_ _’t think I will,_ said another voice in his head. So detached was he that he didn’t register that it was his own.

_Jump!_

_No!_

_JUMP! NOW!_

“Get out of my head!” Harry shouted this aloud and stumbled backwards. His legs had tried to jump, but they didn’t have enough support behind them, so he tripped and nearly fell on his arse instead. The class jumped at his outburst.

“Now that’s more like it, Potter!” Moody said excitedly. “See that, you lot? Potter damn near beat it. They’ll have trouble controlling _you_ Potter. You’re a fighter.”

“I’ve been told I’m very strong-willed, Professor,” Harry said shakily as he stood up.

“Aye, that you are. Imperius isn’t like other mind magic where you can _think_ your way out,” Moody said. Harry noticed Hermione’s face fall. “It’s a battle of _wills,_ and it gives the caster an advantage. That’s what’s so insidious horrible about it. A lot of you felt it just now. It doesn’t _force_ you to do things. It just makes you too happy to fight back. You can do the most horrible things you can imagine, and you’re just too happy to notice, let alone stop yourself.

“Like I said, not everyone’s got the right stuff. Not many people have a will strong enough to fight it, but if you know what it feels like, it might give you a little bit of a chance.”

Hermione still looked a bit shaken when they left the classroom. “That was awful,” she said. “I felt like someone had spiked my pumpkin juice. I even tried Occlumency to try to focus on something else, and it barely did anything.”

“I know. It was the same for me,” Harry said. “I had to fight it head-on.”

“I didn’t know you could fight like that. I wish I could.”

“You still did better than most, sis.”

“Hmm…” she still looked unsettled.

“Hey, at least we learnt it here before some dark wizard came after us.”

“I know. It’s just…”

“What? Something wrong?” Harry asked with concern.

“No, it’s not me, but…it’s what Moody said to Lavender,” Hermione said. “That was just awful. Is he _trying_ to get fired?”

Harry stopped. “Yes. Yes, he _is_ , Mione,” he said.

“He is?”

“He’s super-paranoid, remember? He’s here on a one-year contract, but that didn’t save Professor Williamson last year. He still got killed by Greyback. Moody’s trying to give Dumbledore an excuse to fire him to hedge his bets.”

“That’s…brilliant,” Hermione said. “And insane. And offensive. Plus, now _I_ _’m_ going to have to deal with Lav’s nightmares.”

“Sorry. I guess that’s Moody for you.”

* * *

On the twenty-third of October, a notice went up that the delegations from Beauxbatons and Durmstrang would be arriving in a week’s time, on Sunday the thirtieth. Most of the school was excited, both for the Tournament and after Professor Grayson’s second wandless magic seminar yesterday. (Several people had got actual results this time.) Harry Potter, however, was starting to grow nervous again as Halloween approached.

“I’m telling you guys, something bad always happens on Halloween, and the Tournament is a good way for something extra to go wrong.”

“And I’m telling _you_ , Harry, that’s the gambler’s fallacy,” Hermione countered. “Just because bad things have happened on Halloween for the past three years—”

“Now hold on,” Sirius interrupted. Harry and Hermione had set up both of their communication mirrors in Remus’s office so they could talk to Remus, their parents, and Sirius at the same time. “Don’t dismiss that, Hermione. Bad things happening on a particular day isn’t coincidence if there’s a reason for it.”

Hermione frowned: “What do you mean?”

Remus answered her: “Why do you think Voldemort attacked Harry’s family on Halloween? What did Dumbledore tell you last year when he told you about the horcruxes?”

“That Voldemort likes the Founders?” Harry said.

Hermione made the connection: “That Voldemort is obsessed with symbolism.”

“Exactly. Even in the magical world, Halloween is regarded as the night when the Dark is strongest—or it was until Voldemort was defeated. That’s why he tried to kill you on that particular night, Harry, and I’ll wager that’s also why he made his opening move on Halloween in both your first and second years. Last year _was_ a coincidence—full moon on Halloween morning—but the others weren’t.”

“And Dumbledore says Voldemort’s getting stronger again,” Dan reasoned, “so he’s likely to make a move again.”

“Exactly.”

“But he’s already made his opening move,” Hermione said. “The World Cup.”

Sirius shook his head: “That’s if it was him. Tipping his hand before he’s done anything? Casting the Dark Mark again, and for what? What did he gain? No, I don’t buy it. I’m thinking rogue Death Eaters getting drunk and reliving old times.”

“Which would mean his opening move’s still to come,” Emma said. “On Halloween.”

“Okay, but Voldemort’s not _here_ , is he?” Hermione said nervously. “Professor Dumbledore would have noticed.”

“I hope so,” Remus agreed. “But I still think we should be extra watchful on Halloween.”

“Igor Karkaroff will be there,” Sirius said darkly. “He’s the one who worries me most.”

“Who?” asked the Grangers.

“The Headmaster of Durmstrang. He was a Death Eater in the war, but he stayed out of Azkaban by informing on his fellow Death Eaters. He’d have to do something really damn big to even have a hope of being welcomed back, and that would be a perfect time for it.”

“Definitely watch out for him, then,” Dan agreed. “Do we know who else will be coming.”

“There’ll be Olympe Maxime, Headmistress of Beauxbatons. I’m not too worried about her. It’s an open secret that she’s half giant—that stuff’s more tolerated on the Continent—so it’ll be really hard to get to her. David Monroe from the Department of International Magical Cooperation—no worries there. He’s probably the most liberal person on the Wizengamot. He’d sooner join a muggle hippie commune than support Voldemort. And Ludovic Bagman from the Department of Magical Games and Sports. He gets into shady dealings, Bagman—was accused of being a Death Eater sympathiser once, but he was cleared, and Dumbledore believed him. I’d discount him entirely, except for one thing. I don’t if you heard about that witch, Bertha Jorkins? She was in Bagman’s department, and she vanished the same day you had that dream, Harry. So something might be up with him, but I still think Karkaroff is the one to watch.”

“Alright, then. I’ll be watching,” Harry said.

“Speaking of horcruxes,” Emma recalled from earlier in the conversation, “have you made any more progress on them? They’re what’s giving us so much trouble in the first place, aren’t they?”

“True,” Remus said, “but as far as we know, we’re still where we were a year ago. Three destroyed, two unaccounted for, and that’s if he didn’t make another one, which Dumbledore thinks he might’ve. We’re still looking at Voldemort’s history and the Death Eaters’ activities, but we haven’t found much. I even asked some of the ghosts about the young Tom Riddle, but I haven’t found much. We’ll keep looking, though.”

“Siri?” a voice called from Sirius’s mirror. Everyone else’s eyes widened.

“ _Siri_?” Remus gasped. “You never let _anyone_ call you Siri—well, except Lily. Is that—is that _Vicky_?”

“Siri, where are you?”

“Talking to the cubs, Vicky,” Sirius said quickly. “I’m almost done.”

“Oh, you are?” Victoria McKinnon appeared in the view of the mirror, clad in a bathrobe, to the even greater surprise of the viewers. She leaned close to the mirror and said, “Hi, Harry. Hi, Hermione—oh, and the rest of you, too.”

“Hello, Victoria,” Remus said politely, quickly followed by, “Sirius Orion Black, are you even wearing trousers right now?”

“Er, enough about me. How are you and Dora, Moony?”

Remus growled softly: “Don’t change the subject…” Sirius stared him down, asserting his alpha status. “I haven’t heard much from her,” Remus said. “I don’t think ‘teacher’ is adventurous enough for her. Now answer the question.”

“Well, I think this has been a very productive conversation,” Sirius said with a grin. “Mirror off.”

“Padfoot!” Remus yelled, but he was too late.

* * *

“Okay, so you can’t actually make a Portkey without being detected,” La Pantera said to Voldemort and his growing collection of Death Eaters. “How are you going to get to the boy, then? I’m still on the clock, you know. Do you really think you can just drag him out?”

Voldemort stewed in his chair. He was uncomfortable having wasted this much time. The Tournament was about to start at Hogwarts, and he still didn’t have a plan. All those visitors would be perfect to get an agent into the castle, but getting Potter out of the castle unnoticed would be harder. Especially with Dumbledore watching like a hawk.

Lucius Malfoy had been no help. He wasn’t directly involve, nor were any of the other Death Eaters he had brought back to the fold. Macnair was the best resource they had, and Voldemort really didn’t want to have to trust him with something that important. And of course, the Carrows were too stupid to be of any use.

Barty Crouch Jr sat lost in thought. He had wracked his brain for a better solution than just grabbing Potter and dragging him down to the front gates to apparate him away—or to do it in Hogsmeade. That might work, or they might follow him too quickly to complete the ritual. He knew how tight Potter’s security was. Right now, the idea they were toying with was faking Potter’s death in the Tournament so that no one would be looking for him, but that carried its own set of challenges.

Barty’s werewolf cousin, Artemis, leaned against him affectionately, also trying to think up an answer. Despite her lack of formal education, she was dead clever and might make a better fox than a wolf. The other Death Eaters looked askance at how close Barty was growing to her, but he was the Dark Lord’s most faithful servant, so he could get some leeway.

“So you need a way for Potter’s absence to not be suspicious for a couple hours?” Artemis reasoned.

“Yes, that’s all we need, Arti, dear,” Barty replied, petting her hair. “The trouble is that Potter never spends that much time alone.”

“Hmm…say, let’s take another look at those tasks,” she said. Barty snapped his fingers, and Winky handed her a stack of parchments from their interrogation of Bertha Jorkins. “First Task, no. Second Task, no. Third Task…hmm…”

“Yes, Artemis?” Voldemort said, leaning forward.

“This image projection system they’re planning on using for the Third Task looks awfully precarious, my lord,” she said. “It would be a shame if it were to fail. And if Potter were in the maze, he would be hidden from view the entire time, wouldn’t he—even from Dumbledore.”

“Bring down the projection system…” Barty mused. “It’s definitely possible if we have a man on the inside, but there’s still the problem of getting Potter out of the maze…unless…” He glanced at La Pantera and remembered how they had got to Mexico in the first place. “Oh, yes—no—wait—YES!”

“Yes?” Voldemort said.

“Master, wouldn’t it be more _dramatic_ if, instead of simply grabbing the Triwizard Cup, it was a Portkey that transported the winner back to the entrance of the maze? If we convince the organisers to add that feature, we could do what you taught me and add an extra destination. We’d make the Portkey right under their noses.”

“This would require Potter to _win_ the Tournament, Barty,” Voldemort pointed out.

“I could do it, Master. Arrange for the Portkey, enter Potter in the Tournament, shut down the magical projection, ensure Potter wins, and transport him here when he does. None are difficult tasks if I impersonate the right person…and I know just the right person to do it.”

“That’s completely _loco_ ,” La Pantera scolded. “Except it’s less _loco_ than all your other ideas. Might work with the rest of your minions around to cover anything that goes wrong.”

“Yes. Yes, I believe it will,” Voldemort said. “Barty, you have shown great skill in planning in the past.” He nodded at Artemis. “I will entrust you with this plan.”

“YES! I won’t let you down, Master. Arti, you’re brilliant.” Barty kissed her on the mouth.

Voldemort rolled his eyes. He could afford to indulge such a valuable servant.

The Carrows were more vocal, however. “Woo! Kissing cousins!” Alecto catcalled.

“And a werewolf!” Amycus added with a leer.

“Maybe people’ll quit bothering to make up lies about us, now,” said Alecto.

Barty drew his wand and hexed them nonverbally.

* * *

The next day, the fourth year Gryffindors and Slytherins were introduced to the next ghost lecturer in History of Magic class. They had reached the limit of the Bloody Baron’s expertise and met with someone a little younger.

“I’d like to introduce Sir Robin Greengrass of Wiltshire, onetime heir to what was then the Noble House of Greengrass, better known as the Black Knight,” Professor Lupin told the class. “You may have heard about the Queen’s Royal Court Magician, Maxwell Barnett, who helped plan the Quidditch World Cup this past summer. Sir Robin was the Royal Court Magician to Edward Longshanks from 1272 to his unfortunate death at the Battle of Orewin Bridge in 1282. He will be teaching about British magical history from 1066 to 1314. Sir Robin?”

A ghost in dark, ghostly plate mail strode into the classroom. He wore his helmet with the visor down, so he wasn’t the easiest to understand, but as he explained at once, “The helmet is for your benefit. When you take an arrow to the eye, it isn’t pretty.”

 _A Greengrass?_ Draco Malfoy thought. _Another Slytherin, or at least the family is now._ He and Daphne found themselves staring at each other. _Lupin_ _’s trying to prove himself to us, but what’s this about a Greengrass working with a muggle king? What’s his game?_

Sir Robin quickly got to lecturing, though, and what he had to say was nothing like Draco had expected.

“The thing you must remember,” the Black Knight began, “is that the time of the House of Normandy and the House of Plantagenet were the golden age of muggle-wizard cooperation in England, Scotland, and Wales—after the wizards were organised under the Wizards’ Council and before the witch hunts began. So you need to know more muggle history than you might about other times to understand it.”

Draco frowned, and so did Daphne, he saw. It didn’t look good for the House of Greengrass to have an ancestor talking like this.

“The story really begins in January of 1066, with the death of Edward the Confessor in England. His successor, Harold Godwinson, was considered to be weaker by William of Normandy, who began planning an invasion, along with his right-hand wizard, Armand Malfoy.”

“Lies!” Draco blurted before he could stop himself. But the rest of the class gasped, just as disbelieving as himself—except he didn’t miss the smug look on the werewolf’s face.

Sir Robin lifted up his visor, revealing an ugly, bloody hole where his right eye should be. He waded through Malfoy’s desk and stared him right in the face with his good eye. “You impugn my honour, boy?” he demanded. “And just who are you?”

“Draco Malfoy, Heir to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Malfoy,” he said proudly, refusing to flinch at that ruin of a face, “and you impugn _my_ honour, o _late_ Scion Greengrass by suggesting that one of my ancestors would serve a common muggle.”

The whole class was silent, now. A ghost and a student calling each other out over a matter of honour? That was unheard of. Plus, they had never heard this story before.

“What?” Sir Robin said, his eyebrows rising in surprise. “You are a Malfoy, but you do not know your own heritage?”

“I know my heritage perfectly well.”

“And yet you don’t know the story of the founder of your line? How far a great house has fallen. Armand Malfoy was the greatest political mind of the eleventh century. He was second only to Merlin himself in cunning and influence.”

“Well, that’s true,” Draco agreed. “And yet you speak slander that he would ever serve a muggle king.”

“Are you so foolish, boy? Armand Malfoy cared nothing about a man’s heritage so long as he was _useful_. He set himself up as the power behind the power in _both_ worlds. He was a moderately successful wizard in France, but he saw an opportunity and allied himself with William of Normandy, aiding him in defeating Harold and his wizards. In return, William appointed him the first Royal Court Magician.” That led to a new round of gasps and Granger frantically flipping through her course book. “Armand held the ear of the muggle kings his whole life long. Meanwhile, he so impressed Merlin with his magical skill that when William consolidated the English and Norman wizards under the Wizards’ Council, Armand was made a founding member, and he was an expert at playing them to his advantage. It was his influence in both the magical and muggle courts that made the Malfoys the richest magical family in England. Surely the heir to his line must know these things.”

Draco was shaken, unsure what to say. Didn’t all that sound like quintessential Malfoy? Better than Father or Grandfather had ever done for themselves, and they were masters of politics in their own times. And yet, he knew his heritage, just as he should. He knew about Armand Malfoy and the founding of the Wizards’ Council. But he had never learnt about…this. He thought it over for a minute and gave the answer he was “supposed” to give, hoping to draw out more information: “The House of Malfoy does not associate with muggles. We have kept ourselves pure from the beginning.”

“If that is how you learnt it, Scion Malfoy,” Sir Robin said levelly, “then your education has been sorely lacking. The Malfoys have kept themselves in power and wealth by exercising their influence in the muggle world as well as the magical world. Even those of your line who felt muggles were beneath them were wise enough to recognise their usefulness.”

Draco (and all of the Slytherins, really) were left digesting this when Granger spoke up.

“Excuse me, Sir Robin?”

“Yes, milady?” The Black Knight lowered his visor out of courtesy and faced her. “And your name?”

“Hermione Granger…er, of cadet line to the House of Fawley, if it matters. Our history book doesn’t say anything about that story. It talks about Armand Malfoy and the founding of the Wizards’ Council, but there’s very little about the Royal Court Magicians and no mention at all to indicate he was the first one.”

“Oh, really? Then it seems a poor choice of a course book, milady. Whoever wrote it did a rather poor job.”

“I’ve met the author,” Granger protested. “Bathilda Bagshot. She’s very old, now, but she was an excellent scholar in her day.”

“I’m afraid I must contradict you, milady,” Sir Robin replied apologetically. “Madam Bagshot certainly never interviewed me or the other ghosts of the castle for whatever scholarship she involved herself in.”

“She didn’t? You mean she never bothered to ask firsthand sources?” Granger stared down at _A History of Magic_ with an even stronger version of the look Draco was now wearing—a look of questioning everything she thought she knew. Draco couldn’t properly enjoy it, though, since he was trying to sort things out for himself.

“Ahem,” Lupin spoke up. “I think I may have a theory about all this. A lot of things changed in magical Britain when the Statute of Secrecy was implemented. It’s possible many of these old stories were lost. In fact, I think many of you will remember a couple years ago when it was revealed that even the beloved _Tales of Beedle the Bard_ weren’t handed down in anything close to their original form. Somehow, it just doesn’t seem to occur to anyone to ask the people who were actually there—apologies, Sir Robin. I will track down the Cavalier and the Highwayman before next class to see if they can corroborate my theory. They were from around the time of the Statute.”

That ended the debate for now, but Draco was just beginning to sweat, and he could tell Daphne was shaken up, too. The _Tales of Beedle the Bard_ bit was what worried him—or was “worried” even the right word? He had been shocked when Lord Brocklehurst came out and revealed, with solid scholarship, that the original form of the _Tales_ was much more pro-muggle than the version Draco had grown up with. That was real evidence that not everything was as the received wisdom described it. That Lupin would be able to find evidence of the Black Knight’s tale now seemed plausible, but that called into question everything Draco knew about his family.

Had his ancestors really associated with muggles, even if just for their own gain? Was it really a net loss to deal with muggles when they could provide something valuable? Was Armand a better Lord Malfoy than the more recent generations because he was willing to work with them? Draco would never have thought to ask such questions before, but now, they were nagging at him. He’d never questioned for a minute that Father’s way of doing things was the right one, but if the Black Knight was right, they might be missing out on better possibilities. It was a frightening sensation, having his beliefs questioned like that.

But he couldn’t tell Father, of course. That would never do. But perhaps Mother. She always seemed to be the more understanding sort.


	90. Beauxbatons and Durmstrang

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: When a day that you happen to know is Wednesday starts off by sounding like Sunday, there is something seriously JK Rowling somewhere.

On the thirtieth of October, the Great Hall was decorated with colourful banners for each of the four houses with the Hogwarts coat of arms behind the High Table. It was more than they had at the welcome and leaving feasts, and Harry and Hermione wondered whether they had been custom-made for the occasion. The teachers had spent all week trying to encourage the students to look more presentable, visually and magically. Many of the girls thought they were putting an over-emphasis on uniform standards, banning excessive jewelry and the like, but there wasn’t anything they could do about that.

At six o’clock, the students were lined up outside the East Doors by the greenhouses, the traditional location to receive visitors (before the greenhouses were built). It was apparently where the school had received the visiting students the last time Hogwarts had hosted the Tournament two hundred years ago. It was a chilly evening, and quiet as the students waited, some scanning the darkening skies for any sign of the new arrivals.

“Will they even come by air?” Harry asked. “A Portkey would make the most sense.”

“I don’t know,” Hermione said. “I’m not sure you can even use a Portkey inside the grounds.”

“Maybe we should be watching the path, then?”

“I don’t think it’s a Portkey,” Fred Weasley said from behind them.

“No, not show-offy enough,” George agreed.

“What, then?” said Harry. “They couldn’t fly brooms that far, and carpets are embargoed for some dumb reason.”

“Aha!” Dumbledore called over the grounds. “I do believe the delegation from Beauxbatons has arrived.”

“Where?”

“There!”

It _was_ in the sky, but it wasn’t a broom or a fleet of brooms or even a flying carpet. Harry was pretty sure it _would_ have needed an exception to the embargo, though. It was a powder-blue horse drawn carriage the size of a house, pulled by a team of no fewer than twelve Abraxans—flying horses the size of elephants. It swung around to the south and landed just outside the greenhouse perimeter with a sound of thunder, the horses soaring in on the level of the cliff to hit the ground running. The carriage rolled to a stop just after it crossed the path, and a boy in pale blue robes jumped out of the door and lowered a set of golden steps.

A high-heeled black shoe stepped out and thudded onto the top step—a shoe close to two feet long. It was followed by an enormous olive-skinned woman every inch as tall as Hagrid, though far more stylish.

“That’s a _big_ woman,” muttered Seamus Finnigan.

“That’ll be Madame Maxime,” Harry whispered, remembering Sirius’s explanation.

Dumbledore and Grayson led the students in a round of applause and then kissed Madame Maxime’s hand before she introduced her students. About twenty boys and girls in thin blue robes descended the steps, shivering slightly. Most looked to be in their late teens, but a few were younger—presumably the Quidditch players. One especially pretty blond girl would have been hard to identify with the muffler she was wearing over her face, except that she was leading a miniature carbon copy of herself by the hand, looking impossibly cute in a junior version of the uniform.

“Hermione, look, it’s Fleur and Gabrielle,” Harry pointed them out.

Fleur Delacour waved at him, prompting stares from his classmates, but little Gabrielle tugged at her sister’s hand and squealed, _“Fleur, c’est ‘Arry Potter! C’est ‘Arry Potter!”_ Fleur shushed her and pulled her along with the rest of the group behind her Headmistress.

“Ees Karkaroff ‘ere yet, Dumbly-dorr?” Madame Maxime asked in a deep voice.

“I believe I see him now, Madame.”

There was nothing in the sky, but Lee Jordan pointed to a disturbance in the Black Lake. There was a great bubbling on the surface that turned into a whirlpool, and a dark shape began rising out of it, indistinct in the twilight. Harry took advantage of his feline night vision to make it out more clearly: “It’s a ship!”

As it drew close to shore, the Durmstrang ship was an impressive sight. It looked like a Viking longship with a dragon on the prow, but scaled up to have multiple decks with ghostly portholes. It pulled up to the less steep, but still impassable part of the cliff directly below the greenhouses.

“How’re they gonna get up here?” Ron wondered.

His question was answered quickly when Dumbledore called in a booming voice, _“Scalaria Locomotor!”_ Immediately, there was a grinding sound, and everyone looked and gasped when they saw what was happening: the stone stairs that led up from the Boathouse to the Great Hall had detached themselves and were walking themselves along the cliff face to the Durmstrang Ship.

Hermione giggled. “It’s Hogwarts, Ron,” she said. “Moving staircases.”

It took a few minutes for the Durmstrang students to climb the stairs. The first over the cliff top was Igor Karkaroff. He wore a luxurious silver fur coat and a large _ushanka_ on his head. His goatee was equally silver and pointed, and he had a surly look so that he could have passed for Salazar Slytherin, except with more hair. He carried a gilded staff in one hand. Karkaroff greeted Dumbledore in far too friendly a manner for a Death Eater. Dumbledore was polite, but a little more standoffish.

However, Karkaroff didn’t hold the students’ attention for very long because everyone was staring at the next person to come up the stairs. Harry recognised the prominent curved nose and thick black eyebrows at once.

“What the heck?” he said. “Viktor Krum’s at Durmstrang?”

“Oh my God, Harry,” Ron hissed, jabbing him with an elbow. “I don’t believe it. It’s Krum, Harry! _Viktor Krum_!”

“Yes, Ron, I _know_ it’s Viktor Krum,” Harry hissed back. “I told you I met him at the World Cup. _I_ can’t believe he’s at Durmstrang. Bulgaria’s nowhere near Durmstrang.”

“We think,” Hermione said. “No one knows where Durmstrang is, do they?”

“Look how they’re dressed,” Harry countered, indicating their fur-lined robes. “It’s not gonna be in the Balkans.”

“Hmm. Fair enough.”

“Well, shall we retire to dinner?” Dumbledore said with a clap of his hands. He turned and entered the castle, followed by the Beauxbatons and Durmstrang contingents and finally the bulk of the Hogwarts student body. Many people were jostling for a better look at Krum and whispering their plans to get his autograph.

“Honestly, he’s just a Quidditch player,” Hermione huffed.

Harry, however, was smiling: “Well, one good thing about this: it’ll be good not being the most famous person in school for a change. Hardly anyone’s ever asked me for my autograph here—well, except Colin.”

Ron laughed. “Harry, you’re mental, mate.”

“It’s okay, Harry.” Harry jumped when a curly-haired second-year popped up out of nowhere beside him and took his arm. “I still like you.”

“Er, thanks, Romilda,” Harry said dryly and gingerly peeled her fingers off his arm.

The Durmstrang students looked impressed by Hogwarts Castle, more so than the Beauxbatons ones. That wasn’t surprising given that Beauxbatons looked like a Renaissance palace. The tour was designed to impress, though, as they passed through the Long Gallery, over the Stone Bridge, and through the Entrance Hall to the Great Hall.

The Hogwarts students sat at their House Tables, but even with the large first year class, there was plenty of room for the forty-odd guests. At a whispered word from Madame Maxime, most of the Beauxbatons students took seats at the Ravenclaw Table, but Gabrielle tugged her sister by the hand, whispering, _“Fleur, Fleur.”_

 _“Bien, Gabrielle, bien.”_ Fleur and Gabrielle glided over to the Gryffindor Table and sat across from Harry and Hermione. Fleur pulled her muffler off her face, and immediately, most of the boys and at least one girl that they could see started staring at her. The rest of the girls were cooing over Gabrielle’s cuteness.

“ _B-b-bon soir_ ,” Ron stammered.

“Ron,” Harry hissed and elbowed him in the side.

 _“Bon soir, ‘Arry, ‘Ermione,”_ Fleur said in her almost musical voice. _“Comment ça va?”_

 _“Ça va bien,”_ Hermione replied. _“C’est bon de vous voir.”_

 _“Gabrielle, qu’est-ce que tu fais ici?”_ Harry asked.

Gabrielle giggled. _“Je visitais avec Fleur pour le Tournoi.”_

“Gabrielle wanted to see zee selection of zee Champions, and our parents said she could come wif me,” Fleur explained, switching to English.

“I will be ‘ere for zee Tasks, also,” Gabrielle said.

“Eef I am selected, Gabrielle,” Fleur cautioned.

“Excuse me, Mr. Potter. Is dis seat taken?” Viktor Krum had approached the table and made to sit in the seat next to Gabrielle. At once, most of the girls and Ron stared at him.

“Plenty of room, Mr. Krum,” Harry said with a smile. He shook Krum’s hand before he sat down.

“So, you know each other?” Krum asked Harry, motioning to the two French girls.

“Oh, right. Yes, we met in France a couple years ago. Everyone, this is Fleur Delacour and her little sister, Gabrielle.”

Gabrielle squeaked wordlessly as she stared up at Krum. He kissed her hand and said, “ _Enchant_ _ée, madamoiselle._ I am sorry. I do not speak any other French.”

“You were vairy good in zee World Cup, Monsieur Krum,” Gabrielle managed.

“Thank you, Gabrielle.”

“So are you here for Quidditch, Mr. Krum?” Hermione asked.

“Quidditch and Tournament, if I can manage it.”

“Well, there goes _my_ perfect record,” Harry said.

“Ve vill see, Mr. Potter. I expect a good game vhen ve face each other…” Krum glanced to the side and said, “Are dey alright?”

Harry turned and saw both Ron and Ginny staring at Krum, open-mouthed. He elbowed Ron again, who elbowed Ginny. “This is Ron Weasley,” Harry introduced his friend. “Quidditch fanatic extraordinary, and a pretty good Keeper. And Ginny Weasley, our reserve Seeker.”

“Ah. Pleased to meet you.”

“Pleased to meet you,” Ron mumbled, shaking Krum’s hand. “Merlin, this is so cool! Blimey, Harry, if you beat him, _you_ _’ll_ be the best Seeker in the world.”

“Ron, it’s one game,” Harry corrected. “Whoever wins, a lot of it will be luck.”

“Ve vill see,” Krum repeated.

Looking out at the hall, Harry saw that most of the Durmstrang students had sat at the Slytherin Table, and Karkaroff was looking out at them approvingly from beside Dumbledore. Harry thought he caught a patronising look when Karkaroff looked towards Krum. He also caught Draco Malfoy scowling at him, but he normally did that anyway. Once they were all seated, Dumbledore rose to speak.

“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, ghosts, and honoured guests. It is my great pleasure to welcome you to Hogwarts for the Triwizard Tournament. I hope your stay here will be comfortable and enjoyable. The Tournament will be officially opened at the end of the feast. We are still waiting on two of our guests. But before we begin, I want to introduce two people and some additional extracurricular activities that you may not have heard about. First, we are pleased to have as a visiting professor Edward Grayson, Grand Sorcerer, Ambassador-at-Large for Australia, _et cetera_. Professor Grayson is holding a seminar on wandless magic on selected Saturdays and will be available for private tutoring throughout the year. Second, our History of Magic Professor, Remus Lupin. Professor Lupin is the head of the Hogwarts Duelling Club, and he will be pleased to accept all comers to a duelling tournament to be held in June. The current duelling champion of our returning students is Mr. Cedric Diggory of Hufflepuff House. And now, I invite you to eat, drink, and make yourselves at home.”

The golden plates filled with a wide variety of food, most of it a mix of English, French, and German dishes. The house elves had really outdone themselves tonight. It was a fantastic feast.

“Ah, a duelling tournament,” Krum mused. “Those are very popular at Durmstrang. I vill have to enter if I have time.”

“ _Oui_ ,” Fleur agreed. “I ‘ave not ‘ad zee chance to compete in one before.”

“So, Mr. Krum, if I may ask, why are you going to Durmstrang?” Harry said, making conversation. “It’s somewhere in Scandinavia isn’t it? Pretty far from home.”

Krum frowned and set his fork down. “I take it you do not know about schools in Eastern Europe?” he said.

“Not really,” Harry said.

“A little,” Hermione added.

“You know of Varsaw Pact?” Krum asked.

“Of course.”

“Good. Traditionally, Bulgarians attended Czarnoksiesto Academy in Poland. It vas good school, attended by most Slavic peoples. But after Grindelvald’s Var, Czarnoksiesto fell under rule of Konstantin Jugashvili. He made other Varsaw Pact members attend—Romanians, Hungarians, and East Germans. No von liked dis. Many vere poor Polish speakers, and quality of school was hurt. He also forbade non-Pact members from attending. Dis left Yugoslavians vithout school, and dey had to make deir own. It is Yugoslav National Magic School, but Yugoslavia is too small to maintain good school. Teachers dere are not good, and few classes are offered.”

“That’s awful,” Hermione said. Harry didn’t even roll his eyes since he had to agree with her.

“ _Da._ Even today, after Jugashvili is out of power, many Bulgarians no longer go to Czarnoksiesto,” Krum continued, “and not just for quality. Many leave for political reasons. The rich can afford to send deir children to Durmstrang—best school dat vill take us. But for most Bulgarians, only other option is Yugoslav National.”

Harry could guess the rest of it. Hermione might not pick up on it, but he had been poor once. Krum didn’t grow up rich—maybe still wasn’t. Quidditch didn’t pay that great, even if you were the best in the world. The small size of the wizarding world forced it. “You’re at Durmstrang on a scholarship, aren’t you?” he said.

“ _Da_.”

“He is?” Hermione said in surprise.

“He is?” Ron repeated, equally surprised.

“ _Da_ ,” Krum repeated. “How did you know, Mr. Potter? It is not vell known in Vestern Europe.”

“Lucky guess. It happens a lot in the muggle world.”

“Ah. It is true. I vould have gone to Yugoslav National if it veren’t for Quidditch. Most of my oldest friends vent dere. But I have loved Quidditch since I could first ride broom. In Junior League, I played as well as Seekers twice my age. Headmaster Karkaroff noticed and offered to pay my full tuition to attend. It vas for good press for him, but I still owe him much for it. I vas undefeated in my first four years at Durmstrang vhen I vas recruited for Bulgarian National Team. You see, then, vhy I suggested it to you, Mr. Potter.”

He nodded. “Please, call me Harry,” he said almost automatically. “I’d never heard about all that stuff. You know, I think if I grew up in the magical world, our stories would have been even more similar.”

“Perhaps. And you may call me Viktor.”

Fleur didn’t have as much in common with the rest of the group at the Gryffindor Table, even Hermione, who was mostly on the Quidditch Team because of Harry. But Gabrielle was fascinated to meet another celebrity, so Viktor indulged her with funny stories from his Quidditch experiences. Ron was working up the nerve to ask him for an autograph while trying not to stare at Fleur too conspicuously. Neville seemed a little too nervous in Fleur’s presence to speak. In any case, the conversation was light except when Fleur brought up the Triwizard Champion selection tomorrow night, and Harry’s anxious mood returned.

“What ees wrong, ‘Arry?” Fleur asked. “Do you ‘ave a problem wif zee Tournament?”

“No, I don’t have a problem with the Tournament,” he said. “I have a problem with the date.”

“Wif zee date? Oh, of course, “Alloween?”

“What ees wrong wif “Alloween?” Gabrielle asked.

“Shush, Gabbie. I am sorry, ‘Arry. Eet must be ’ard for you. Zere are always celebrations zee day your parents died.”

“It’s not about that so much…” He glanced at Viktor, unsure how far to involve him. But he seemed like a good sort, even if Karkaroff wasn’t. Harry leaned across the table and motioned for Fleur and Viktor to come closer. “Voldemort’s not dead,” he said.

Fleur gasped and grabbed her sister around the shoulders, while Gabrielle clapped her hands over her mouth. Viktor’s countenance darkened. “Dere are not many who vill say dat name, even at Durmstrang,” he said.

“Dumbledore says we shouldn’t be afraid to speak it,” Harry replied. “But he’s still out there. I’ve seen him. He’s a wandering spirit, trying to come back. Dumbledore says he’s getting stronger again. He’s come after me twice more since I’ve been here, and both times, he’s set his plan in motion on Halloween. I’ve got a bad feeling he’s going to cause some kind of trouble tomorrow.”

At that point, Gabrielle started crying and babbling in French, and Fleur pulled her onto her lap and held her, whispering comfort to her.

 _“Je suis désolé, Gabbie,”_ Harry said. _“Je ne voulais pas t’effrayer.”_

“I understand, ‘Arry.” Fleur assured him. “Eet ees good zat we know. You do not zink zat Vol-de-mort ees ‘ere, do you?” she whispered.

“No, he’s not. I’d know if he was. But I’m sure something’s gonna happen. I can feel it in my gut.”

“Dat is good reason to vorry,” Viktor said. “Always trust your instincts. Ve vill keep eyes out for trouble.”

“And so will we,” Fleur agreed.

“Thanks,” Harry said, “but I’d appreciate it if you didn’t tell anyone exactly why. Especially you, Viktor. No offence. I’m sure most of your Durmstrang friends are good people. But you must know about your school’s reputation.”

“ _Da_. It is not so bad as people say, but it has its bad points. Our refusal to accept muggle-borns is problem for many in Europe. Ve vill be discreet if you vish it.”

With that settled, Harry felt a little better, although he still had a feeling there would be no avoiding whatever Voldemort had planned. It was a few minutes later that the doors of the Great Hall finally opened again, and the remaining two Tournament organisers entered.

“Sorry we’re late, Headmaster,” said the man in the wide-brimmed fedora. “We got held up along the way. Official business. You know how it is.”

“Not a problem, Mr. Monroe,” Dumbledore answered. “In fact, you’re just in time to begin. Ladies and gentlemen, to officially open the Triwizard Tournament, I would like to introduce David Monroe, head of the Department of International Magical Cooperation and Ludo Bagman, head of the Department of Magical Games and Sports.”

The two Ministry wizards took their seats with the three heads. The five of them together would be the judges of the Tournament, which seemed a little odd, but no one questioned it. Even now, no one seemed to know who the “impartial selector” was who would choose the champions, until Mr. Filch brought in a jewel-encrusted chest that contained a large wooden goblet filled with blue flames.

“The Goblet of Fire,” Dumbledore said reverently. “An ancient artifact of uncertain origin, which has been used from time immemorial for the purpose of choosing. Aspiring champions have twenty-four hours to place their names in the Goblet. Tomorrow night, it will return the names of those three it judges most worthy to represent their schools—those most likely to succeed in the tasks whilst upholding standards of good sportsmanship and international cooperation.

“I reiterate that only students who have passed their O.W.L.s or equivalent exams may enter their names, and those who are underage must have written permission from a parent or magical guardian. A teacher or Tournament organiser will personally inspect all names entered in the Goblet to ensure these rules are followed, and I will place a ward around the Goblet to ensure that no student is able to access it physically or magically while it is unattended.

“Finally, I wish to impress upon you that entering your name in the Goblet of Fire constitutes a binding magical contract. There can be no change of heart once you become a champion. If selected, you must compete until the Tournament closes, or as long as you are able. So be sure you are wholeheartedly prepared before you enter. Now, I think it is time for bed. Good night to you all.”

“Blimey, Harry, how’d you meet that Fleur girl?” Ron said as they headed up to their dorms.

“We told you. We met in Baton Vert on holiday two years ago,” Harry said. “The magical world’s tiny by muggle standards. We’re bound to run into everyone sooner or later.”

“Still, you’re friends with a real live veela, and you didn’t tell me?”

“She’s only a quarter veela, Ron,” Harry said. “And it’s not that important.”

“Not important? Did you _see_ her, mate?”

Hermione chided him: “I think _everyone_ saw her, Ron. Boys. I shudder to think how you’d react to a full-blooded one.”

Harry didn’t join in the brewing argument any further. He was busy contemplating the feast. He had avoided Karkaroff when he led the Durmstrang students back to their ship, but he didn’t miss the former Death Eater beginning an animated conversation with Viktor, nor him quailing under an intense glare from Mad-Eye Moody. Harry also knew Sirius would want a full report right away, just in case there was something he missed. One thing was certain: whatever happened, they wouldn’t be idle this time.

* * *

Sadly, classes were still on the next morning, but that didn’t stop aspiring champions from lining up before breakfast. Moody was inspecting all of the entrants, employing his native paranoia to make sure they weren’t doing anything suspicious. However, Harry and Hermione were very surprised to see three underage sixth-years in the line: Fred and George Weasley and Lee Jordan.

“Fred? George? You’re entering?”

“Of course we are! For a thousand galleons, do you think we could keep away?” George answered.

“We’ll split it three ways if one of us wins,” Lee said.

“It was this or try to shake down Bagman for the money we won off him at the World Cup,” Fred added. “Long story.”

“And your parents let you?” Hermione said. “No, I refuse to believe your mother signed off on this.”

“And you would be correct, Miss Granger,” Fred replied with a grin. “But we didn’t need Mum to sign off on it.” He held up a permission form that was signed _Arthur Weasley_.

“Is that a real signature?” Hermione said in shock.

“It most certainly is.”

“See, we convinced Dad that there’s no way in hell either of us would actually get chosen,” George explained.

“Not with our O.W.L. scores.”

“Then why bother entering?” asked Harry.

“Because we figure a little out of the box thinking is just the edge we need,” said Fred.

“And anyway, if one of us _does_ get chosen, it’ll mean we’re the most likely to succeed anyway,” added George.

“And how likely are you to succeed against your mother’s wrath when she finds out?” Hermione asked shrewdly. “Whether you get chosen or not?”

Fred and George flinched a little. “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” George said.

There were a lot of rumours circulating the school about who had entered the Tournament and who was likely to be chosen. Few had any doubt that Viktor would get in for Durmstrang, and he was considered the favourite to win it all. No one knew much about the Beauxbatons girls, but a lot of the boys wanted Fleur to get in on general principle. As for Hogwarts, people were more divided. Some thought Cedric Diggory would get it, even though he was only a sixth-year, because he was the best duellist in school. Others said he would be chosen because of his alleged superhuman strength and stamina as a werewolf. But there was another contingent who was of the opinion that he didn’t deserve to be a champion because of his lycanthropy. Those were mostly Slytherins who were pulling for their own big brute, Cassius Warrington.

The speculation went on between classes all day and on through the Halloween Feast. Harry was on edge for an entirely different reason, though. Nothing seemed amiss so far, but there was still plenty of time for something bad to happen.

At the feast, Madame Maxime and Headmaster Karkaroff both insisted their students sit together, so Harry wasn’t able to sit with Fleur or Viktor, but he wished them both luck. Finally, the golden plates were cleared away, and the entire school waited with baited breath for the Goblet of Fire to reach its decision.

“I will ask the champions, when their names are called, to come forward and proceed into the antechamber behind me to await further instructions,” Dumbledore said. “We should know the the results very shortly—ah, here it is.”

The flames in the Goblet changed from blue to a deep crimson. Sparks shot out of it, followed by a charred piece of parchment. Dumbledore caught it and read it.

“The champion for Durmstrang will be Viktor Krum,” he said.

A storm of applause swept the Great Hall. Viktor had fans everywhere, so a lot of people were excited to see him compete. Viktor strode forward confidently and into the antechamber.

A second piece of parchment emerged from the Goblet: “The champion for Beauxbatons will be Fleur Delacour.”

Fleur also got a loud round of applause, although it was much more from the boys. The girls weren’t particularly happy about the presence of a part-veela in the school, and Fleur’s classmates didn’t take it nearly as well as Viktor’s. Gabrielle, however, jumped up on a chair and whistled loudly, making Fleur smile.

“The champion for Hogwarts will be Cedric Diggory,” Dumbledore called when the third piece of parchment emerged.

Cedric was the only champion to get audible boos, although they were mostly from the Slytherins. Hufflepuff was wholeheartedly behind him, they so rarely topped any competition, and Harry, Colin Creevey, and Demelza Robins all applauded him on their feet. Fred, George, and Lee looked disappointed, but they graciously didn’t shout Cedric down.

“Excellent! Bravo, Mr. Diggory,” Dumbledore agreed. “Now that we have our three champions, I hope that I can count on all of you to give them your full support—”

But Dumbledore stopped as the flames in the Goblet turned crimson again, and a fourth piece of parchment fluttered out. Everyone froze. Harry Potter’s eyes widened in understanding and horror as he realised what was happening.

“Oh no,” he whispered.

“What?” Hermione said, but then she, too, figured out what Harry had guessed.

“Oh no. Oh no,” Harry repeated. A few people stared at him.

Dumbledore caught the parchment and read it. He turned deathly pale where he stood, and his eyes flicked in shock towards one of the guests.

“Oh no oh no oh no oh no—”

“Harry Potter.”

“OH _HELL_ NO!” Harry shouted. He sprang to his feet and glared at Dumbledore.

There was a brief silence, followed by a buzz of whispers like angry bees. The professors were already up and moving. “Harry, I’m afraid you must come forward,” Dumbledore said.

Harry stayed rooted to the spot. “I didn’t enter my name, Professor,” he called back loudly.

“But your name _has_ been chosen by the Goblet of Fire,” Dumbledore responded.

“I’m not old enough,” Harry countered. “I don’t have permission.”

“The Goblet does not know that, Harry. It has accepted your name and signature. I am sorry, but you are obligated by the contract to join the other champions.”

Harry stormed forward, up to the front of the Great Hall. He had had an inkling that this could happen but he didn’t think even Voldemort could pull something like that over on Dumbledore. It just seemed too unlikely to be the real plan. “So much for your great security again,” he said aloud. “How was I even chosen? Hogwarts already has a champion.”

Somehow, Dumbledore looked even more uncomfortable. He seemed reluctant as he answered, “You were not entered under Hogwarts, Harry.”

Harry stopped and stared. “What school was I entered under, sir?” he said.

“Harry, I do not think this is the appropriate time—”

“Why not? It’s going to be public record soon enough, isn’t it, Professor? What school was I entered under?”

“I would like to know zat as well, Dumbly-dorr,” Madame Maxime spoke up.

“As would I,” Karkaroff spat. “A fourth champion! Preposterous!”

Harry kept up his feline stare, and Dumbledore acquiesced to the pressure from the other heads. He closed his eyes with a sigh and said, “Harry, you were entered as a champion for the Uluru School of Song and Dream in Australia.”


	91. The Fourth Champion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: It was called “the Big Lie” technique, Harry. Just sound like you know what you’re talking about—as if you’re reciting JK Rowling.
> 
> Credit to Tharl for pointing out the Harry-Grayson wandless magic link.
> 
> The reactions and analysis for Harry’s name being drawn were strongly influenced by Josie Kearns’s essay on Goblet of Fire on the Harry Potter Companion blog, which I highly recommend.

_“The twenty-fourth of November is a Thursday! Our schedule is complicated enough this year. We don’t need to be disrupting classes.”_

_“Well, we can adjust the dates…”_

_“And what’s this about the champions being exempt from end-of-year examinations? Do you realise the Hogwarts champion will probably be taking his or her N.E.W.T.s this year?”_

_“What? Oh, hmm, that’s an old rule, I guess. I thought we’d already got rid of it.”_

* * *

_“Harry, you were entered as a champion for the Uluru School of Song and Dream in Australia.”_

Harry stared and slowly turned to look at Edward Grayson. The Australian ambassador looked just as surprised as he felt. Was it an act? Or was it a cover for the real culprit? He’d been expecting Voldemort to make a move, but _this?_ It didn’t make any sense. Why would Grayson want him in the Tournament? Why would _anyone_ want him in the Tournament?

“Harry?” Dumbledore repeated.

 _Join the other champions_ , Harry thought. He had a feeling he wasn’t going to get out of this by arguing. He turned around and spotted Hermione, intent on telling her to run up to Gryffindor Tower and mirror-call their family, but she was already ahead of him. As soon as he fixed his eyes on her, she stood up, nodded, and rushed from the Great Hall.

The murmuring of the rest of the students had reached a fever pitch, and many of them were looking back and forth between him and Grayson suspiciously. Harry turned back to the High Table and surveyed the teachers for a moment. Hagrid looked astonished. Remus looked frightened. Dumbledore looked grave as Harry gave him his most disapproving feline stare. “We _will_ be discussing how this happened, Headmaster,” he said. Dumbledore nodded sadly, and Harry passed him by into the antechamber.

He had never been in the little room before. He suspected it was mostly used by the teachers to use if they became ill or had an emergency come up during a meal. Quite a few portraits hung on the walls, and a handsome fire was roaring in the fireplace. Cedric, Fleur, and Viktor were standing in front of the fire waiting idly. Fleur heard him enter first and said, “What is it? Do zey want us back in zee Hall?”

Harry shook his head mutely.

“What is it, then?” asked Cedric.

“My name came out of the Goblet.”

The other three champions gasped—well, Viktor didn’t, but his heavy eyebrows rose comically, and he surveyed Harry carefully. Cedric looked perplexed. How could they have another champion? Fleur almost laughed, but the look on Harry’s face was enough to tell her he was serious.

“But zair must be a mistake,” she said. “You are too young.”

“That’s what I said.”

“And you did not enter yourself?” Viktor asked.

“No, I didn’t,” Harry said testily.

“But we already have a champion,” Cedric protested.

“I wasn’t entered under Hogwarts.”

Cedric’s confusion grew. “What school were you entered under, then?”

“Uluru. Grayson’s old school.”

That shocked all three of them with the same questions everyone else was thinking. _How? Why?_ But they couldn’t enquire further as the door behind him banged open, and a large, blond, and overexcited man strode in. “Extraordinary!” Ludo Bagman said with a grin. “Absolutely extraordinary! Ladies and gentleman, may I present, amazing though it may seem, the _fourth_ Triwizard Champion!” He grabbed Harry’s arm as if to show him off to the others, oblivious to the fact that he was already acquainted with all three of them.

Harry hissed loudly and yanked his arm away, suppressing the urge to take a good swipe with his nonexistent claws. “I already told them,” he grumbled.

The other organisers barrelled in: Dumbledore, Maxime, Karkaroff, and David Monroe, as did Professors Grayson, Moody, Snape, and Lupin, making the room very crowded.

“Madame Maxime,” Fleur said at once, “‘Arry says ‘e is to compete also!”

“Eet ees true, Fleur,” Madame Maxime told her. “And we wish to get to zee bottom of it, now.”

“Yes,” Karkaroff agreed, and he suddenly whirled on the Australian man. “What are you playing at, Grayson? Trying to get your friend an extra champion with that little ruse?”

“Certainly not. I am as surprised as you are, Professor Karkaroff, and no offence to Mr. Potter, but if I _were_ to try something like that, I wouldn’t have picked a fourth-year.”

“But Potter is not just any fourth-year, isn’t he?” Karkaroff retorted. “He has advanced skills—fighting dark wizards, using wandless magic.”

“Not _that_ advanced, I assure you.”

“Or maybe he did it himself. What do you have to say for yourself, boy?” He took a step towards Harry, but he was cut off by Moody’s wand.

“You just stay put, Karkaroff,” the old Auror warned.

“I wouldn’t put it past Potter, Moody,” Snape spoke up. “The brat’s propensity for getting in trouble is truly astounding.”

Harry glared at Snape. “Hey, almost all of those weren’t my fault, Professor,” he protested. “It’s not my fault dark wizards are after me.”

“There’s no need to be so dramatic, Potter,” Snape glared back.

“He didn’t do it, Severus,” Remus said, but it didn’t improve the dour man’s mood.

“The lad’s got a point,” Moody said. “This Tournament’s dangerous—meant to test the limits of students three years older than he is. It’d be awfully _convenient_ for certain people if he didn’t make it out alive.”

Harry paled. Of course, that was the most obvious reason to put him in the Tournament…although it seemed like an awful lot of trouble. Why not just shoot him down with a Killing Curse in Hogsmeade?

“And that would be _such_ a great loss,” Snape continued.

“Severus, I’m warning you…” Remus growled.

“That will do,” Dumbledore cut them off.

“Albus, he can’t compete,” Remus insisted.

“I’m afraid it may not be so simple,” the Headmaster replied. “We must ascertain what happened. Now, Harry, for the record, did you put your name in the Goblet of Fire?”

“What, you think I was getting bored not getting in any mortal peril yet this year?”

“Harry—”

“Of course I didn’t!”

“Did you ask anyone else to place your name in?”

“No. How could I? Wasn’t every signature checked by hand?”

“Aye. I checked most of them,” Moody agreed. “I’d like to know how someone pulled one over on me, too.” His magical eye seemed to be focused on Grayson. It was an obvious suspicion, since Grayson was supposed to be Dumbledore’s equal and so was powerful enough to do it.

“What about how a fourth school was supposedly added to the Tournament?” Karkaroff asked.

“What about the fact that I never _signed_ anything?” Harry demanded.

“As I said, it may not be so simple,” Dumbledore told him. He handed him a small scrap of parchment, charred around the edges. “Is that your handwriting, Harry?”

Harry took the parchment, and his heart sank. There, in his own hand was his signature:

 

_Harry Potter_

 

And below it, in completely different handwriting, was:

 

_Uluru School of Song and Dream_

 

“The signature is,” he admitted. “Professor, this looks like it was taken off one of my homework assignments.”

Dumbledore cocked an eyebrow: “How do you know?”

“It’s torn from the top right corner of the page. I only write my name there for homework.”

“Then the teachers would’ve had easiest access to it,” David Monroe spoke up for the first time, and the judges eyed the three teachers in the room suspiciously.

 _And Professor Moody was the one checking the signatures_ , Harry thought. But that didn’t make sense, either. Moody was the last person who would do anything for Voldemort. “But I don’t understand, sir,” he said. “I didn’t sign anything for the Tournament willingly. And I’m not old enough.”

“The Goblet of Fire is not picky, Harry,” he replied. “Its enchantments are powerful, but not precise. Your signature was enough. It was the responsibility of the organisers to ensure the signatures were legitimate, and I’m sorry to say we’ve failed in that regard.”

“But I’m not even a student at Uluru. How could I be entered for them?”

“As to that, I an unsure, but that is what I have sent Minerva to check.”

The other three champions had been watching this exchange with great interest. The organisers were at least performing their due diligence in investigating, but they didn’t like were this was going. Viktor’s face darkened as he realised that Harry wasn’t likely to get out of this. Fleur looked very worried for the younger boy, and Cedric seemed generally unhappy.

“Are you saying dat Harry vill have to compete, Headmaster Dumbledore?” Viktor asked.

“He may well have to, Mr. Krum. We will know more shortly.”

Suddenly, the door opened again, making Harry jump, and Professor McGonagall entered the room, looking pale and shaken.

“Ah, Minerva, excellent timing,” Dumbledore said. “What have you found?”

“I checked the records, like you said. You were right, Albus. Harry Potter is marked down this year as an exchange student to Uluru School.”

“Exchange student?” Harry said in surprise. “We even have those? And wouldn’t someone need to sign for that?”

“That’s what so troubling, Mr. Potter,” she said. “Your magical guardian did not given permission for the forms to be filed, as he should have, and yet Hogwarts seems to have accepted the documents as valid. I cannot explain it.”

“Well, even if they’re valid, that shouldn’t be enough,” Grayson reasoned. “He’d have to be officially enrolled at—” His face darkened, and he reached into his robes, withdrawing a hand mirror. “This needs investigating. Kylie Grayson,” he said.

After a few moments’ pause, a young, female voice emanated from the mirror. “Grandpa?” she said. “Do you know what time it is?”

“Sorry, Wallaby, but this is urgent,” he said gently. “I need you to go to Uluru School right now and check the student records for a Harry Potter.”

“Harry Potter?” Kylie said in confusion. “Isn’t he supposed to be—”

“He’s right here in the room with me, but his name just got picked for this Triwizard Tournament they’re having— _for Uluru_. We’re trying to figure out if it’s legit.”

“Harry Potter…for Uluru…how the hell—?” Kylie muttered.

“I’m not sure, but Potter’s down here as an exchange student to Uluru. I need you to see if there’s a corresponding document there. Quickly, if you can.”

“Right…Alright, grandpa, I’m going. I’ll mirror-call you if I find something.”

“Thank you, Kylie. Mirror off.”

So Grayson had a communication mirror. That surprised Harry, even though it probably shouldn’t have. It was just that most wizards seemed oddly complacent with lower-quality communications like Floo calls.

“Expecting to find something, Grayson?” Moody said suspiciously. “It’d probably be easiest for you to file those records.”

“I assure you I had nothing to do with it, Professor Moody,” he shot back. “If I wanted Uluru represented, I could’ve easily done it above board.”

“What if it’s a show of the power of wandless magic?” Karkaroff said. “The boy’s supposed to be quite adept. You might like the publicity.”

“Did you forget where I’m from, Headmaster Karkaroff? Many of Uluru’s upper-year students are better than Mr. Potter at wandless magic. And anyway, it probably would have been easier to file those documents through the Department of International Magical Cooperation.”

All eyes turned to David Monroe, the head of that department. “What, you think _I_ did it?” he said.

“Well, you heard the man,” Karkaroff said, striding up to him.

 _David Monroe?_ Harry thought. _But he_ _’s supposed to be the most liberal member of the Wizengamot. He would never be in league with Voldemort—if that’s who’s behind this._ And what possible motive could anyone else have for making him compete? But then, what motive could Voldemort himself have?

“Don’t think I’m letting _you_ off the hook, Karkaroff,” Moody snapped. “The pardon I can tolerate, but I still don’t understand how anyone was barmy enough to hire you. That’s suspicious in itself in my book.”

“But what about you? You were the one guarding the Goblet with that crazy eye of yours.”

“Alright, just stop for a minute,” Remus spoke up before a duel could start. “Let’s think about this logically. Not just anyone could have done this. Whoever’s behind this must have done three things: one, done something to the Goblet of Fire to add a fourth school to the Tournament; two, put Harry’s name in either under our noses or through Albus’s wards; and three, filed the enrolment records to make Harry a legitimate entry.”

Harry was pretty sure that speech was for his benefit as much as the adults.” That really narrowed down the suspect list. In fact, it sounded like most, if not all, of the people who could have done it were in this room. But none of them made a lick of sense except Karkaroff, and oddly, Dumbledore looked merely suspicious of him, not accusatory.

“I think that investigation will have to be left for another time, Remus,” Dumbledore said with a warning edge. “The most pressing concern is whether Harry must compete in the Tournament. Unfortunately, though, I fear the contract will require it.”

“Well, zen,” Madame Maxime spoke up, “Monsieur Monroe, Monsieur Bagman, you are our impartial judges. What ees your ruling?”

David Monroe sighed, adjusted his hat, and said, “The rules of the Tournament are very clear. If the Goblet accepted Mr. Potter’s name, he is bound by the contract to compete.”

“I agree with David,” Bagman said. He had watched the proceedings in bewilderment, but now, his boyish grin was creeping back onto his face. “But I don’t think the Tournament will give to much trouble to Harry Potter. He slew a basilisk in his second year, you know.”

“That doesn’t mean I want to do it!” Harry protested.

But Bagman wasn’t listening. “Oh, it’ll be great fun, I’m sure. Do you think we should change the name? Let’s see, would Quadwizard or Tetrawizard be the correct form?”

“We should redraw the names,” Karkaroff insisted. “Or else draw more so we each have two champions. It’s only fair.”

“Sorry, Igor, we can’t do either of those,” Bagman said, frowning a little. “The Goblet’s gone out. It won’t light again until the next Tournament.”

“Humph. Then I insist that the official record say that Potter is a champion for Uluru and Uluru alone. No recognition of Hogwarts in the unlikely event he wins. I won’t tolerate Hogwarts having—what’s the expression? A second bite at the apple.”

“Fine,” Harry snapped, causing Karkaroff to look at him in surprise. “I don’t want to be in this anyway, and I don’t want to upstage Cedric, either. I _do_ want to see a copy of this contract, though. What happens if I break it?”

Nearly everyone in the room gasped. “Mr. Potter, you can’t just break a binding magical contract,” David Monroe spoke up.

“I know how binding magical contracts work, Mr. Monroe,” Harry said. “I’ve used them before. They have penalties if you break them. They can be pretty nasty, but they can’t kill you. I think it’s only fair that I get to decide for myself.” There were still more surprise from the room. That sort of thing just wasn’t done— _choosing_ to break a contract and accepting the penalties. “So, can I get a copy?”

“I vould like copy also,” Viktor spoke up. “I do not normally sign anything before it is read by my solicitor.”

“That sounds like a good idea to me, too,” Cedric agreed, and Fleur nodded.

“Alright, alright, then,” Monroe said. He drew a small, but fancy-looking parchment booklet from his robes and used a duplication spell to make four copies, which he handed to the four champions.

Bagman clapped his hands excitedly: “Well, then, that’s settled. Let’s get started. The first task will be held on Saturday, the twenty-sixth of November in front of the students and the panel of judges. Oh, and your families will be invited to attend. The first task is designed to test your daring, so we’re not going to tell you what it is.”

“Huh? How does _that_ follow?” Harry said.

“Courage in the face of the unknown is an important quality in a wizard,” Monroe answered for him. “You may not ask or accept any help from your teachers to complete the tasks, and you will face the first challenge armed only with your wands. The second task, on the other hand, will test your planning and problem solving, and completing the first task will be critical to your receiving the clue to the second. That will be all for now.”

“Which just leaves the matter of Harry’s records,” Remus pointed out.

“If I know Kylie, she won’t be much longer,” Grayson said.

“Because she knows where to look?” Moody sniped.

“Alastor,” Dumbledore warned.

Harry suspected Moody was still cross at being accused by Karkaroff more than at Grayson. He still had to be suspicious of Moody though. His head was spinning with half the room all accusing each other. And yet, Moody was the best dark wizard hunter in Britain. Karkaroff still seemed more likely, except that he sounded so unhappy about it (and not without reason).

“Ahem, there is one other piece of business,” Monroe spoke up.

“There is?” Even Dumbledore looked as if he wasn’t expecting anything more.

“The bylaws of the Tournament state that the head of each champion’s school, or a proxy, shall serve on the judges’ panel. Headmaster Karkaroff, if you wish for Mr. Potter to be marked down for Uluru, Ambassador Grayson would be entitled to join as a judge.”

Karkaroff’s eyebrows shot up with a mad stare. He turned from Monroe to Grayson in renewed suspicion, then to Harry, and finally, he looked at Viktor with a calculating look.

“I do not object, Headmaster,” Viktor said.

“Very well,” Karkaroff agreed at once. “If only to help show how great a farce this is. Come, Viktor.”

Karkaroff and Maxime took Viktor and Fleur away at that point, but Cedric and the others stayed behind for news. A couple minutes later, there was a soft buzzing sound, and Grayson pulled out his mirror. “Mirror on,” he said. “Kylie? What did you find?”

Kylie whistled. “You’re never gonna believe this, Grandpa. I found three things on Harry Potter in the records. I’ve got an old acceptance letter they sent him three years ago that was never answered. I’ve got an enrolment form for him as an exchange student from Hogwarts. But here’s the best part. I also found a form that lists Harry Potter as an exchange student from Uluru _back_ to Hogwarts.”

“ _Back_ to Hogwarts?” Harry said.

“Crikey. So Potter’s technically a student at both schools.”

“It looks like it. The one thing I don’t get is that the forms don’t have the proper signatures. They should never have been filed.”

Grayson sighed with sudden understanding: “They didn’t _need_ the signatures because Potter never actually _went_ anywhere. He never did anything against his guardians’ wishes. The paper trail is just a legal fiction that let him be entered in the Tournament for Uluru.”

There was a sudden hissing sound, but it didn’t come from Harry. It came from Professor McGonagall. Harry flinched. She usually kept her feline tendencies tamped down so well. “This is not good. They went to that much trouble… _Someone_ has planned this in great detail, Albus,” she said, “and whatever plan they have, it’s _working_.”

“I’m aware of that, Minerva,” Dumbledore said.

“I’d like to get my claws into whoever did this to one of my cubs,” she muttered.

“And I’ll help,” Remus growled.

“Admirable though that is, there is no more we can do for tonight. I think it is time for you to go up to Gryffindor Tower, Harry,” Dumbledore said. “Your family will no doubt want to know about this. The students have already been dismissed to bed, but I will make the announcement at breakfast tomorrow to set the record straight. Please inform Professor McGonagall beforehand on what you decide about competing—although I strongly urge you to do so.”

“Yes, sir,” Harry said dully, and he and turned to go.

“I’ll come with you, Harry,” Remus said. “Help your family sort this out.”

“You know you are not allowed to help Harry with the tasks, Remus,” Dumbledore him.

Remus bristled, but he stayed calm and replied, “I’m not going to help him with the tasks, Albus, although you can rest assured that if I actually knew what the tasks _were_ I would’ve resigned already to do it. But I _am_ going to help him understand the contract and make his decision.”

McGonagall looked thoughtful as he left. She actually _did_ know a thing or two about the tasks, and while they could have been a good deal worse, she was not at all happy with Harry Potter being forced to compete in them. Would it be worth it to give up her post in order to help him?

Cedric stuck close to Harry while the paths to their common rooms coincided, but he wasn’t saying anything.

“I’m sorry about all this, Cedric,” Harry said. “This was supposed to be your moment. When you were chosen, I thought it was good that you had a chance to rebuild your reputation, and maybe you could make a statement about werewolves, too. I didn’t want to upstage you.”

“It’s alright, Harry,” Cedric said with a sigh. “I can see you didn’t want to do this. I’ll do what damage control I can in Hufflepuff.”

“Thanks, Cedric.”

* * *

Hermione had tried to remain dignified as she walked out of the Great Hall, but she broke into a jog once she was out of sight. She dashed up to Gryffindor Tower and then up the next seven flights to her dorm room to retrieve her communication mirror that connected to her parents and then down and back up to Harry’s dorm room, where she found his mirror that linked to Sirius in his trunk. Finally, out of breath and close to tears, she sat down at Harry’s desk and called, “Daniel Granger, Sirius Black.”

The three of them appeared very quickly, looking concerned. “Hermione, what’s wrong?” Emma asked.

“Harry’s name came out of the Goblet.”

Hermione immediately found herself telling her dumbfounded parents and godfather everything she knew, which unfortunately wasn’t much at this point. So engrossed was she in her explanation that she was actually surprised when, just a few minutes later, Ron came in. He froze in surprise when he saw her and scowled: “Hermione? What are _you_ doing here? You can’t be here!”

“It’s not against the rules, Ron, and I happen to be talking to my family.”

“Telling them how excited you are?” he said.

Indignant noises came from the mirrors, and Hermione shot back, “ _No,_ telling them how worried I am and trying to figure out what we’re going to do about it.”

“Oh? I figured you’d be down there celebrating like the rest of them.”

“They’re celebrating?” Emma cried from the mirror.

“I’m not surprised,” Sirius said. “Gryffindors don’t need much excuse to party, and there’s probably a few who only care about getting a champion from their house.”

“After he stood up in the Great Hall and said that he didn’t want to be in it?” Hermione said.

“I hate to rag on my former house, but they’re not Ravenclaw. Some of them are gonna be idiots.”

Hermione glared at Ron again. “Well, I’m sure Harry will tell them off when he gets back. He’s not going to appreciate it.”

“Oh, really?”

“Yes, really, Ronald. You know Harry doesn’t like being treated like a celebrity.”

Ron only grunted in response to this. Hermione went back to her discussion with her parents and Sirius, but without more information, all they could really do was wait for Harry to get back. That took a while. When he did return, they were a bit surprised to see Remus was with him.

“You were right, Harry,” Remus said when he saw the mirrors. “Like a well-oiled machine, you two.”

“Moony! Cub! Thank God, it’s about time,” Sirius said.

“Are you alright, Harry?” Emma said. “Hermione told us everything she knew.”

Harry flopped down on his bed and sighed heavily.

“I thought you weren’t gonna enter, Harry,” Ron said, still sounding annoyed.

“I _didn_ _’t_ enter,” Harry said.

“Yeah, I bet you couldn’t get past Moody yourself. Did you make a deal with Grayson “cause you can both do wandless magic?”

Harry sat up and stared at him: “Ron, I don’t want to be in this thing. I told you before, there’s no point to me being in this thing.”

“Or is it “cause you’re both animagi? He’s an animagus too, isn’t he? And you didn’t even enter for Hogwarts. What’s up with that?”

“Ronald Weasley, that’s enough,” Remus snapped. “I thought you would be more supportive of your friend. There rest of us are all very concerned about the danger he’s in. Harry made it very clear that he didn’t enter the Tournament and didn’t want to. We don’t know who did enter him, but we’re trying to find out.”

Ron’s eyebrows shot up. “Why would somebody else enter you?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” Harry said, “but I have a bad feeling Voldemort is involved somehow.”

Ron flinched. “Seriously, Harry? You-Know-Who?”

“Ron, he _always_ makes his opening move on Halloween. You remember first year. _And_ second year. If this year is anything like those, this is the first step of some convoluted plan that ends with him trying to kill me sometime in June.”

Ron was taken aback. He was smart enough to see the truth of Harry’s words. He didn’t feel so jealous when he put it that way. “Whoa, I’m sorry, mate. I never thought about that.”

“Well…now you know.”

“Ahem,” Dan said. Harry turned to the mirrors. “Harry, you know we don’t like it when you talk that way. We want everyone doing their best to make sure you _don_ _’t_ have anyone trying to kill you this year.”

“Yeah, me too, but this kind of stuff keeps happening.”

“Harry, what did Professor Dumbledore say?” Hermione cut in. “You don’t really have to compete in this thing, do you?”

Harry shook his head: “He says I probably do.”

“What? Why?” his parents said.

“Whoever put my name in ripped my signature off my homework. Apparently, that was enough to bind me to the contract.”

“Damn,” Sirius growled. “Binding magical contracts are bad news.”

“Well, what happens if you break it?” Dan said sensibly.

“I don’t know yet. They gave me a copy of the contract, though.” Harry took out the small parchment booklet and flipped through it, muttering to himself. “Aha. Here it is…He who refuses to compete when chosen, or who brings injury upon himself for the purpose of being prevented from competing…shall be branded as a coward for all to see and shall be…oh no…shall be struck with weakness of the limbs and…illness of the stomach so as to be confined to his bed until he repents of his cowardice or, until the Tournament concludes.”

“That sounds bad,” Hermione said obviously.

“No, you think?” Harry said. “So this means if I break the contract, I’ll be sick for the rest of the year.”

“It’s worse than that,” Sirius said darkly. “If it’s written in a contract, ‘branded as a coward for all to see’ isn’t just a figure of speech.”

Harry’s stared at him: “You mean it’ll _actually_ write ‘coward’ across my face or something?”

“It didn’t say write; it said branded. That’ll probably leave a scar.”

Harry winced and let out a meow-like squeak.

“That’s barbaric!” Hermione cried. She grabbed the contract to read it for herself.

“That’s not the important part, though,” Remus said. “The main problem is that we’re pretty sure Voldemort is plotting against Harry again, and if he doesn’t compete, the penalty will make him too sick to defend himself.”

“Oh, God,” Emma gasped.

“Remus, do you know what the tasks will be?” said Dan after a pause.

“No. I’m going to try to get the organisers to give me some clues, though. I’m not technically supposed to help Harry, but I imagine we can find a way around it.”

Emma sighed and rubbed her forehead, saying, “So the real question is, and I can’t believe I’m saying this, which is more dangerous, the tasks, or being sick and missing a year of school?”

“They modified the Tournament,” Hermione recalled. “The tasks aren’t supposed to be life-threatening.”

“Unless Voldemort sabotaged them,” Sirius said.

“If Harry’s just sick, he might be safer as long as he has good protection,” Remus said.

“Except that he’ll be a year behind in his studies,” Hermione objected. “That could hurt him long-term.”

“And Voldemort could still try to kill him when he’s vulnerable, though,” Sirius observed.

“Either way, how much danger could Harry be in at Hogwarts?” Hermione said hopefully. “In fact, why go to all this trouble in the first place? Why not just attack him on the street?”

“I don’t know, except maybe that at Hogwarts, Voldemort knows where Harry is all year,” Remus said. “He’ll be easier to find.”

“Wait, you think he’s infiltrated the school again, Remus?” Dan said in horror.

“He’s right,” Sirius said. “A plan this ridiculously overcomplicated only has a chance of working if he has a man on the inside. Does Dumbledore know how Harry’s name got in in the first place?”

“How, yes, but not who. We have some ideas, but none of them seem very good.”

“Karkaroff?” Sirius growled.

“Maybe.”

“Okay, how about this, Harry,” Hermione reasoned. She was still reading over the contract. “According to this, it looks like you can still carry on normally, and when you get to the first task, if it’s too hard, you can just walk away and take the penalty. And if you go ahead and compete in the second task after that, you’ll be back to normal.”

“If I can,” Harry said. “That could be a problem—”

Hermione wasn’t listening. “And even then, if you get injured in one of the tasks or for some unrelated reason, you’re off the hook, right?”

“Yes,” Sirius interrupted, “but I wouldn’t try having you deliberately hurt him to get him out of it. Even I don’t know what would happen then. The penalty might hit _both_ of you.”

“Oh.”

“Another important question,” Dan said. “What’s the definition of ‘competing’ according to the contract?”

“I don’t think it matters,” Harry said. “I have to give the first task my all—I have to beat it to get the clue for the second task.”

“Oh…” Hermione repeated.

“It’s probably safest if you make a genuine effort, anyway,” Sirius said.

“But with a strategy of trying not to get hurt,” Emma countered. “Being forced into a dangerous tournament at all…That shouldn’t be allowed. And they _can_ _’t_ think you have a chance of winning, Harry, not going up against seventh-years—sorry.”

“It’s okay, Mum,” Harry said softly.

“It’ll be okay, Emma,” Dan comforted her. “At least it’s not completely out of our control.”

“That’s right,” Sirius agreed. “We’ll take it one task at a time. And Harry doesn’t have to win; he just has to get through in one piece. So here’s what we do. Moony, you do everything you can to get Harry information about the first task, and then, we make a plan either to take on the task, or to keep Harry safe if it’s too dangerous, and he has to sit out until the next one. We can handle this.”

Emma took a deep breath. “You’re right, Sirius,” she said. “We just need more information. We’re sorry you have to go through this, Harry. I wish you could have just one normal year.”

“Yeah, story of my life,” Harry grumbled. “But thanks.” Hermione hugged him in solidarity.

“Okay, now that’s settled,” Sirius spoke up, “how did your name wind up in the Goblet, and what do you have on who did it?”

Harry and Remus then told everything that had been said in the meeting with the professors and the judges, from Harry’s signature on the parchment to him being enrolled as a double exchange student. Remus reiterated his three points about who did it, which led to consideration of suspects.

“I hate to admit it, but Grayson or Monroe would’ve had the easiest time filing those papers,” Sirius said. He had the best idea of how the politics worked. “Either one of them could have potentially filed them in Australia by international post.”

“But anyone could’ve done it if they stole Harry’s signature,” Remus countered.

“It would’ve been easier for a teacher to do that wouldn’t it?” asked Dan.

“Easier, yes, but not impossible for anyone else. Besides the only teachers here who haven’t been here for years are me and Moody. The others can be trusted.”

“Didn’t you say Moody was the one checking the signatures?” he pressed.

“Yes, most of them, but still, it’s Mad-Eye Moody. You’d be hard pressed to find anyone alive who hates Voldemort more.”

“Hold on; we should write this down,” Hermione said. She grabbed a piece of parchment from Harry’s stuff and started writing out the names of the potential suspects along with columns for _Evidence For_ and _Evidence Against._ Her mother chuckled weakly. She was just about to do something similar herself.

Sirius had another point: “The real key is who managed to Confund the Goblet to add a fourth school to the Tournament. That’s a powerful magical artifact. It can’t have been easy.”

Remus nodded. “I’d immediately dismiss any of the students on those grounds,” he said. “Even if someone told them how, I doubt they could pull it off. Grayson could, though, and so could several of the other teachers.”

“Karkaroff,” Sirius repeated. “He’s the obvious suspect.”

“Except that he spilt everything he knew to stay out of Azkaban. I don’t think anything—excuse me, but I don’t think anything short of killing Harry outright would convince Voldemort to welcome him back.”

“But isn’t that his plan?” Harry said. “He wants me to die in the Tournament?”

“No, too complicated,” Sirius said. “We know he has a man on the inside, and we don’t know who it is. There are a hundred easier ways. No, he must want you actually _in_ the Tournament for some reason.”

“But why? What could Voldemort possibly have to gain from me being in the Tournament whether I win or not?”

“And more importantly, isn’t that a good reason to pull him out?” Emma suggested.

“Unless that’s what he’s hoping we’ll do—” Remus started.

“No! No! Stop!” Sirius said. “That way lies madness! We’re going in circles; we can’t decide based on just that.”

“What if…” Hermione spoke up. “What if Voldemort really _isn_ _’t_ behind this.”

“What?” Everyone turned to her in surprise.

“What if someone else put Harry’s name in, and it really _is_ just a coincidence?”

“Mione, that doesn’t make sense,” Harry protested. “It still doesn’t explain who or why?”

She wrote down an additional column on her chart labelled _Motive_. “Someone who genuinely thinks you can win, maybe?”

Remus thought about that for a minute, but he shook his head: “The only people here who are remotely that foolish are Hagrid and Bagman, and neither of them have the skill.”

“Maybe it’s someone who’s just trying to give me a hard time,” Harry said.

“Snape!” Sirius and Ron both yelled at the same time.

“No,” Remus said firmly.

“He’s been nastier to me than usual this year,” Harry said.

“But he’s not stupid. He knows Dumbledore would murder him, and if he didn’t, Padfoot and I would.”

A horrible thought crossed Emma’s mind. “Dumbledore,” she whispered.

“What was that?”

“Okay, this may sound crazy, but is there any chance Dumbledore did it himself?”

“That’s crazy!” Ron said.

“Ron!” Harry and Hermione yelled back.

Ron flinched under their glares. He knew he was on thin ice already for yelling at Harry earlier. “Sorry, Mrs. Granger,” he mumbled. “But seriously, why would Dumbledore want to do that?”

The adults all looked at each other nervously through the mirrors. Ron didn’t know the full story and wasn’t supposed to. Dan cleared his throat, “Um, listen, Ron, we can’t exactly say everything, but back in your first year, Professor Dumbledore tried to…well, he tried to manipulate Harry into doing some dangerous things because he thought it was good training.”

“He did?” Ron said in surprise.

“Well, sort of, but I don’t believe it now,” Remus said firmly. “If you recall, even in the cubs’ first year, Dumbledore dismissed that idea before he fully implemented it. He wouldn’t do it now…I wouldn’t put it past Moody…but there’s no way he’d do it without Dumbledore’s say-so.”

“So we’re back to Voldemort,” Harry said in resignation. “And how many suspects do we have, Mione?”

Hermione looked over her now-long chart. “One—if you count Karkaroff.”

“Aren’t we forgetting something, though?” Dan said.

“What?”

“We’re talking about people who can use magic. What if Voldemort’s man is disguised as someone else—maybe even a student?”

Several pairs of eyes widened, and several voices said, “Bloody hell!” at the same time.

“But—but that means it could be _anyone_ ,” Hermione said fearfully. She even glanced at Remus and Ron in spite of herself.

Fortunately, Remus was more level-headed. “Not just anyone,” he said. “It would be hard to impersonate a student. They have friends. Families. They have to interact with other students in their dorms and teachers in class. Even the foreign students, it’d be hard. Someone would suspect something. And most importantly, I doubt they could’ve got anywhere near the Goblet that way without raising suspicion. Ditto for the teachers except _maybe_ Moody, but Dumbledore’s known him for years, and he’s too paranoid not to have security questions.”

“Security questions?” Hermione asked.

Sirius answered, “Ask someone a question only they would know the answer to. We did it a lot in the war. Ideally made up on the spot so they can’t kidnap you and force it out of you. Like this: Moony, how did James and Lily _really_ get hexed to get electrically shocked every time they touched each other in fifth year?”

“Lily bribed me to do it with imported muggle chocolate. She thought it would keep James away for a while.”

“Yep, that’s definitely Moony,” Sirius said as the others laughed. “And he’s right. Mad-Eye’s too paranoid not to do that. I don’t think it’s any of the Hogwarts teachers if Remus doesn’t. Maxime can’t be impersonated because she’s not all human, although she could be Imperiused. Karkaroff’s still a suspect, though. Be careful around him regardless, Harry.”

“The only other possibilities are Monroe, Bagman, and Grayson,” Hermione said.

“Not Grayson,” Harry corrected. “Animagus, remember? You can’t fake that. And he’s been here all term.”

“Alright, so we’ve got three likely people,” Remus said. “It’s not a certainty, but it’s a pretty good start.”

“Can’t you just question them all?” asked Emma.

“Not without evidence. But we can watch them. Monroe and Bagman won’t be around much, but at least that’s two fewer things to worry about.”

“You should tell all this to Dumbledore,” Dan said.

“I will. But he’s probably already figured out of this on its own. He _is_ Dumbledore, after all.”

Dan took a deep breath and replied, “Alright, I guess we’ve got it sorted as well as we can for tonight. Keep us informed. Be safe, kids.”

“We will,” Harry said.

“Mm hmm. Oh, Dad, I think I found something,” Hermione said.

“What?”

“Well, I’ve been looking over this contract, and it turns out the anti-cheating part looks pretty loose.”

“What do you mean?” asked Dan.

“The harsh penalty clause doesn’t talk about cheating. Only non-competing. There’s only so much the judges will let you get away with, Harry, but still…”

Everyone stopped, and Sirius and Remus grinned at her.

“Now _that_ _’s_ thinking like a Marauder, Miss Fisher,” Sirius said.


	92. The Morning After

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Moral behaviour is Harry Potter behaviour above the JK Rowling level.
> 
> Several readers reminded me that Harry could just check the Marauder’s Map to find out who the impostor is. This was an unforced error on my part, but fortunately, I found a solution, which is hinted at in this chapter. Bonus points if you can figure out what it is.
> 
> JKR now says that James Potter’s parents were named Fleamont and Euphemia and makes no mention of Charlus and Dorea Potter from the Black Family Tree, nor their unnamed son. We can only assume that Charlus was a cousin of Fleamont, and regardless, Harry was still the last Potter. Obviously, I’m sticking with Charlus and Dorea in this story. Such is the life of a fanfic author.

“You’re certain they won’t notice that you’re missing for the night, Barty?” Voldemort hissed.

“They will not, my Lord. The plan worked perfectly. Enough people were accusing each other that everyone has something to investigate. With Grayson’s involvement, it won’t look suspicious for me to go off investigating him—not even to Dumbledore.”

“Then you do not believe Dumbledore suspects you?”

“No more than his other suspects. Less, I believe…” He hesitated just a moment and added, “Lupin is the greatest threat, in my estimation, my Lord.”

“Does he suspect you?”

“No. Or at least, not yet.”

“He couldn’t have sniffed you out,” Artemis said. “I checked.”

“I know you did, dear cousin,” Barty replied warmly. “But Lupin, Black, and their friends—they were two years ahead of me in school. I always thought they had some way to track people in the castle. They were far too adept at not getting caught. I suspected it, and so did Regulus…Did Pettigrew ever tell you anything about it, my Lord?”

“I did not have the occasion to ask.”

“It’s plausible, though,” La Pantera interrupted.

“Is it?” Voldemort said curiously.

“Sure. If it’s set up anything like the schools in America, it wouldn’t be hard to tap into the wards and find out the names of everyone in the building.”

“Dumbledore does not do so,” Voldemort objected.

“No, he doesn’t. He would’ve caught me straightaway if he did—ma’am,” Barty added.

“I bet you he does. He just doesn’t look at them. Too much going on in a school. If he’s as smart as you say, he’ll have them set to trigger when there’s an unauthorised intruder, and since you’re dead, you won’t be on the list.”

Barty paled: “Except now, he’ll be looking for someone who isn’t supposed to be there—or rather Lupin will be. I can keep Dumbledore occupied while I’m there, but not him.”

“This will be a problem, Barty,” Voldemort hissed. “One that will need to be solved quickly.”

“I understand, Master.” He immediately put his brilliant mind to use, thinking up the possible ways the wards might work. “Winky!” he snapped.

The cringing little elf shuffled out from the shadows. She looked much worse than she had when Barty had taken her for himself a year and a half ago—scarred and downtrodden, with numerous scrapes especially on her hands. She was lucky to still be alive, since Voldemort had her tending to Nagini much of the time. “Yes, Master Barty, sir?” she said in a voice that squeaked more than it used to.

“I have a problem with the Hogwarts wards. Can you get me through them without letting them know who I am, or fool them into thinking I’m someone else?”

Winky cowered before him. “Winky is so sorry, Master Barty, sir. Winky cannot. The wards of Hogwarts is being too strong for elf magic.”

Barty hissed like a snake: “You told me you could get in and out without being noticed.”

“Y-y-yes, Master Barty,” she squeaked. “But not with a w-wizard, sir. The wards is watching for wizards coming in by any means.”

“Bah!” He kicked the elf, and she scurried away. “Get back to work. I’ll have to do this myself. Hmm…I could send Winky on her own—no, I can’t trust her to get Potter through the Tournament on her own. I need some way to mask my identity. It shouldn’t be _that_ hard. Untraceability Charms work pretty similarly…”

“I don’t care how, Barty. Just do it,” Voldemort hissed. “Dismissed.”

Barty spent the next hour leaning against the windowsill, staring out at the darkened grounds of Riddle Manor, occasionally jotting down notes, trying to figure out how to make an Untraceability Charm perfect enough and powerful enough to fool the wards of Hogwarts. He was still there when Artemis called him.

“Come to bed, Cousin,” she pleaded. “We have time before you have to go back to work.”

“I have to figure out this spell, Arti,” he said, but he followed her to their bedroom anyway.

“You need to rest, Barty,” she told him softly. She came up behind him and massaged his neck and shoulders. “You’ll think better if you do.”

He sighed wearily. “I can get you out of Azkaban, Arti, but I can’t get into a castle that keeps its bloody doors open half the time.”

“So the wards will tell anyone who looks your real name as soon as you enter?” she asked for clarification.

“Yes.”

“I’m guessing you can’t just fool them like you did the Goblet?”

“No, I can’t Confund the wards. Even the Dark Lord doesn’t have that kind of power. I could try to break into them and reprogramme them to miss me, but the time and effort—and the risk of being caught…That’s why I need to charm myself Untraceable. It’s not as easy as it sounds.”

“Hmm…” She leaned onto his shoulder. “I wonder if La Pantera could help you,” she whispered.

Barty turned to face her and held her in his arms. “She might,” he whispered back. “But I won’t ask her except as a last resort. I’m afraid the cost might be more than I can afford.” The Dark Lady _always_ demanded a price for her services. It was like dealing with the Fae in the old, old stories. And with the woman’s thing for animal sacrifices, he was already making sure to keep Artemis far away from her on full moons. “But I’ll think of something,” he said, trying to sound confident.

“ _We_ _’ll_ think of something, you mean,” she corrected him. “We work best together, Barty.”

“Mm, that we do, dear cousin,” he said, and he let her pull him down to the bed.

It was early morning, and the sky was still dark when Artemis awoke. The werewolf had slept uneasily beside her cousin, still turning his predicament over in her mind. She wasn’t as well-versed magically as he, but she was clever, and years living outside civilised society had given her a knack for thinking outside the box. It took a while of sifting through possibilities, but the answer came to her in a flash.

“Barty!” she hissed excitedly, shaking his shoulder.

“Huh?” he grunted.

“Barty, wake up. I have an idea.” She kissed him to try to wake him further.

“Arti? What’s going on?” he said drowsily.

“I think I have an idea to solve your wards problem.”

That snapped him fully awake. “You do? What is it, Arti?”

“Well, it’s a little complicated, and you’ll need to move fast. You see, there was this one time back at Greyback’s camp when a muggle werewolf came in…”

* * *

“Oh my God, I’m an idiot, Hermione,” Harry said as he and his sister prepared to go down to breakfast.

“Yes, you are,” Hermione said primly. “But why?”

Harry leaned close to her and whispered, “I completely forgot about the Marauder’s Map.”

Hermione’s eyes widened: “Oh my God, I’m an idiot,” she said.

By the time she said it, Harry was already racing up the stairs to his dorm room. She followed quickly. Once there, he took out the Marauder’s Map and said, “I solemnly swear that I am up to no good.”

“Okay, the professors should be gathering for breakfast by now,” he said. He looked to the Great Hall and read off the names with Hermione reading over his shoulder. “Here we go,” he said. “Albus Dumbledore, Olympe Maxime, Igor Karkaroff, Edward Grayson. Good. Good. Minerva McGonagall. Remus Lupin…Moody…Where’s Moody…?”

They both scanned the Map. “There!” Hermione pointed to a dot labelled _Alastor Moody_. “And there’s Professor Flitwick, Professor Babbling, Professor Vector.”

“Where’s Snape?” Harry said. He turned the Map around. Snape was just coming up from the dungeons, and soon enough, they had spotted the rest of them.

“Well, all the teachers are who they’re supposed to be,” Harry said. “That’s one less thing to worry about.”

“That doesn’t definitively prove anything, though,” Hermione said. “One of them could still be Imperiused—or just be the one behind it in Karkaroff’s case.”

“Yes there’s that. Not to mention Monroe and Bagman aren’t here. We’ll have to wait until the first task to check up on them.”

“Well, there’s nothing we can do now. Let’s get breakfast.”

Harry sighed: “Do we really have to?”

“Harry, where’s your Gryffindor courage? If you hide from them, it’ll only make you look guilty. Besides, we need to be there for Dumbledore’s announcements.”

“Alright, alright. Let’s go.”

Professor Dumbledore was waiting in the Entrance Hall for them, and Harry told him he would tentatively be competing, but reserved the right to drop out if it looked like it would get him killed.

“I think that’s a reasonable decision, Harry,” Dumbledore told him.

“Thank you, sir,” Harry said. “So what’s the damage in there?”

“I am hopeful that we can contain it. There will be some who continue to oppose you on principle, but I suspect most of your classmates will be understanding.”

All the same, whispers broke out in the Great Hall as soon as the pair walked in, and Harry felt the eyes of the school on him. Granted, that happened to him alarmingly often, but it never felt any better. The anger was strongest from the Slytherin Table. Hufflepuff looked annoyed that he had upstaged Cedric, but they weren’t too bad, as he suspected they were most willing to take his assertion that he didn’t enter himself at face value. Ravenclaw’s reaction was mixed, and Gryffindor…sadly, most of Gryffindor still looked happier about having a champion than anything else.

“Hey there, Harry.” “How’s our champion?” “How _did_ you set that up?” “Beat Pretty-Boy Diggory for us, will you?”

Last night, Harry had just pushed past the party his house had thrown for him (with Remus’s help), and even that was enough to get his fill of their attitude.

“Look, Harry,” Angelina Johnson told him when he sat down. “I know you weren’t really interested in competing, but if it couldn’t be me, at least we could get a Gryffindor in the tourney, right?”

“What’re you so happy about, Angie?” Harry grumbled. “Do you really think I have a chance against Cedric? He beat me in ten seconds flat in the last duelling tournament.”

“Sure, but you kicked his arse in Quidditch.”

“You _do_ remember Viktor Krum’s in the Tournament, don’t you?”

Angelina frowned and dropped the subject.

The visiting students didn’t look particularly resentful so far, which was encouraging to Harry. There was only a vague dislike of the extra competition at present. They had taken their same seats at the Ravenclaw and Slytherin Tables, except for little Gabrielle Delacour, who once again dragged her sister over to sit with Harry.

“‘Arry! Allo, ‘Arry!” the little girl squealed as she hopped up to the seat across from him. Harry cracked a small smile. No matter how bad things were, an eight-year-old part-veela could brighten anyone’s day…except maybe Snape.

“Hello, Gabbie,” Harry said. “Hello, Fleur.”

“‘Ello, ‘Arry,” Fleur said. “I ‘ope you are well.”

“I’m doing alright…It was a long night.”

“I can imagine. Gabbie wanted to know every-zing.”

“Ees eet true, ‘Arry?” the little girl cut in. “You did not want to be in zee Tournament?”

“No, I didn’t want to be in it,” Harry answered. “Someone else entered me. We don’t know who.”

Fleur caught Harry’s choice of words. “But you are still going to compete, _non_?”

“Yes. It’s that or take the consequences from the contract, and I’m not doing that unless it looks like the tasks will kill me. Did you read it?”

“ _Oui_. “Branded a coward,’” she quoted harshly. “I was not pleased to read zat. Veela ‘ave ‘ad problems with wizards trying to brand zem in zee past.”

Harry winced, and Hermione gasped softly. “Well, at least you had a choice in entering,” he said.

 _“C’est vrai._ Eet should not be possible to bind you to a contract like that. By zee way, I told my school-mates I believed your story, although I am still not sure if zey do.”

“Eet ees not fair!” Gabrielle burst out. “Zey are making you compete, and eet ees dangerous, and you are too young…” She trailed off with a soft screech rather like an eagle’s. In a flash, her skin turned scaly, and her fingernails elongated into talons, her veela traits coming out.

 _“Gabrielle, arrête,”_ her sister scolded.

_“Pardon, Fleur.”_

People were staring at her.

“What? We still ‘ave a leetle veela blood,” Fleur said defensively.

Most of Gryffindor hadn’t heard direct confirmation yet that Fleur and Gabrielle were part veela, although the signs were clearly there. Many of them reacted—boys and girls—but Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil practically jumped on them with questions like a pair of fangirls, derailing the conversation for the moment.

It wasn’t long afterwards that Dumbledore stood up and addressed the Hall. “Attention, everyone,” he said. “Now that we’re all here, I think, I would like to make a few clarifications regarding the events of last night. Last night, it was discovered that Harry Potter was entered in the Tournament as a champion for Uluru School or Song and Dream by a person or persons unknown. Mr. Potter assures me that he did not wish to enter, but that he will compete under the terms of the binding magical contract.

“Also under the terms of the contract, some changes have been made to the format. First, while Mr. Potter remains officially a Hogwarts student, the judges and Mr. Potter have agreed that he will serve exclusively as the champion for Uluru, and should he win the Tournament, it will count as a victory for Uluru alone, so that each school may continue to have only one champion. Second, under the terms of the contract, Uluru is entitled to send an additional judge, and Professor Grayson will serve in that capacity. And finally…” Dumbledore sighed. “At the request of Ludo Bagman, the Triwizard Tournament has officially been renamed the Tetrawizard Tournament.”

A rising murmur of surprise filled the Great Hall. The name change was a surprise to most of the school and made the whole thing feel that much more surreal.

“A press conference and official wand inspection will take place one week from Saturday,” Dumbledore added. “That is all.”

“Oh, no. The press,” Harry groaned.

As if on cue, the post came, and with it, many copies of the _Daily Prophet_ loudly proclaiming his entry in the Tournament. He didn’t read it. Hermione told him Ludo Bagman was named as the official source. Apparently, he still thought it was all great fun. Harry didn’t like the press, and everyone close to him knew it. It was like the gossip mill at school, but much worse, especially when Rita Skeeter stuck her nose in it.

As for the rest of the Hall, Harry tried to ignore the talk as they read the paper, but it was hard. His sensitive feline ears picked up the whispers from the Ravenclaw Table. Their reactions were the most varied: some suspicious of Harry, some genuinely inquisitive, and some even supporting him.

“Well, sure, they’re gonna _say_ that,” one older student said, “but I’m telling you, it’s him and Grayson. They both use wandless magic. They make the perfect team. And besides, who else could get one past Dumbledore?”

“Well, _I_ say it’s good we have something other than that werewolf in the running.”

“Hello! It’s Potter! He’s the one making friends with all the werewolves.”

“Oh, are you still on the werewolf thing? Honestly, we’ve got four of them in the school this year, and nothing bad’s happened.”

Harry bristled at the anti-werewolf remarks even more than the digs at himself, but he held his temper. No good would come of lashing out at a time like this. The Grayson-wandless magic conspiracy theory was perhaps the most prominent one he could hear. It was fairly easy to believe. But he was pleased to hear Karkaroff’s name mentioned as suspect, at least.

“Don’t listen to them, Harry,” a voice said. He turned back to the table and saw that it was Neville. Neville knew he was an animagus and therefore knew his “eavesdropping cat” look when he saw it. “Everyone who matters believes you,” he said.

“Thanks, Nev. I’m glad I can count on you.”

“Hey, we’re allies, aren’t we? Potter and Longbottom stick together.”

“It’s still nice of you to put yourself out there for Harry,” Hermione said admiringly.

“Just being a good friend,” he muttered, blushing a little.

“Hey, Harry,” Ron said. “Ginny and I talked to these clowns—” He pointed to Fred and George. “—and we’re all with you, too.”

“We still want you to win, though,” Fred said with a grin.

“Yeah,” George added. “Even if you’re officially for Uluru, it’ll be good for Gryffindor.”

“Plus it’s a great prank,” Fred finished.

“Thanks, guys. I won’t know if I’ve got a chance until the first task, though.”

Harry felt better after breakfast, although the overall situation was still weighing on him. At the same time, in all of this, he hadn’t really been thinking about his friends in other houses. It was more of a Gryffindor solidarity thing. But that changed when Luna greeted him in the Entrance Hall.

“Hello, Harry,” she said, and before he could do more than wave back, she walked up to him and hugged him.

“Um…hi, Luna,” he said in confusion when she stepped back. “What was that?”

“You looked like you needed a hug, so I hugged you,” she said simply.

“Er…thanks, Luna,” he said, trying to sound sincere (which he was, but he was mostly surprised).

She followed Harry and Hermione up the stairs. “I wrote to my dad today,” she said.

Harry stopped and tensed up. He’d forgotten about that: Luna’s father ran a tabloid magazine called _The Quibbler_. His first thought was that she was a little too close to the press for comfort. But he forced himself to relax. Luna had never given him any trouble before about _The Quibbler_ , and she knew all too well what it was like to be the recipient of unwanted attention. Besides, she was only being a good daughter to keep her father up to date. “What did you tell him?” he asked.

“Only what Dumbledore said. Everything else I heard was unfounded speculation.” Harry stared at her. _The Quibbler_ was _built_ on unfounded speculation. “I didn’t want to report anything without talking to you first,” Luna clarified. Harry continued to stare. Since when had that ever stopped _anyone_ , including the Quibbler? Luna must have sensed his disbelief because she sighed and said, “We may publish a lot of unorthodox ideas, Harry, but we _always_ confirm our sources. We _do_ want to be responsible journalists, after all…Of course, I wouldn’t report anything private to Dad that you didn’t want me to.”

Harry broke into a grin. He knew there was a reason Luna was such a good friend. “Thank you, Luna,” he said, giving her a quick hug in return. “So is there going to be a _Quibbler_ article this week, too?”

She shook her head: “Not yet. The next issue of _The Quibbler_ won’t come out until the end of the month. Dad wrote me and said we’re going to send out a leaflet distribution, though, to say we’re delaying it a week so we can cover the first task…Would you mind terribly if I attended the press conference for _The Quibbler_ , Harry? I do think you’d give me an interview directly if I asked, but it would be a conflict of interest.”

Harry’s grin broke out again. “Luna,” he said, “I think you’d be a _great_ addition.”

“Thank you Harry,” she said with a smile. “Now, I would like to know the full story of what happened last night, if you want to talk about it. I only need to tell Dad about the parts confirming or denying the various rumours.”

“Of course, Luna. You’re my friend. You ought to know what’s going on.”

Luna smiled a little wider. She knew Harry considered her a friend, but given her lonely childhood and still not being very popular in her own house, it was good to hear him say it.

* * *

The rest of Harry’s day didn’t go very well. The low point was Potions class, where Snape was stepping up his “lessons.”

“Antidotes,” he said harshly, “are one of the most important classes of potions you will ever need to brew, even if you do not pursue a career, such as Auror or Healer, which requires it for your job. I highly doubt any of you will ever have practical need of a Forgetfulness Potion or a Swelling Solution.” Seamus started to whisper a wisecrack, but Snape heard and cut him off: “Finish that sentence, Mr. Finnigan, and you will regret it most dearly. As I was saying, various healing and cleaning potions are the most the average wizard will ever have to use in daily life, and poisonings—accidental and deliberate—happen with alarming regularity. Your cat eating your chocolate cake, a dunderheaded ‘adventurer’ getting into the wrong berries, an ignorant child deciding to sample poorly-stored cleaning products, or even a severe allergic reaction—all can be more quickly and cheaply cured by a competent brewer than a visit to the hospital.

“That is why we will be pursuing our study of antidotes _very_ thoroughly. You will all want to be most diligent in the subject. We will be handling poisons much more than in previous years, and it very easy for a hand to… _slip_ , even in the potions lab. It would be good to have a properly brewed antidote on hand.”

The class shuddered. Snape couldn’t be planning to have them test their antidotes on themselves, could he? That was the kind of thing he would have done— _maybe_ —before last year, when Dumbledore and Harry’s family made him raise his safety standards. And why did he seem to be focusing on Harry during that speech.

“Potter!” he snapped. “What is the most effective magical remedy against most types of poison?”

Harry blinked and said, “A bezoar, Professor.” He knew that, and he was sure Snape knew he knew. He’d answered that same question in his first Potions Class in first year. What was he playing at?

“Correct. Name one example of a poison that _cannot_ be cured by a bezoar,” Snape continued.

Harry had to think about that. He wasn’t sure he knew one, but then he saw the pattern: “Basilisk venom, sir.”

“Correct. What is the best counter-agent for basilisk venom?”

Harry ground his teeth. He didn’t like to think about what had happened to Neville in the Chamber of Secrets. “Phoenix tears, sir,” he answered.

“Yes, phoenix tears, of course. But you would know that.” Suddenly, Snape pointed his wand and said, “ _Accio_ bezoar!”

“Hey!” Harry yelled as the bezoar he always carried with him flew out of his pocket and into Snape’s hand.

Snape ignored his protest and examined the spiral stone. “This bezoar is expired, Potter,” he said. “A bezoar should be replaced once per year. Tsk-tsk. I would have expected better from someone who is so well-versed in poisons, especially a _champion_. I do hope there are no poisonous animals in the Tournament. Perhaps a more…hands-on lesson would motivate you to learn the subject properly.”

That was a very bad sign. Snape sure sounded as if he meant to poison Harry. He’d never been particularly nasty to Harry before—not over the other Gryffindors, anyway. Was he really that sore about Harry being chosen as a champion? Was he still cross about Remus teaching this year? And most importantly, what was he talking about with Harry’s bezoar? “I _do_ replace it once a year, Professor,” Harry said in confusion.

“Oh, really? And you carry it with you at all times?”

“Whenever I’m out of my dorm, sir.”

“Where do you store it in your dorm?”

“In a cloth pouch to keep it from drying out too much, of course.”

“And where, pray tell, do you carry it when you are not in uniform?”

“Huh?” Harry said, and Hermione echoed him.

“It’s a simple question, Potter. Do I need to repeat myself? Perhaps you should work on your listening skills to prepare for the Tournament.”

The Slytherins sniggered at Harry, but he forced himself to remain calm and gave Snape a feline stare. “I keep it in the pocket of my trousers, _sir_ ,” he answered.

“Your _muggle_ trousers?”

“Yes. Why does that matter?”

“Because your _muggle_ trousers, Potter, are made from cotton, which remains drier than the wool and linen worn by most wizards, and the dry conditions cause the bezoar to deteriorate in nine months, which you ought to know if you are skilled enough to become a champion for _any_ school, not to mention your personal connections to certain individuals who claim to be so gifted in defence.”

Hermione’s eyes widened. Cousin Andi had never mentioned that. It was the kind of thing that was so specific only potions masters would know it, but it could be critically important. Harry also noted the value of the information, but he was mostly angry. That was another dig at him _and_ one at Sirius and Remus. Snape was really pulling out all the stops today.

The professor wasn’t quite as nasty for the rest of the class, but he did single out Harry for criticism more than usual, and he made a few more comments about him being a champion and an attention-seeker. He looked like he was trying to find something to criticise Hermione on, too, but that was rather difficult to do.

Harry refrained from saying anything while the class was going on, but he didn’t hold back once everybody else had left. He walked right up to Snape and said, “Professor, do we have a problem?”

Snape cocked an eyebrow at Harry. “You mean regarding your pathological narcissistic behaviour, Potter?” he said.

“Excuse me? Narcissistic? Was I behaving any differently than usual in class today, sir?”

Snape didn’t respond to that. Instead, he answered, “I am referring to your pressing need to insert yourself in this farce of a tournament, which is disrupting the entire school.”

“I already told you I didn’t enter, and I challenge you to name when I was ever an attention-seeking narcissist.”

Snape opened his mouth.

“Besides Quidditch,” Harry added.

“I should think your athletic exploits are ample evidence by themselves, _Potter_. Just like your father.”

“That’s completely different from the Tournament, and I do it for fun, not fame,” Harry said. “I may be Gryffindor, Professor, but I’m not stupid.”

“Harry,” Hermione chided.

“And what of your far-reaching political activism?” Snape challenged in return. “Driven almost entirely by your status as the Boy-Who-Lived?”

“I get into politics, because I have a responsibility to help those who can’t help themselves,” Harry said. “Something _you_ haven’t helped with. Don’t think I’ve forgotten how you tried to get Sirius arrested last spring.”

“He would have deserved it,” Snape sneered.

“Maybe so, but your timing was clearly calculated to derail legislation designed to help a lot of deserving people.”

“As if that wasn’t entirely self-serving—”

“It was _not_ —sir,” Harry hissed. “That bill was about Cedric, Colin, and Demelza as much as it was about Remus, and besides that, it was a matter of principle.”

“You may say that, Potter, but—”

“Professor,” Hermione interrupted, “this isn’t our point. If you have political disagreements with my brother or _anyone_ in our family, in class is not the time or place to act on that. If you disapprove of our personal associations, in class is not the time or place to act on that. And if you have a problem with Harry being a champion, you need to take that up with Professor Dumbledore because Harry said in no uncertain terms that he was entered against his will, and Professor Dumbledore believed him. Now, unless you have an actual issue to raise with our behaviour under your supervision, we will be going.”

Harry stared at his sister. It wasn’t often that she made a speech like that—well, it was fairly often, but not to a teacher. She sounded like Mum putting her foot down just then. When Snape didn’t seemed to have anything to say to that, she turned to leave, and Harry followed her. They were about to walk out the door when Hermione turned back around and said, “Oh, and Professor, I hope you know that you can’t _actually_ poison _any_ of the students. Even Professor Dumbledore won’t be able to save you if you do that.” She walked out before he could respond.

* * *

The Triwizard Tournament—now the Tetrawizard Tournament—was of interest to more than just wizards. That was why Maxwell Barnett sat in front of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II that afternoon to inform her of the events of the previous night.

The very highest levels of Her Majesty’s Government, those who were privy to magic, were kept informed of events in the magical world by the Queen’s Royal Court Magician. Officially, the Ministry of Magic liked to have as little contact with muggles as possible, but upon taking the throne at the height of the Cold War, the Queen was very concerned about the possibility of magical spying, and she asked Master Barnett, then a recent veteran of “Grindelwald’s War,” as the wizards called the Second World War, to train all of her children and later her grandchildren in Occlumency—the ways of preventing a wizard from reading one’s mind. That meant telling her young children about magic in the 1960s. And _that_ meant her children asking Master Barnett to tell them bedtime stories about Dumbledore and Grindelwald, about dragons and warlocks, about Merlin and the Founders of Hogwarts and the Tales of Beedle the Bard, and a hundred other fantastic things.

By the time the young princes and princess were grown, the Queen was well-versed in the magical world whether she wanted to be or not (and as it happened, she wanted to be). So it was no wonder that she took interest in the Quidditch World Cup last summer when she learnt it would be held in England. She asked Master Barnett to keep her abreast of the results, and she sent a personal congratulations to the winning Irish Team (which she was pleased to learn included two members from Northern Ireland).

When he informed the Queen that there would be another international competition taking place in Britain this year, Master Barnett wasn’t surprised that she asked for regular updates on that as well. But he was _very_ surprised when he heard about the new developments in the magical schools’ competition.

“It seems there was a…complication in the selection of the Champions, ma’am,” he said nervously.

“What sort of complication?” the Queen replied.

“I don’t have all the details, but the _Daily Prophet_ reported that Lord Harry Potter was chosen as a fourth champion for the Australian school of magic—against his wishes.”

The Queen set down her teacup and gave him a stern look. “Lord Harry Potter, Maxwell?” she asked. “Isn’t he too young?”

“He is, ma’am, by two years, even if he had his parents’ permission. Someone must have bypassed the measures that were taken to prevent it.”

“That sounds troubling. The boy’s been excused, I assume?”

He shook his head. “It’s not that simple. There’s a binding magical contract connected with the Tournament—”

“A binding magical contract?” the Queen said in surprise. She knew well enough how those worked from Barnett’s own contracts. “Is that legal—binding someone to a contract against his will?”

“No, it’s _not_ legal, ma’am. And it’s thankfully very difficult to do. They’re still trying to figure out how it was done, in fact. But I contacted Lord Potter’s godfather, Lord Black, and he informed me that Lord Potter will compete as long as the Tournament looks less dangerous than the consequences.”

“And just how dangerous _is_ this Tournament, Maxwell?” she demanded.

“From what I’ve seen, ma’am, a good deal worse than Quidditch. Challenging even to gifted seventeen-year-olds, though it’s not supposed to be life-threatening. My greatest worry is that Lord Potter doesn’t have enough magical education to properly compete.”

“And is anything being done to help him?” the Queen said with a sharp look that said, _Are you doing anything to help him?_

Barnett got the message and answered, “They’re keeping the nature of the tasks pretty well buttoned down, ma’am. One downside to Lord Black’s werewolf initiatives: they’re using more magical contracts at the Ministry this year. I’m bound not to reveal the tasks. So are Lord Potter’s teachers. But I do know that the boy has a lot of support from his family and friends. He is incredibly gifted for his age, and I don’t think you could find a better person for…unorthodox solutions than Lord Black.”

The Queen nodded. “And do the magical authorities have any idea who was behind this plot against Lord Potter?”

“Not yet, but I’m sure the Aurors are investigating as we speak.”

“Very well. Do inform me when they find something. Now, the other champions?”

“The official Hogwarts Champion is Cedric Diggory.”

“The boy who was infected with werewolfism?”

“Yes, ma’am. The older one, that is. He’s only a sixth year, but I understand he’s the best duellist in the school. For Durmstrang, it’s Viktor Krum, the Quidditch star. And for Beauxbatons, it’s Fleur Delacour, seventh year, top of her class.”

“Quite reasonable.”

“The Goblet of Fire _is_ supposed to choose the candidate for each school who has the best chance of winning, ma’am. Lord Potter’s problem is that he was the only entry for Uluru.”

“I see. _Well,_ I would like to know how Lord Potter fares in the Tournament, and if there is need for any further intervention in his case, Maxwell. I cannot merely sit by whilst a peer, even of the less august magical realm, is subjected to such injustices. And moreover, I know that William and Harry want to know all about it. I want you to attend the tasks of the Tournament yourself to assess them and to confirm Lord Potter’s safety. Use Mr. Major’s name if they will accept no other.”

“My own will be sufficient, ma’am. The wisest of us are well aware that we must still be loyal to your royal self…” Barnett thought for a minute about her words and added, “Actually, ma’am, if I can get hold of a Pensieve, I may be able to show you the tasks directly.”

* * *

_Dear Father and Mother,_

_The news that Potter was selected as a fourth champion in the Tournament is no doubt widely-reported by now. Dumbledore confirmed the news this morning. Potter insists that he was entered against his will, but that he will compete rather than violate the contract. Dumbledore claims not to know who entered Potter or how, but it must have been a valid signature that came out of the Goblet of Fire. Many people are speculating about Grayson, because it was his school, or Karkaroff, for obvious reasons._

_Interestingly, Dumbledore also announced that Potter will compete in the name of Uluru only, and that Grayson will now be a judge. Also, Ludo Bagman renamed the thing the Tetrawizard Tournament._

_I find it curious that Dumbledore was supposedly unable to figure out what happened. The old man_ _’s powers of deduction may be weakening, but I wouldn’t have said the same about Moody. I can’t tell if they’re really clueless or if they’re just playing close to the vest, but the lack of Auror activity on the grounds today would suggest the former. In any case, only a few people had the means and access to do this._

_I also do not understand why this happened. I don_ _’t see what anyone would have to gain from entering Potter in the Tournament, including Potter himself. The most likely outcome ought to be Potter making a complete fool of himself, which, while entertaining, seems like a poor outcome for a nefarious plot._

_The obvious alternative is that Potter is lying and did conspire to enter himself. Despite his claimed dislike for his fame, he always revels in his Quidditch victories and other school-related achievements. However, Potter would certainly have needed a confederate to enter his name, and the reactions of the teachers, including Dumbledore and Lupin, and Granger_ _’s reaction, suggest this is unlikely. Even so, I expect that Potter will take great pains to prepare for the tasks._

_The reaction to Potter in the school is currently negative. Most non-Gryffindors are at least annoyed with him for being chosen, and many do not buy his line that he was entered against his will. However, his friendship with Diggory does not appear to have suffered. In fact, Potter befriended all three of the other champions before the names were drawn, which I consider as suspicious if not more so than his own name being drawn. There may be multiple plots in play._

_I may be able to capitalise on the current resentment against Potter. Professor Snape has already done so. But I am hesitant because there are so many unknown factors in this situation. I await your advice if there is more information behind the scenes that I should know._

_Your loving son,_

_Draco_

 

Draco Malfoy knew how to play the game of subtleties. His queries were written so as not to appear to rise above the level of idle political chatter, but knowing what he knew and how Father had been implying he knew more than he was saying all year, there was a deeper meaning hidden inside his letter, which was roughly, _What the hell is going on?_ Unlike some of his classmates he could name, Draco had thought through the situation carefully and had probably come to similar conclusions to Dumbledore and Potter himself, but they made no sense.

Potter’s name had come out of the Goblet of Fire. That would not have been easy to achieve. Therefore, it was almost certainly intended. By whom? Potter? That made the most sense, but why? To win the Tournament? Even Potter wasn’t _that_ good, and for all Draco’s mocking, he was smart enough to know it. Probably.

And who put the name in? Potter definitely couldn’t have done it on his own. Lupin? He most likely could. Dumbledore? Possibly, but why? If the old meddler was involved, he was certainly the one pulling the strings, and Draco couldn’t see what he had to gain from it. Grayson? Could be, but they barely knew each other…or so he thought.

No, it didn’t make sense for Potter to be behind it, but it didn’t make sense for anyone else, either. What was the motive? For Potter to win? No one smart enough to get his name drawn would be that stupid. For Potter to lose? It seemed like an awful lot of trouble just to make a fool of him. For Potter to _die?_ There were far easier ways to kill him. No, there had to be something else about the Tournament that Draco didn’t know—something that would make Potter’s involvement actually useful.

And then there was Father. He’d been acting strange all year, ever since the World Cup. Draco’s best guess, all things considered, was that the rabble-rousing he had done that night had stirred something within his Father and made him yearn for the glory days again. Perhaps it had been enough to inspire him to start plotting—to try his hand at being a dark lord himself, in which case the sudden obsession with magical creatures was probably misdirection. Or perhaps…perhaps _the_ Dark Lord was involved somehow.

Both possibilities excited and worried Draco at the same time. The Dark Lord’s reign had been truly glorious for the House of Malfoy and those who thought as they did, but it was a very dangerous time—a danger that Draco had had a taste of. The last time Father acted anything like this was in second year, when he conducted a devious plot with the Heir of Slytherin without telling Draco about it. That plot involved setting a bloody basilisk loose in the school where Draco was living all year. He was with Mother on that one. That had been a monumentally stupid idea. The end of second year, when Father was kicked off the Board of Governors and kicked out of his own bedroom for a week, was the first time Draco had truly seen him as fallible. He had always been taught to think for himself, but he found himself doing it a lot more since then.

He really hoped Father would give him the full story this time.

* * *

_Dear Auntie,_

_You probably heard last night that Harry Potter_ _’s name came out of the Goblet of Fire for the Uluru School. No one’s really sure how that happened or who did it. A lot of people think Harry did, even though he said he didn’t, but I’m not so sure. I don’t think he could have done it alone. Other people think he got Professor Grayson to help him, but he says he didn’t want to enter at all, which kind of makes sense. He’s already rich and famous, isn’t he?_

_But if Harry was really entered against his will, that_ _’s got to be illegal, right? It’s a binding magical contract! I didn’t know that was even_ _ possible _ _. I_ _’m guessing since I haven’t heard about anyone getting arrested here, you either don’t know who did it, or it turned out to be Harry after all._

_A lot of us in Hufflepuff are mad at Harry for upstaging Cedric, but Cedric himself isn_ _’t. He says he believes Harry that he didn’t want to enter, and he’s worried the Tournament might be too dangerous for him. I see his point. It was designed for NEWT students. Anyway, I guess it’s not so bad since Dumbledore says Harry’s competing for Uluru, so Cedric is the only official Hogwarts champion. And Harry said he’s okay with that, too, which is the biggest reason why I think I might believe him that he didn’t enter._

_I really hope Harry_ _’s going to be okay. He always seems so nice, and dark wizards always seem to be out to get him. I hope you can find out who’s behind this before they can hurt anyone else._

_Love,_

_Susan_

* * *

Neville Longbottom was worried about his friend and ally. He was sure a lot of people in the school were worried about Harry, but it was different for him. He knew the prophecy about Harry—how he would have to fight Voldemort in the end. Neville himself was also potentially the subject of the prophecy, but Harry was much more likely. So when something really weird like this happened, it was a serious concern that Voldemort was involved somehow.

Neville hadn’t told his Gran about the prophecy. He didn’t want her to worry about it, or worse, try to do something about it. Also, she didn’t know Occlumency. He _did_ tell his Great Uncle Algie, though, since he was the Head Unspeakable and knew about such things. Uncle Algie knew a prophecy existed about Harry, but he didn’t know what it said and was shocked that Neville could be involved. He asked Neville not to tell him the second half of the prophecy, the part Voldemort didn’t know. Prophecies were treacherous things, he said, so it was safer that way. But he offered Neville whatever help he could give, and right now, Harry needed help. Was Voldemort involved in this plot? What did it mean? And was there anything Uncle Algie could do or tell him to help Harry get through the Tournament in one piece?

It looked like Neville would be writing two letters today.


	93. Public Relations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Some quotations are [not] greatly improved by lack of JK Rowling.

Hermione gave Harry one day to recover from the shock before she made him start training again in earnest. In addition to his regular homework, she wanted him (and herself) to start working ahead in the Charms and Defence textbooks, and their daily exercise and karate practice was augmented by wandless magic practice.

“It’s getting to be where it might not help much, though,” Harry said. “The spells we’re doing this year are a lot harder to manage without a wand. You remember what Professor Flitwick said. The wand helps conduct magic better.”

“I know, Harry,” Hermione told him, “but Dora learnt the Summoning Charm wandlessly, and Professor Moody says that’s the most important one. You need to be able to summon your wand back if you lost it.”

“Yes, I know that. I just wasn’t expecting you to go all crazy about it.”

“Well ordinarily, I wouldn’t have. We should’ve had all year to work on this, but now that you’re in the Tournament, I want you to learn it before the first task. You never know; you might need it.”

“ _Oh_?” Harry said with exaggerated surprise. That wasn’t how she usually spoke. “You _want me_ to learn it? Are you playing the big sister card now?”

“ _Yes_ , I’m playing my big sister card, Harry. You need to learn wandless summoning in three weeks, and I’m going to make sure you do.”

“Fine,” Harry said. “But after that, I’m making you learn wandless banishing.”

“Huh? Um…the joke’s on you, Harry,” she tried to make a comeback. “I would’ve done that anyway.”

“Well, yes, but you’ll be singing a different tune when I use it on you.”

“You wouldn’t.”

Harry stared at her.

“Yes, you would,” she conceded. “Can’t you be serious, though?”

“Nope, I’m Harry.”

“Argh!”

“Hermione, calm down. I’ve been press-ganged into a highly-dangerous tournament. I need to laugh about it somehow, or I’ll go insane.”

“You’re already insane,” Hermione groused.

“And besides, I can’t ‘use the Force’ properly if I don’t know wandless banishing along with summoning. Levitation’s always been too clumsy to pull it off.”

Hermione rolled her eyes: “Come on, Skywalker. We have class.”

“Alright, I’m coming,” he replied. “You know, maybe we should ask Professor Grayson to help us with this. I know he’s not supposed to help with the Tournament, but this is the kind of thing we’d do anyway.”

“Hmm, that’s a good idea. You have your moments. Not many, but you do have them.”

“Oi!”

* * *

“So you still trust me, Albus? That’s more than I can say for some of the staff,” Professor Grayson said as he sat amid the many twittering instruments of the Headmasters’ office. They were a mechanical mockery of a natural bird chorus, but it wouldn’t do to say that aloud. Having a British boy who had never been in his country representing Australia in a Tournament neither he nor Uluru was supposed to be in was a scandal, and Grayson didn’t appreciate having to deal with an international incident that he was suspected of causing.

“I don’t believe any of the teachers truly suspect you over more likely candidates, Edward,” Dumbledore told him. “And I know we do not always agree, but you have proved that you are you, and if _you_ of all people are working with Voldemort, we are doomed regardless, so nothing is lost by confiding in you.”

“I wouldn’t sell you that short, but I appreciate the sentiment. So what’s the situation? Did you find out any more about the Goblet?”

“Alas, no. My list of suspects stands exactly where it did before, and I have not been able to identify anyone suspicious lurking around the Goblet at any point, although I have not yet reviewed a full sequence of memories of the time it was lit.”

“You should—even though whoever did it was probably in disguise. What about _how_ they did it? It shouldn’t be possible to have a fourth school in the Tournament.”

“Most likely a powerful Confundus Charm, although a more detailed investigation may reveal more. I received an interesting letter from our Head Unspeakable this morning. Apparently, he would like to examine the Goblet himself as a favour to a family ally.”

“That’s good. An extra set of eye can’t hurt. But what do you want me for?”

“I confess my motive was a little more self-serving,” Dumbledore said. “Regarding Mr. Potter, to be precise. You will have been fully informed about the three tasks by now. What do you think of his chances?”

Grayson blew out a breath. “It’s a bad situation. The young bloke’s got talent to spare, but he hasn’t got a qualification, and he could barely scrape one if he had to. The tasks are doable for him, but not like they are for the other champions. And several of the solutions I can think of involve him revealing his animagus ability.”

Dumbledore frowned: “That’s very troubling, especially in light of the prophecy I told you.”

“What, that ‘power the Dark Lord knows not’? Child Animagus…? Maybe,” he conceded. “But my gut says no. If you’re looking for something beyond Voldemort’s comprehension, you’re probably more on the right track with your ‘love’ theory.”

“Hmm. I certainly hope so. Although I also worry about the repercussions to Harry’s life. How much danger do you think he is in if he competes?”

“My personal opinion? The young bloke’s in serious danger of being trampled to death in the first task—more than the others, depending on what strategy he uses. I’m not worried about the second task as long as he doesn’t do anything stupid. The third task is the worst, though. He’s not qualified to go up against a gauntlet like that. He’s going to get hurt if he tries it. Even with us watching the projection, there might not be time for us to get to him if the worst happens.”

“If Harry refuses to take part in the third task, he will only have to deal with the consequences of the contract for a few days,” Dumbledore observed. “It may be safer for him to do so.”

“Except for the permanent scarring on his face,” said Grayson. “He’s not going to want to do that. And besides, if there’s one thing I’ve learnt from what I’ve heard about Potter, it’s to expect the unexpected. _Winning_ might be in the cards for him if he gets lucky.”

“That’s little consolation if he dies. Speaking of which, have you given any more thought to the horcrux problem?”

“Some. You’re _certain_ the bloke is a horcrux?” Grayson hadn’t learnt the full story behind Dumbledore’s odd enquiries until the two of them were in quarantine over the summer, but he’d been horrified when he learnt the truth.

“Not a proper one, perhaps,” Dumbledore replied, “since it was not created by the actual ritual, but my instruments confirm that Harry has a soul fragment within him.”

“Hmm. I told you we don’t deal much in soul magic. And healing magic will only take you so far…Have you told Harry yet?”

“No. I was hoping we could wait until we have a solution for him.”

“Well, good luck with that. I have a few ideas, but none I’m comfortable trying without examining him for myself.”

Dumbledore stared at him unhappily. Finally, he said, “I won’t stand in your way, if you think it is necessary, but I ask that you speak to Harry’s godfather about it first. He already knows the problem. However, I urge you to move quickly. Voldemort’s plan appears to be working, and we still don’t know what it is.”

“I can see _that_ for myself, Albus. But this isn’t going to be easy. As far as I can tell, this hasn’t ever happened before. I think you need to prepare for the worst, just in case—prepare for Voldemort’s plan to _succeed_.”

Albus Dumbledore was left thinking, for the first time since 1981, _I_ _’m getting too old for this._

* * *

_Our beloved son,_

_Harry Potter_ _’s entry into the now-Tetrawizard Tournament came as a surprise to us as well, Draco. Your father has questioned his contacts, and we believe you may take Potter at his word that he had no desire to enter, nor did Dumbledore have any desire to enter him. You may do with this information what you will. It is certainly a refreshing change to see someone outwit Dumbledore for once._

_Our understanding is that the new arrangements for the Tournament were negotiated among the judges and are of little importance. However, how this came about in the first place, or who would have done such a thing, is much more mysterious. To enter an unauthorised name under so many watchful eyes would be very difficult, even if it were an inside job._

_You are correct that if neither Potter nor Dumbledore wanted this to happen, then it is not clear what anyone has to gain from it. We highly doubt anyone close to Potter would enter him without his knowledge, and your mother believes that includes Black. A plan this elaborate clearly must have a larger motive than making a fool out of Potter, but the full extent is well beyond the scope of our knowledge. As such, you would do well to continue to observe and to stay out of the way._

_You can be assured that Potter will be using the full resources at his disposal to prepare for the Tournament. At minimum, that will include your Aunt Andromeda (who, make no mistake, is every bit as skilled as your mother); her daughter, an Auror; and Cousin Black, a Hitwizard. With those trainers and his annoying penchant for surviving things that ought to kill him, we do not think you should count him out of the Tournament just yet, even if he is not favoured. We may not be able to attend for ourselves, so we expect full details of the tasks from you as they occur._

_Moving on to your questions in your previous letter, we are very proud that you are taking an interest in your heritage. The Houses of Malfoy and Black are both fine families with long and distinguished histories. It is true that the more popular history texts must needs be light on details, owing to the scope of the subject. However, the Hogwarts Library has many more detailed history books, and you will find our family name sprinkled throughout many of them. If you are more interested in finding older sources, closer to the true events, you may wish to ask Professor Snape for a pass to the Restricted Section. In addition to books on dark and restricted magics, the Restricted Section also houses the library_ _’s rare books collection. Neither of us ever had much cause to look in there ourselves, but you will no doubt be able to find several early historical sources there._

_We appreciate your continued disapproval of Professor Hagrid, and we do share your concerns. Your father believes he has learnt more about the hybrid Skrewts in two weeks than Hagrid has in two months. However, because of political circumstances, he believes a more delicate approach is warranted. We are investigating the possibility of transferring him to the dragon reservation in the Hebrides. Please keep this fact to yourself._

_All our love,_

_Father and Mother_

 

Draco could read between the lines of his parents’ words very well by now. Signing it “All our love” meant that Mother was the main writer. “He believes’ meant she was sceptical about Father’s new magical creatures hobby, as Draco was. They were unusually short about the oaf Hagrid, which meant they had some reason to want to maintain the status quo about him, but that wasn’t a large concern right now. Draco’s main issue was Potter, and there, there was a lot of interesting information.

“You may do what you will.” That was straightforward. It meant he had a blank check to carry out whatever plans seemed good to him with that particular piece of information—revealing it or not—and thus using it against Potter any way he could think of. That was good. It also meant it wasn’t sensitive information. That was unhelpful. “Much more mysterious’ was pretty much exactly how it sounded, hidden in plain sight: they knew something, but not everything, and they were keeping it under wraps. They had to know _something_ , or they wouldn’t be so sure that Potter hadn’t entered himself. “Even if it were an inside job” meant it was _definitely_ an inside job, which only made sense, but there was a subtext there: whoever entered Potter’s name was impersonated—or possibly bought off. Either way, the motive wasn’t their own. Tellingly, though, Mother and Father were silent on who it was.

The most surprising line, though, was “well beyond the scope of our knowledge.” Taken together with the rest of the letter, that said two surprising things: one, the plan was big enough that Father couldn’t get the full lay of it; and second and related, Father wasn’t calling the shots. There were only two explanations for a plan that big: someone high up in the Ministry…or the Dark Lord returned. He shuddered. The first possibility would be shocking. The second…well, he didn’t want to admit it even to himself, but…he wasn’t sure _how_ he felt about that one. In either case, staying out of the way of whoever was behind it was a good move.

But _why_ do this? _Okay, suppose an enemy of Potter is behind this_ , Draco reasoned. _It_ _’s not worth the trouble if they want him to lose. Could it be possible they want him to_ win? _But why? What unusual happens if he wins the Tournament? It makes a lot of other people look like fools—possible. It makes Potter do things he normally wouldn_ _’t, come in contact with creatures he normally wouldn’t, come in contract with_ magic _he normally wouldn_ _’t…_

The possibility of a ritual came to Draco’s mind. It had a certain ring of truth to it, at least in that several more things made sense in that light. But he wasn’t familiar with ritual magic, and with good reason, so he couldn’t pursue the thought further. He decided he’d keep that to himself for now.

Then, there was his family history. It had taken Draco a few days to work out an innocuous way to phrase his enquiry. He had to suppress his surprise that his parents were so supportive; they didn’t know why he was really asking, after all. The Cavalier and the Highwayman had affirmed Lupin’s theory that the Malfoys had cut ties with muggles only after the Statute of Secrecy was implemented, but he still wasn’t sure how much he trusted the word of ghosts. He wanted to see the old books for themselves. He couldn’t shake the feeling that maybe _A History of Magic_ was biased and _didn_ _’t_ give an accurate portrayal of the past, and that maybe books written at the time would paint a better picture.

Perhaps he _would_ ask for that Restricted Section pass from Professor Snape.

* * *

The excitement in the school had died down some by Friday, partly replaced by excitement over tomorrow’s Gryffindor-Slytherin Quidditch match. There was a rumour about something big happening tomorrow in connection with it, but no one seemed to know what it was. Harry had an inkling, but he kept it to himself.

He was generally enjoying the fact that things were settling down when he opened his newspaper.

As soon as he saw it, he became aware of the whispers that were already starting to build around him. With a thud, he banged his head down on the table and groaned, “Oh no. I forgot.”

“Harry, what is it?” Hermione demanded.

“See for yourself.”

Hermione looked at the paper, and there on page 3 was a quarter-page ad that read:

 

_Coming 6 December to Flourish and Blotts_

_What was Harry Potter really doing during his ten years in hiding?_

_What did the Defence Professor of Hogwarts do in the spring of_ _“92?_

_Who is the REAL Harry Potter?_

_Find out straight from the source!_

_Harry Potter and the Philosopher_ _’s Stone_

_The True Story in His Own Words_

_By Lord Harry James Potter_

_Published by Whizz Hard Books_

Hermione smacked her forehead: “Oh no. I forgot.”

“Talk about awful timing,” Harry groaned.

“Oh my God! You wrote a book?!” Lavender Brown squealed, and that set off the Hall. At one point, Harry had been looking forward to the excitement this day would cause, but after this week, he was not enthusiastic.

“This is great!” Ginny Weasley said. “I can finally replace _The Harry Potter Adventures_ with the real thing.”

“Wow, I had no idea. Good on you, mate,” Ron told him. “I can’t wait to read it.”

“What are _you_ so excited about, Ron?” Harry shot back. “You already know more than what’s in the book!”

“Well, sure, but I’ve never had a friend who wrote a book before.”

“It’s not all great fun, Ron,” Harry said.

“Why not.”

“Hello, Mr. Potter,” a smug voice said, and Harry turned to face Draco Malfoy approaching the table. “So this is why you _really_ entered the Tournament.” Draco had no idea this book was coming out, but he had a blank check to deal with Potter, and this was a brilliant opportunity.

Harry sighed: “Mr. Malfoy, do you have any idea how the publishing industry works? It’s _slow_. I signed the contract for this book deal back in August, before I even knew about the Tournament, much less that I would be in it.”

“August? Do you think I would buy that? _My_ father told me about the Tournament at the beginning of summer.”

“Well, my godfather didn’t…He would’ve thought it was a great prank not to.”

Draco turned up his nose a fraction: “Hmph. Some families have no sense of propriety.” He deliberately didn’t name names so no one could call him out.

“And some families have no sense of proportion,” Harry shot back. “But for what it’s worth, I started writing this book long before the Tournament was finalised, and Professors Dumbledore and Lupin will vouch for that.”

“Hardly neutral sources, Mr. Potter. And how do I know you didn’t just take advantage of the windfall of having the Tournament here.”

To that, Harry just gave him the best are-you-really-that-stupid look he could muster and said, “Do you really think I can’t sell a book on my name alone, Mr. Malfoy?”

Malfoy sneered at him: “Doesn’t that just make you an attention whore either way?”

A silence descended. People waited to see how Harry would respond. That was edging on duelling territory. Harry gave him an easy out, though: “I think you’re labouring under a mistaken impression, Mr. Malfoy. My goal in publishing this book was merely to set the record straight about me. I’m sure you would do something similar in my position.”

“Merlin forbid! And I would think the House of Malfoy would not need to be so ostentatious.”

 _Did he_ really _just say that?_ Harry thought. “I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree on that. Good luck on the pitch tomorrow, Mr. Malfoy…You’ll need it.”

Draco gave Harry a wicked grin. Tomorrow’s Quidditch match promised to be quite a sight. “We’ll see about that,” he said, and he slipped away.

“Well, that didn’t seem so bad,” little Natalie McDonald said from across the table.

“No, now he’s just gonna spread his ‘theory’ that I joined the Tournament for publicity all around the rest of the school.”

“So call him out,” Ron suggested.

“Malfoy’s too smart for that,” Harry replied, shaking his head. “He won’t directly accuse me. He’ll just suggest the possibility to anyone who will listen. This sucks. I thought I was gonna enjoy this.”

“Why can’t you call him on what he says?” Natalie asked in confusion.

Neville explained it to her: “Malfoy has to make a provable insult to Harry’s character before Harry can issue a grievance.”

“What? Why can’t you just say he’s wrong?”

“No, not call him out to say he’s wrong,” Hermione explained. “They mean call him out for an honour duel. That’s different. No one would really get hurt or anything, but it’s a big political deal with noble families.”

“…Oh.” Natalie was wide-eyed at this insight into wizarding politics.

“And the ad’s not that great either,” Harry went on. “What happened to Quirrell—they’re treating it like a joke!”

“Well, after this many years of it, ‘The Defence Professor did it’ kind of _is_ a running joke,” Neville said.

Hermione gave him an uncomfortable look. “It’s really not that funny, Neville,” she said softly. “Quirrell died. Williamson died. Lockhart really hurt a lot of people.”

Neville frowned and looked a little ashamed. “I guess it’s not that funny,” he said. “But that’ll be why they did it.”

Harry and Hermione accepted this and tried to finish their breakfast. Harry was still being bombarded with questions, although he ignored most of them, except from his friends. He was much more open about it, however, when Demelza Robins examined the ad and asked, “Is this about your first year, Harry?”

“Yes, it is.”

“Was that before the basilisk?”

“Yes, the basilisk was my second year.”

“What happened to Professor Quirrell? I didn’t really hear much about you before the basilisk—except for the Sirius Black thing and that one article about your relatives.”

Harry lowered his voice and leaned across the table, repeating their cover story: “Quirrell was working for Voldemort.”

“EEK!” Demelza jumped about a foot in the air at the name. Natalie flinched, but more at her friend’s reaction than direct fear.

“Quirrell was sick, and Voldemort promised to heal him if he stole the Philosopher’s Stone from Dumbledore. Hermione and I stopped him.”

“How?” Natalie asked in wonder.

“You’ll have to read the book to find out.”

“I’ve never met a real author before,” Natalie said excitedly. “Was it hard to write?”

“Actually, it was a lot easier than I expected once I really got into it,” Harry said. “It really helped me deal with all the stuff that happened, and it’s not as much work as it sounds like if you know what you’re going to write.”

“Cool,” Demelza jumped in. “Are you going to write one about the basilisk, too? And the…the werewolves?” she added nervously.

Harry hesitated too long in answering, and Hermione said, “You might as well tell them, Harry. Everyone will be expecting it anyway.”

“Alright, alright. I’m working on Book Three now, but I won’t publish anything about you without your permission.”

Demelza sighed with relief: “Thanks, Harry.”

“Ooh, are you gonna write one about the Tournament now?” Ginny asked.

“Probably, yes. I’ll call it _Harry Potter and the Tournament of Doom_.”

“Don’t be so dramatic, Harry,” Hermione chided. “You’re not doomed yet.”

“Well…okay, maybe not, but it sounds cooler if it has ‘doom’ in the title.”

* * *

Despite Harry’s levity, that day was not pleasant for him. Most of the school was firmly divided between people who were excited about the book and people who bought Malfoy’s line that he was using the Tournament to sell it.

Surprisingly, one of his strongest allies was Viktor. The Bulgarian Seeker was already friendly with him, but Harry hadn’t expected him to be a staunch ally. After he defended Harry to an offended group of Hufflepuffs, Harry asked why.

“I care about truth, Harry. I am familiar vith fame,” he replied. “And vith press and publishing. You show no signs of engaging in publicity campaign. It is clear to those who understand dat Tournament is not related to your book.”

Fleur didn’t quite seem sold on Harry’s story, but she did inform him that Gabrielle, who had now gone home, was sure to want a copy of the book. Cedric was once again supportive, even if his house wasn’t, as he was strongly inclined to trust Harry’s word after the past year.

Of course, since they had another Potions class that day, Snape was the most disagreeable part of the day. He would have made a fuss over just the book by itself, but now, he railed on Harry from the start.

“Potter!” he began the class. “Since you seem so fond of your classmates’ attention, perhaps you could explain the first step in the Golpalott Process for determining the antidote for a blended poison.”

“Er…” Harry started. He had heard the name “Golpalott Process” before, but he was certain it had not been in the reading. He tried to reason it out as best he could in the few moments he had: “I think the first thing you’d need to do is cast _Specialis Revelio_ to figure out what’s _in_ the poison.”

Malfoy and Nott sniggered, but everyone else looked perplexed. “Very amusing, Potter,” Snape replied unctuously. “However, Golpalott assumes that you are not a simpleton and have already completed that step.”

“Then I don’t know, sir.”

Snape smirked: “A pity. Perhaps you should pay extra attention to today’s lesson.”

The lesson _did_ involve a blended poison, but the instructions were on the board and in the book, as usual. They didn’t have to _use_ the Golpalott Process. This continued throughout the class. At intervals, Snape would ask Harry a question that was well beyond the scope of the exercise, and Harry was forced to answer that he didn’t know. Soon, he thoroughly resented both the smug grins of the Slytherins and the sympathetic looks of his fellow Gryffindors who were powerless to do anything.

Finally, Hermione got fed up, raised her hand, and asked the “dumb” question: “Professor, will this material be on the exam? I believe much of it is actually on the N.E.W.T. standard.”

That gave Snape pause. He wasn’t expecting to actually be called out on that. The class waited with baited breath for the reaction. “Well, Granger, since your ‘brother’ seems so eager to expand his activities beyond the usual schoolwork, I should think he would put as much effort towards his classes.”

“I don’t think my extracurricular activities are at issue right now,” Harry jumped in.

“Five points from Gryffindor for talking out of turn, Potter!”

Hermione raised her hand again, but Snape ignored her, wisely avoiding a further confrontation in front of his students. He toned it down after that, but he had succeeded in his efforts to make Harry look like a fool. He wasn’t surprised that Harry and Hermione confronted him after class.

“Something on your mind, Potter?” he growled.

“Only that we both consider your behaviour in class today unfair and unprofessional…sir,” Harry said.

“Oh? And who are you to say it’s so unfair?”

“I don’t need to be a teacher to see that grilling a fourth-year with N.E.W.T.-level questions in front of the class is not appropriate.”

“Ha! As if your head couldn’t use a bit of deflating.”

“Excuse me?”

“Don’t play dumb with with me, Potter. You can hardly claim not to be exploiting your fame when you write a book before you so much as sit your O.W.L.s, knowing full well that any drivel you put out will be printed.”

“You didn’t even read it!” Hermione exclaimed.

But Harry whispered her name and waved her back. It was his turn to deal with Snape this time. “I don’t see what your problem is, Professor,” he said. “You knew I was writing that book already. Professor Dumbledore spoke to you about it last summer.” Snape’s eyes widened just a hair. He didn’t know Harry knew that. “And Hermione’s right. It’s considered common courtesy to actually _read_ a book before giving it a bad review.”

“Hmph. If you have somehow produced a quality work of literature, then I will reassess my position,” Snape said. “Now, unless you have a pertinent question about potions, get out of my classroom.”

Harry left and motioned for Hermione to follow. He doubted Snape would ever back down from his position, but he could at least make it clear that he wouldn’t be dealt with so unprofessionally. A well-placed complaint or two, if necessary, would keep him in line.

“God, he’s being cranky this year,” Hermione complained.

“Well, he’ll be even crankier tomorrow after I kick Malfoy’s arse in Quidditch,” Harry said.

“Oh, boy. I guess we’re really back in first year, then. If your broom gets cursed again, I’ve had it.”


	94. The Press Conference

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Tekeli-li! Tekeli-JK Rowling!

_“Yes, I_ know _the Weighing of the Wands is traditional, but there_ _’s no reason we have to have it on a class day.”_

 _“Alright, then. Why don’t we move it to…Saturday, the twelfth, eh? We’ll call in Ollivander, get the_ Daily Prophet _in on the story; it_ _’ll be good day.”_

_“I assume you’ll also be inviting the newspapers from the other participating schools’ countries, Mr. Bagman?”_

_“Er…sure, let’s go with that.”_

* * *

“Good morning, Hogwarts!” Lee Jordan’s voice boomed over the Quidditch Pitch. “Welcome to the third Quidditch match of our special expanded season. This match is Slytherin versus Gryffindor!” The crowd roared their support of the teams. With the visiting students and a few more members of the public than usual, it was a big crowd.

“ _But_ the moderator’s chair today will _not_ be filled by Professor McGonagall—although she is still standing over my shoulder. Hi, Professor. Instead, let’s have a rousing Hogwarts welcome for my special guest commentator for the day, _Viktor Krum_!”

Gasps and screams of delight (from both boys and girls) thundered in the air as Viktor Krum slid into the seat next to Lee, confirming the most fantastic of the rumours that had been floating around the school. “Good morning,” Viktor’s deep voice sounded through the magical microphone. “It is pleasure to be here. I am happy to have this opportunity to check out competition.”

That drew laughter from the stands as people realised that was exactly what he was doing. Harry also noted that Viktor’s accent was improving. He must be continuing to study his English.

“And let’s hear it for the Slytherin Team,” Lee said halfheartedly. “Bletchley, Montague, Pucey, Warrington, Crabbe, Goyle, and—” He coughed. “—Malfoy.”

The Slytherin team flew out, taking a lap of the field like the professionals had done at the World Cup while Viktor commented on their squad: “Slytherin Team has uphill battle with three new players this year. Malfoy has done vell as Seeker in previous seasons, but he has not yet shown he can vield Firebolt against equal opponent.”

“Well, Slytherin’s definitely got their work cut out for them because let’s hear it for the Gryffindor Team!” Lee shouted, and the crowd roared much more loudly. “Weasley, Johnson, Spinnet, Bell, Weasley, another Weasley, _aaaaannnnndddd POTTER_!”

The Gryffindor section of the stands erupted with an old favourite from Harry’s first year as the team took its lap: “Harry Potter is our king! Potter can catch anything!”

“Now, Gryffindor has very strong team,” Viktor said enthusiastically. “All of their players are vell-trained and proven on pitch. Their new Keeper, Ronald Weasley is inexperienced, but proved himself in von match he played. But real gem of this squad is Harry Potter. I have been folloving Potter’s career since I joined Bulgarian National Team.” The crowd quieted down and was in rapt attention as he revealed this information. Most of them had no idea Harry was attracting international attention. “Our manager is always vatching for exceptional school players around vorld to be ready for competition, and Potter’s record is exceptional. He is undefeated in nine matches despite multiple cases of interference. One year ago, he achieved his greatest feat: diving one half mile in hailstorm vith damaged broom and saving his opponent before landing.”

Across the pitch, Harry could see Malfoy turning red with anger. His arch-rival still maintained that he hadn’t needed saving in that incident.

“This is also Potter’s first match facing another Seeker vith Firebolt, so ve vill see today vhether either Seeker is ready for national team. I think ve vill see at least von of them is.”

“Time for some _real_ Quidditch, eh, Malfoy?” Harry said with a predatory grin when the teams met on the pitch.

“Is it, Potter?” Malfoy sneered back. “Sounds like Krum didn’t get the memo, then.”

“It wasn’t _your_ flying skills I heard him praising a minute ago.”

“Ha! Just because you got lucky and made some hard catches doesn’t make you a genius. I could’ve done what you did.”

“Yeah? You just keep telling yourself that, Malfoy,” Harry said, and a moment later, Madam Hooch started the match.

“And the Quaffle is immediately taken by Katie Bell of Gryffindor—an excellent Chaser, started as a second year for those who don’t know, and she’s really _grown_ since then.”

It was jarring not to hear Professor McGonagall chastising Lee for that remark, but instead, Viktor audibly chuckled and said, “And more importantly, Gryffindor shows excellent Quaffle handling from start. Now, Bell passes to Johnson, who dodges Bludger from Crabbe. Goyle is lining up to get Gryffindor Chasers in cross-fire. Spinnet and Bell tighten into Hawkshead Formation. Johnson passes back to Bell—oo! Dodges double-Bludger assault—”

“And Bell lines up her shot—” Lee said. “IT’S IN! Ten-nought Gryffindor.”

Cheers rose from half of the stands, although the fans were more balanced than normal with most of the Durmstrang crew supporting Slytherin. Harry pulled a loop when Katie scored, causing Malfoy to yell, “What are you, eleven?” But before Harry could answer, both of them found themselves moving out of the way as Crabbe and Goyle went wild with the Bludgers and got into a near brawl with Fred and George.

“Slytherin appears to be playing very aggressive defence,” Viktor said. “Beaters are keeping close to Bludgers to keep them in their control. Ah—and Goyle interferes with Johnson’s steal attempt. Pucey still in position, reaching the scoring area…and blocked by Veasley.”

“You’re doing great, Ron! Keep it up!” Harry yelled as Ron pumped his fist in the air triumphantly. He knew that if Ron could stay on his game, he would be nigh-unbeatable, but he was still spotty in practice.

As the rest of the players battled it out, Harry decided to test how well Malfoy could really fly. He tipped his Firebolt into a dive and accelerated as fast as he could before pulling up level and zooming along the stands, nearly blowing the hats off the Gryffindor first years.

“Hold up, Potter’s seen something!” Lee said. “He’s on the move!”

“It looks like feint to me, but is alvays hard to tell,” Viktor said. “But Malfoy is folloving. Both Seekers can handle Firebolt at speed. Malfoy is trying to catch up.”

Harry deliberately let Malfoy get close behind him, and then he pulled up and into an Immelmann turn that had him flying straight at Malfoy. He would have buzzed his slicked-back hair, but Malfoy pulled a Sloth Grip Roll and got safely out of his way when he passed.

“WHOA! And Potter nearly nails Malfoy!” Lee said. “Nice move.”

“ _Da_ ,” Viktor agreed. “Vould have been—how you say? Close shave, _da?_ But Malfoy has good reflexes.”

“Wow! Did you see that move?” Dennis Creevey said from the stands. “Harry looked like a fighter pilot!”

“Yeah, he did,” Natalie McDonald said nervously as she repositioned her hat. “This game is a lot worse than that last one.”

“That’s because it’s with Slytherin,” Colin said from behind her.

“Do people get hurt a lot in Quidditch?”

“Yes, but no one’s died in years,” Demelza Robins said. Somehow, that didn’t reassure her muggle-born friend very much.

“Watch where you’re going, Potter!” Malfoy yelled.

Harry just grinned and said, “If you wanna play with the big boys, you’d better be ready.”

“Oh yeah?” Malfoy made a face at him and zoomed off, straight at the Gryffindor Chasers. In a move worthy of an acrobat, he spun his way between them and broke up their formation, allowing Warrington to swoop in and snatch the Quaffle.

“Still think my flying’s no good, Potter?” Malfoy taunted.

“Oh, it’s not bad—if you’re a sparrow!” Harry buzzed him again and looped back around to get above him, looming like a hawk. And like a hawk, he swooped in to get in Warrington’s way. Warrington panicked and took his shot, but it went wide.

“Now this is interesting,” Viktor commented. “I can see that Potter and Malfoy have very different flying styles, even though both are very good. Malfoy uses traditional aerobatics and can perform many elaborate manoeuvres, making him a versatile player. Potter keeps things simpler, but pursues his quarry very aggressively, often in surprise attack from above. He seems comfortable at higher speeds, and is not afraid to make near-collisions.”

“Well, I’ve always said Potter flies like a hawk swooping in for the kill,” Lee said. “It’s a wonder Malfoy can even keep up with him.”

“ _Nyet_. Malfoy is classically trained. It is only vay he could handle Firebolt like that.”

“Hmph. He’s rich enough to afford it, I guess—Oh, damn! Montague slips another one by Weasley. That’s thirty-all.”

The points began to rack up, and Harry was starting to worry about Ron when he let through several goals in a row, but Gryffindor stayed ahead in terms of points. The Snitch showed itself once when Harry and Malfoy were at opposite ends of the pitch. The Snitch appeared smack in the middle. They both made a beeline for it, but by the time they got there and nearly collided at a combined two hundred plus miles per hour, it was gone.

Viktor continued commenting on the tactics of both teams, going into more detail about the efficacy of this or that play and how well it was pulled off. He had a lot to say about all fourteen players. Ron, he said, was gifted, but imperfect, while Slytherin’s Bletchley was only average but for her experience. Each of the Chasers had particular roles on their team, which Harry hadn’t consciously thought about before, and Viktor even picked out differences between Fred’s and George’s playing styles, to widespread astonishment.

“Wow…” Lee said, for once failing to keep up his rapid-fire commentary. “I…I don’t know what to say, Mr. Krum. I’m their best mate, and even I can’t tell them apart half the time. But that’s why you’re the expert.”

By now, Gryffindor was three goals up, but both teams were playing well, and they couldn’t rest on their laurels. And despite all his talk, Harry knew that Malfoy was a real threat. He decided to try the move Viktor had pulled against Lynch in the World Cup. Picking up the pace to draw Malfoy’s attention, he circled up to a high altitude. Once Malfoy was following him for a couple minutes and hopefully lulled into a false sense of security, Harry pulled into a steep dive and accelerated towards the ground.

“Whoa! And Potter dives!” Lee yelled. “Malfoy follows! It’s gonna be a close one…”

The crowd roared as Harry pulled out of his dive so close to the ground that his heels skimmed the grass. But the big surprise was when he _didn_ _’t_ hear Malfoy ploughing into the ground behind him. Somehow, the blond ponce had made the turn successfully.

“And Malfoy survives Wronski Feint attempt by Potter!” Krum explained. “That is one of most difficult moves in playbook for Seekers.”

“Well, yeah. You got Lynch to crash in the World Cup final with that move,” Lee said. “Poor bloke got trampled by angry veela—and not in a good way. I’m amazed Malfoy pulled that off.”

“I think it is safe to say both Potter and Malfoy could play professional,” Viktor said. “If recruiters are listening, you may vant to come see before season is over. You need to start early for national teams.”

Harry and Malfoy stared at each other in shock. Harry had heard Viktor’s compliments before, but he hadn’t expected him to call for recruiters. They hardly ever payed attention to anyone but the seventh years. The two Seekers’ expressions slowly shifted to glaring at each other as they realised their rivalry had just heated up further.

And then, as if on cue, the Snitch appeared halfway between them, and they zoomed after it.

The Snitch wasn’t going quietly. It zoomed along the stands, forcing Harry and Malfoy to bleed off speed to make the turn around the scoring area. With its lead widened, it spiralled upwards with them following and then took a sharp nosedive. Both Seekers dove after it, reaching out their hands. The Firebolt was easily faster than the Snitch on a dive, but they were neck-and-neck and bumping into each other, each struggling to get ahead. With the distance to the ground rapidly closing, Harry made a wild sweep with his hand and pulled up just before he hit the dirt. Malfoy managed to pull up, too, spinning off in another direction, but Harry was grinning.

“Whoops, looks like they lost it,” Lee said. “No, wait! Potter’s fishing something out of his sleeve—He’s got it! _Potter_ _’s got the Snitch!_ Must’ve swept it up on that last dive! _Gryffindor wins two-seventy to ninety_!”

“ _Amazing_!” Viktor agreed. “That vas most perfect Plumpton Pass I have seen in long time.”

“Now _that_ is something you don’t see every day,” Lee agreed. “This is a great Quidditch match, folks.”

The Plumpton Pass was a half-joke in the Quidditch World. To hear people talk, the Snitch flying up the Seeker’s sleeve practically always happened by accident. But it had its uses when the Seeker didn’t have time to turn or slow down to match the Snitch’s speed, and it was moving too fast to catch with their hands. In any case, Harry had used the play to great effect to snag the Snitch when he couldn’t quite reach it with his fingers and maintained his undefeated record.

Malfoy was glaring at him more than ever, so he was going to call it a good day.

* * *

The day after the match was a day to relax for most of the school, but most of the school wasn’t Harry Potter. He wasn’t at all surprised when Professor Dumbledore summoned him and Hermione to his office. They were pleased to see Remus was there as well since they could use someone there who was unquestionably on Harry’s side. Dumbledore came down on his own side a little too often for their tastes.

“I’m sure you know why I called you, Harry,” Dumbledore started.

“Yes, sir—the fact that I was illegally entered in a dangerous tournament,” Harry said calmly. “Do you have any more leads about who did it? Or how?”

“Alas, no,” he answered. “Well, yes, the _how_ is fairly simple. Algernon Croaker from the Department of Mysteries visited this week to examine the Goblet of Fire personally. The culprit used a modified Confundus Charm to make it accept the presence of a fourth school name. Most students would want to represent their own school, so we did not take great pains to block that avenue—although it was still beyond the capabilities of all but the most gifted students. He also confirmed that the wards I placed around the Goblet were not breached, which indicates that who ever entered your name had a right to be there. Unfortunately, that category includes all of the staff and most of the sixth- and seventh-year students.”

“Did Mr. Croaker look into whether there’s a way to get Harry out of the contract, Professor?” Hermione suggested.

“He did, Hermione. But he informed me that attempting to break the charms on the Goblet—or damaging the Goblet itself—could have unpleasant and unpredictable side effects—for Harry, for the other Champions, and possibly even for Hogwarts itself. It would be safer merely to accept the penalty.”

“Figures,” Hermione grumbled.

“Well, it’s not like we didn’t expect it,” Harry said. “I think I’m still good to compete.”

“Hopefully.”

“If it helps, Harry,” Dumbledore said, “I have been discussing with Professor Grayson changes to our safety measures to mitigate the most dangerous parts of the Tournament. Once those are finalised, I am confident that you have the capability to make it through the Tournament alive and mostly unscathed. And, while I would never condone cheating, you are correct in what you told Remus—that there is no real penalty for doing so.”

Remus snorted: “Ha. According to the records, cheating in the Tournament is as much a tradition as the Tournament itself. I wish we could just give you direct help, but the school’s contract with the Ministry is stopping that. They were a lot tougher with that one. However, as a fellow Marauder, I encourage you to exploit any chance you get.”

“Trust me, I will,” Harry said. “I don’t even know what I’m going up against. I need all the help I can get.”

“Naturally,” Dumbeldore said. “Now, Harry, I know that you often have your own ways of doing things. Have you learnt anything of note this week about the perpetrator of this act?”

This was new, they thought. Dumbledore usually didn’t involve them this deep, at least not of his own accord. “Well, Professor,” Harry said, “we checked the Marauder’s Map, and all of the teachers show up as themselves.”

“And even for them, the Goblet was constantly watched, sir,” Hermione added. “Even if someone was Imperiused, it would have looked odd if, say, Professor Sinistra approached it for any reason. And certainly no student could get Harry’s name past Professor Moody.”

“Yes, it’s possible, but unlikely,” Remus agreed.

“So we talked it over with Mum, Dad, and Sirius, and we think the only people it could be are David Monroe, Ludo Bagman, or Igor Karkaroff—or someone impersonating Monroe or Bagman,” Harry said.

“Maybe an anti-social seventh-year being impersonated, but that’s a long shot, too,” Hermione added.

“Right. There are good reasons not to suspect anyone else,” Harry finished.

“Excellent reasoning,” Dumbledore agreed. “I myself came to the same conclusion. I did, of course, actively check for other suspects. I ruled out Professor Grayson from being impersonated simply by asking him to change into his animagus form. Professor Moody is automatically suspect because he is the Defense Professor, but he passed his security questions, and so on. As for being Imperiused, done skillfully, it is virtually undetectable, but as you said, Hermione, the Goblet was being constantly watched. After considering all of the possibilities, there are only three people I could reasonably suspect—the same three that you named.”

“Good to know we’re on the same page, at least,” Harry said.

“Indeed. And this raises an interesting point.”

“What’s that, sir?”

“All three of our suspects are on the judge’s panel. I will be able to keep my eye on all of them the entire time during the tasks.”

Harry and Hermione thought that idea had potential, but Remus was less convinced. “There’s a problem with that logic, though, Albus,” he said. “Maybe the real Monroe or Bagman is still being sent in to work, Imperiused or Obliviated. Maybe the real Monroe or Bagman will even be sent here from now on. Any free Death Eater could be behind it, and we’d have no way of knowing how they got in, much less who did it.”

“Very true, but we will at least be covering as many possibilities as we can,” Dumbledore replied. “And the other possibility is, in fact, if one of our suspects is being impersonated—or _was_ being impersonated, to figure out _who_ did the impersonating.”

“How do we do that?” asked Harry.

“By reviewing memories of suspected Death Eaters who are now free in my Pensieve, alongside memories of everyone who approached the Goblet. Since it was constantly watched, the latter will be easy to procure, and any small mannerism or pattern of speech may give the culprit away. I hope that you will join me in this endeavour. In addition to your personal interest, there is also there is also that matter of your dream at the end of summer Harry. I will say again that I do not want you to seek out any more visions of Voldemort. The danger to you if you fail to block him out of your mind is far greater than the value of the information it could provide. But since you have had the one vision, it is possible that you could identify someone in it. Even if not, your feline senses could spot something that I don’t.”

Harry and Hermione were amazed. Actually involving them (safely) in the investigation was far more than they expected of Dumbledore, even after he shared the knowledge of horcruxes with them last year. He so often preferred to work on his own—but maybe the East African War, not to mention his previous difficulties with the horcruxes, had finally taught him how valuable allies could be.

“We’d be happy to help, Professor,” Hermione said. “Right, Harry?”

“Yes, definitely. Thank you, Professor.”

“You’re quite welcome, Harry. I’ll compile the memories as soon as I can. I hope that we can solve this mystery quickly.”

With their plans set, Harry and Hermione returned to Gryffindor Tower, where Harry quickly sought out Neville.

“Hey, Nev,” he called when he found him.

“Hey, Harry. Hey, Hermione,” he said. “What did Dumbledore want?”

“Still working on who put my name in the Goblet. And he said your Great Uncle Algie came to inspect the Goblet. Did you ask him to come?”

“Yeah. I thought he might be able to help. Did he find anything?”

“Nothing really useful, but it was a good idea,” Hermione said with a smile. “That was very thoughtful of you.”

Neville blushed a little and said, “Hey, we’re allies, right? Potter and Longbottom have to stick together.”

“And Granger,” Hermione said playfully.

Neville blushed harder and said, “Er, yeah, Granger, too.”

* * *

In the second week after Harry was chosen for the Tournament, some of the students, particularly Slytherins, started wearing badges that said:

_Support Cedric Diggory_ _—_

_The REAL Hogwarts Champion!_

 

When Theo Nott showed off his badge to Harry, he just gave him a funny look and said, “What’s this about? I’m not a Champion for Hogwarts.” That by itself was enough to discredit them, and shortly after that, Cedric told Hufflepuff to stop wearing them when he found out they changed to say _Potter Stinks._ He wasn’t too happy to be sharing the spotlight with Harry, but he was still a friend, and it wasn’t his fault. By Saturday, students were simply wearing badges with their preferred Champion’s name on them—sometimes more than one.

Harry was not looking forward to the press conference on Saturday. He’d been in some high-profile Wizengamot meetings, and those were bad enough. Being actually _stuck_ in a room with a bunch of reporters was one of his worst non-Voldemort-related nightmares. Hermione offered to go with him, but he turned her down; that would only confuse things more.

Given the number of people involved, the press conference was to be held in the Great Hall. Harry happened to meet Cedric in the Entrance Hall, and they walked in together. It looked surprisingly like a muggle press conference. A table was set up with five seats along it. Two were filled by Fleur and Viktor, and a third by Mr. Ollivander, the famed wandmaker, to inspect the wands. A dozen chairs were set up across from the Champions’ table, five for the Tournament judges and the rest for members of the press. Dumbledore, the sixth judge, stood at a podium, apparently moderating. Harry eyed Ludo Bagman and David Monroe suspiciously as he and Cedric took their seats. He had told Hermione to check the Marauder’s Map to make sure there was no one there who shouldn’t be.

As for the press, Luna Lovegood was the one who stood out the most to him, despite being the smallest person in the Hall. Luna was wearing a bright purple fedora with a little card that read _PRESS_ tucked into the band, and she carried a little muggle notebook and a self-inking quill. Harry smiled at her when he saw her. Behind her was a blond-bearded man who looked like he could have stepped of a Viking long ship, next to him, a small, thin man in colourful robes, and on the end, to Harry’s surprise, was Maxwell Barnett, the Queen’s Royal Court Magician. The Tournament must be attracting more attention than he thought. To Luna’s left was  a giggly young woman who looked like a ten-years-older Lavender Brown, then a paunchy photographer, and finally, Harry’s face fell as he saw the final reporter in the room—a middle-aged woman with bleach-blond hair, tacky jewelled spectacles and two-inch nails. He knew her picture from the _Daily Prophet_ , and he wasn’t shy about it.

“Oh, damn, it’s Rita Skeeter!”

Everyone stared at him.

Viktor was the first to speak. He understandably wanted to be well-informed about reporters. “You know this voman, Harry?” he said.

“Yes,” he groaned. “Rita Skeeter. She’s the premier gossip columnist at the _Daily Prophet_.”

If Skeeter was offended by Harry’s reaction to her, she didn’t show it. “Harry Potter,” she said saccharinely, “such a pleasure to meet you again. You’re causing quite the stir right now. I might like to know if you’d mind having a private interview after the conference.”

Harry snorted: “After the hack jobs you’ve been running on me the past three years? Yes, I _do_ mind.”

Viktor’s eyes widened, and he looked at Skeeter suspiciously.

“Now, Harry, I can’t give you special treatment just because you’re a celebrity,” Skeeter shot back. “Sometimes, the truth hurts.”

“And I’m sure you published that article about my abusive muggle relatives on the eve of the vote on the Muggle Protection Act by sheer coincidence,” Harry replied.

Fleur and Viktor both looked at Harry in surprise and gave Skeeter a nervous look.

“Harry, Rita,” Dumbledore spoke up. “I do not think this is the time.”

“Alright, then, Dumbledore,” Skeeter said. Harry didn’t object either. He had done his job of warning his fellow champions about her.

Dumbledore stood and approached the table. “Welcome all,” he said. “One of the traditions of the Triwizard Tournament—now the Tetrawizard Tournament—is the Weighing of the Wands, which ensures that all of the champions have a wand in good working order before each task. Garrick Ollivander is the premier practising wandmaker in Europe, and he will be performing the inspection.”

“Thank you, Albus,” Ollivander said. He rose from the seat and passed down the line. Ollivander was an old man with wild, white hair and piercing silver eyes. Harry noticed for the first time that his eyes looked similar to Luna’s and wondered if they were related. Ollivander was definitely creepier, though. Even foreign wands Ollivander could identify just by holding them in his hand. Fleur’s wand was rosewood with a hair from her veela grandmother—a “temperamental” substance, he said. He conjured a bouquet of flowers and pronounced it in good working order. Cedric’s wand was an Ollivander—ash and unicorn hair. Krum’s was a Gregorovitch wand, thicker than usual, of hornbeam and dragon heartstring. Harry noted that each of the champions had a different wand core, but he didn’t know if that meant anything.

“Now, Mr. Potter, let’s see about your wand.”

Harry sighed and snapped his fingers. His wand shot into his hand from his wrist holster, to the surprise of most of the Hall.

“Ah, you wear your wand close, I see,” Ollivander said.

“After the last three years, I hardly ever let it out of my sight,” Harry muttered. He carefully handed it over, not taking his eyes off it with his feline stare.

“Yes, I’ve heard about your exploits,” he continued. “I knew we should expect great things from you…holly and phoenix feather, eleven inches, nice and supple—I remember _this_ wand well…And you’ve kept it in good condition. Excellent…”

Harry was very relieved that Ollivander didn’t mention the fact that his wand was a brother to Voldemort’s. He still didn’t know if that actually meant anything, but after the Parseltongue debacle two years ago, that was the last thing he needed to get out.

As he took back his wand, he was momentarily blinded by a flash of light. Harry immediately snapped his wand in that direction, only to lower it at once when he saw it was the photographer, who seemed unconcerned. “Great action pose, Mr. Potter,” he said.

Harry suppressed a groan. Why hadn’t the photographer taken photos of the other champions? He wondered. But he had a more important question at the moment: “Shouldn’t you do this right before each task instead of just once weeks before the whole thing starts, Mr. Ollivander?”

Ollivander looked back at the judges, and the judges looked at each other in surprise. So no one had thought of that. Great.

“I think that would be a reasonable addition,” Dumbledore said. “If Mr. Ollivander agrees.”

“I’ll check my calendar.”

Ollivander sat down, and the floor was officially opened for questions. Dumbledore first pointed to Maxwell Barnett to speak.

“Hello, Maxwell Barnett, the Royal Court Magician for the United Kingdom,” he introduced himself, standing up. “Doing a personal report for the Queen. My question is for Mr. Diggory and Lord Potter. While you are nominally representing different schools, you are both technically representing the British Commonwelth in this Tournament. How do you feel about representing Her Majesty in an international event?”

Cedric and Harry stared at each other. Harry hadn’t thought of himself as still competing as a British subject, and neither of them had imagined the Queen getting involved. After a few subtle gestures to the effect that Cedric had no clue how to respond, Harry leaned forward and said haltingly, “With all due respect to Her Majesty, I wasn’t supposed to be in this Tournament, and I’m mostly focused on getting through it in one piece. I’ll do my best, of course, but I’m honestly not expecting to give a stellar performance.”

Several of the reporters looked surprised at that, likely due to Harry’s reputation for daring deeds. However, Barnett didn’t follow up, and Cedric answered, “Um, I guess—respectfully—we don’t think much about the muggle government in general in the magical world. I’m certainly proud to be representing Hogwarts and Britain, and I’m going to give the Tetrawizard Tournament my all because of that.”

It was a bit of an odd start, but the press conference continued as Dumbledore called on the bearded man in the back. “Beowulf Dansgaard from _Nordiska Nyheter_ ,” he said. “For Mr. Krum, how will you balance training for the Tetrawizard Tournament and the inter-school Quidditch Tournament?”

“I vill train intensively only for matches that vill be serious challenge,” Viktor said. “From vhat I have seen, that vill be only Gryffindor and perhaps Slytherin.”

Cedric turned red at being dismissed like that. Harry thought the question was unfair considering there were two other Quidditch players at the table—and both Seekers, no less, but it again, there was little time for follow-up.

“Philomela Misslethorpe from _Witch Weekly_ ,” the young woman next to Luna introduced herself. (Rita Skeeter looked annoyed to be passed over so far.) “For Mr. Potter, are there any new romances in the air for you? Or did you enter the Tournament to try to win back your ex-girlfriend, Cho Chang?”

Harry’s mouth hung open. _That_ was what they wanted to know? No wonder Hermione complained about her roommates. “What?” he said stupidly.

“Are there—”

“No and no,” he answered quickly. “Or alternatively, none of your business, and I was entered without my consent, in case you missed it.”

“So no hard feelings towards your fellow Champion Mr. Diggory since he’s now dating Miss Chang?”

“What?!” Harry said in surprise.

“Where did you hear that?” Cedric said.

Harry turned to him: “Wait, that was _true_?”

“Yes, but I don’t know how she knew.”

“It’s my job to be on top of the rumour mill, Mr. Diggory,” Philomela Misslethorpe replied, “especially when it concerns such prominent figures. So, Mr. Potter…”

“N-n-no,” Harry coughed, wishing he sounded more convincing, his surprise covering up his genuine sincerity. “No hard feelings. If you _must_ know, Miss Chang and I split amicably last spring when we _both_ decided we weren’t a good fit for each other.” Cedric gave him a concerned look, and Harry whispered, “Yes, really,” hoping the reporters wouldn’t hear.

The next reporter Dumbledore called on was the thin Frenchman, who introduced himself as Roland Pelletier from _Le Monde Magique_. “For Miss Delacour,” he said, “Do you think your veela heritage will give you any advantage in the Tournament?”

Fleur giggled musically, apparently not taking offence to the question. Harry could feel her turning up her allure for effect. Even for only a quarter-blooded veela, it was surprisingly strong. Cedric went glassy-eyed. Harry used Occlumency to try to focus on her words and not her beautiful voice and wondered if veela pheromones would be classed as a restricted drug in the muggle world.

“Zat would depend on whether any of zee tasks calls for fire, no?” she answered, before her voice turned harder and more determined: “but then, fire ‘as many uses, doesn’t it?”

 _Note to self: don_ _’t get on Fleur’s bad side,_ Harry thought.

On the next question, Rita Skeeter jumped up to speak before Dumbledore even had a chance to call on anyone: “Harry, Rita Skeeter from the _Daily Prophet_ , but you knew that. How do you think your parents would feel if they knew you were competing in the Tetrawizard Tournament? Proud? Worried? Angry?”

Harry resisted the urge to hiss. “My parents _are_ very worried because I’ve been entered in a dangerous tournament designed for students two years ahead of me,” he said testily. “Not to mention angry because someone managed to enter me against my will without getting caught…If you meant my _birth_ parents, I’m sure they’d feel the same way.”

Dumbledore called on Luna before Rita could respond. “Hello everyone,” she said dreamily. She still wasn’t very tall, even standing up. “Luna Lovegood from _The Quibbler_. My question is for Miss Delacour and Mr. Krum: while you’re in Britain, are you concerned about the vampire infiltration of the country through the Rotfang Conspiracy?”

Fleur and Viktor (and Cedric, for that matter) just stared. Harry was trying not to laugh, and he nudged Viktor and whispered, “Just go along with it.”

Viktor tried to formulate an answer: “Ummm…I have not heard of any Rotfang Conspiracy. But I am not afraid of any vampires. At home in Bulgaria, ve have many vampires. I know how to deal with them.”

“Eet ees…zee same for me,” Fleur said. “We ‘ave a few vampires at Beauxbatons. Zey say some of zeir cousins are very dangerous, but I ‘ave never ‘eard of any of zem infiltrating countries.”

The press conference continued for quite a while. Harry found most of the reporters to be not especially good. They tended to be biased towards their own champions, and the questions definitely left something to be desired. Rita Skeeter didn’t ask a single question that wasn’t to or about Harry, and they were generally in the direction of him being both a tragic hero and an attention-seeker. The man from _Le Monde Magique_ seemed inordinately focused on the fact that Cedric was a werewolf and whether the other champions were worried about their safety around him, and whether he would have an unfair advantage.

Harry supposed that Philomela Misslethorpe from _Witch Weekly_ was at least doing her job. She asked for things that young witches would care about like favourite colours and ideal dates (Harry decided to mess with her and said bird watching, but he suddenly realised that actually sounded like a pretty good date to his feline self.) and eventually got around to asking all four champions about their love lives. They didn’t appreciate that: Viktor had at least as much trouble with fan girls as Harry, Fleur was part-veela, and with Cedric being a werewolf, romance didn’t come easily to any of them.

To Harry’s amazement, the best reporter in the bunch turned out to be Luna. Sure, half of her questions were completely mad, but the other half were surprisingly insightful and relevant, and she was fair in asking them of all four champions. If she worked for a respectable—er, _mainstream_ —paper, she could probably become a great reporter. Dumbledore must have noticed, too, because he gave her the last question.

“My last question is for all of the Champions,” she said. “What do you plan to do with your prize money if you win?” It seemed odd that Philomela Misslethorpe had passed that one up, but Harry supposed none of the reporters had time to ask everything they wanted to.

“I vill donate vinnings to Yugoslav National Magic School,” Viktor said without hesitation. “I have friends there, and it is unfortunate that school suffers badly from its circumstances.”

Cedric sighed when Luna looked to him and said, “As you might imagine my expenses have been high lately. Even with the Cor Humanum Foundation supplying Wolfsbane Potion free of charge, it’s a hard life, being a werewolf. Winning the Tournament would pay for a lot of my costs and help me land on my feet when I graduate.”

“I will buy a few nice zings, for myself,” Fleur said. “Perhaps a dress or two and a new broom. And I will put some of it towards a mastery in Runes. But the rest I will put towards my sister, Gabrielle’s, tuition for Beauxbatons.”

“And Mr. Potter?” Luna asked.

“Eh, I’ll probably just give it away. I don’t need it, and I didn’t want to be in this tournament in the first place. I haven’t thought much about it, though…Maybe I’ll give it to the Cor Humanum Foundation,” he added with a grin. That would get the hardliners’ knickers in a twist.

“And on that note, that concludes our press conference,” Dumbledore said before anyone else could speak. “Thank you all for coming.” Some of the reporters shouted questions as the champions were led out, but no one answered them.

“So, Cho?” Harry said when they were out of earshot. “Really?”

“Yes. It was the day I entered in the Tournament. You said you didn’t have a problem with it,” Cedric replied.

“I don’t, but I didn’t know she’d come around so quickly on werewolves.”

“Well, I guess you really gave her something to think about over the summer.”

“Hello, Harry. Hello, Cedric,” Luna said, seeming to pop up out of nowhere and still wearing her purple press hat. “I thought that was a very good press conference.”

“Er, thanks, Luna,” Harry said. “I thought you were the best reporter there.”

“Why thank you Harry.” From anyone else, Luna would have questioned that, but she could tell Harry was sincere. “I always try to practice with Dad over the summers. Oh, and by the way, I do enjoy bird-watching, too.”

Harry turned and stared at her, but she just gave a slow blink, smiled at him, and skipped away. He shook his head, dismissed the thought. He already knew she liked unusual creatures—that was just Luna being Luna.


	95. Detective Work

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Obeying an inalienable law, things grew, growing riotous and strange in their impulse for JK Rowling.
> 
> Since there were several comments on this, I would like to clarify that Luna was not flirting with Harry at the end of the last chapter…or at least, not consciously flirting with him. That really was just Luna being Luna…But a lot can happen between now and Christmas…

_“Dragons?! Are you mad, Bagman? We’re trying to challenge the champions, not kill them!”_

* * *

_“I am heartened by Her Majesty’s interest, Mr. Barnett. However, I am afraid that I cannot spare my Pensieve from my investigation of young Harry’s entry in the Tournament. I will, however, put in a word for you at the Ministry to see if they will lend you one.”_

* * *

Harry was both relieved and frustrated when Hermione reported that David Monroe and Ludo Bagman both showed up on the Marauder’s Map as themselves. As far as they could tell, no one in the castle was being impersonated—at least not now. They couldn’t be certain about Halloween. It was hard when you couldn’t be absolutely certain of who was whom, even from day to day. They would certainly be using the Map again during the first task.

Now, if only they knew what the first task was.

Rita Skeeter’s article about the press conference came out on Monday, and it was even worse than Harry feared. No, it wasn’t unreasonable to summarise a long press conference for print, but what Skeeter did could hardly be called summarising:

 

_HARRY POTTER, UNEXPECTED CHAMPION, SPEAKS OUT ON LIFE AND LOVE IN THE TRIWIZARD TOURNAMENT_

_By Rita Skeeter_

_Harry Potter, suspect entrant into the Tetrawizard Tournament, spoke with the press Saturday at the traditional Weighing of the Wands Ceremony. Harry wore a determined expression as he spoke despite his obvious nervousness and told reporters that he was confident in making his way through the Tournament unscathed, in spite of his inexperience._

_A product of a tragic past of murder and abuse, Harry Potter was adopted at age five by the family of Hermione Granger, who is now known to Hogwarts as a brilliant and stunningly pretty muggle-born witch in Harry_ _’s year. By all accounts, Harry’s life with his new family has been good, barring occasional near-death experiences at Hogwarts that have no doubt strained their familial bonds._

_Now, at the tender age of fourteen, Harry has already experienced love and loss at Hogwarts. Last year, according to friends, he dated fellow Quidditch player and rival Seeker Cho Chang for some time before tragically breaking up at the end of the year. Miss Chang appears to prefer a wilder and more dangerous sort of wizard, for she is now dating Harry_ _’s rival champion, the werewolf Cedric Diggory, hiding their new relationship so that Harry first learnt about it at the Wand Weighing. But ever the gentleman, after his initial shock, Harry put on a brave face and gave the couple his blessing._

_As for whether any new romance is in the air, Harry was silent, but according to their classmates, Harry_ _’s and Hermione’s closest associate outside the family is fellow Gryffindor Neville Longbottom. No word yet on whether Neville and the lovely Hermione—or for that matter Neville and Harry—are anything more than friends._

 

When Harry, Hermione, and Neville read that, the three of them stared at each other with wide eyes. When Neville and Hermione made eye contact, they both rapidly turned bright red, which made Harry raise his eyebrow at them. However, when he and Neville made eye contact, they both grimaced as if they’d bit into something unpleasant.

“No offence, Nev, but you are _totally_ not my type,” Harry said.

Several girls around them giggled, and Harry glared at them.

“Same to you, Harry,” Neville said.

 

_After this, tears filled those startling green eyes as the topic of the conference turned to the birth parents he can barely remember—_

Harry failed to read any more of the article because at that point, he accidentally set the newspaper on fire.

“Well, we all know how bad Rita Skeeter is,” Neville observed, handing his copy to Hermione to read. “No one who matters is going to believe this tripe.”

“We can hope.”

“Um…Harry?” Hermione said, pointing to the bottom of the article. “I think you’d better take a look at this.”

 

 _Harry refused all questions regarding his upcoming memoir,_ Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone _, saying that the press conference should be solely about the Tournament. However, a query at Flourish and Blotts revealed that he will be holding a book signing over Christmas holidays, at which some of the people_ _’s burning questions may be answered._

 

“What?! I didn’t agree to that!” Harry shouted.

“You didn’t?” Hermione said.

“No!”

“Hmm…I wonder—”

“Hermione!”

“I’m sorry, Harry. I’m not saying Rita Skeeter’s right, but she usually doesn’t say anything provably false. I think maybe we should check your contract to make sure you didn’t miss anything.”

Harry groaned and dropped his forehead to the table with a thud.

“Well, if you _do_ have to sit a book signing,” Neville said offhandedly, “only use your own quill, and make sure what you’re signing is an actual book. You don’t want to get roped into another contract by accident.”

Harry stood up: “Yep. That’s it. I’m going back to bed.”

Hermione grabbed his arm: “Calm down, Harry. We still have to get to class today.”

“And there’s a Duelling Club meeting tonight,” Neville reminded him.

 _With Malfoy and Company_ , Harry thought. “I wonder what it’s like to have a peaceful life.”

“Oh, please, Harry,” his sister teased. “That would last about two weeks with you.”

As soon as breakfast was over, Harry had to endure snide remarks about the article, mostly from Slytherins who relished in quoting it back to him—at least, he assumed they were quoting it back to him since he refused to read another word of it. Apparently, Rita Skeeter had made him out to be one of those brilliant, but troubled wizards whom witches gushed over for some inexplicable reason. He had a wild side—hence his participation in the Tournament—and his antics were a misguided effort to live up to his birth parents’ memory, or something like that. He also apparently still cried over them sometimes (which was technically true, but only when he visited their graves, and he most certainly hadn’t mentioned that at the press conference).

And if classes were bad, the Duelling Club was worse.

“Are you sure you’re up for this, Potter?” Malfoy sneered. “You sure you don’t need a hankie? It’s unbecoming to start crying in the middle of a duel.”

Harry made a show of rolling his eyes at the Slytherin. “You actually _read_ that rubbish, Malfoy?” he said. “You’re even thicker than I thought.”

Malfoy glared at him: “It’s a good thing we’re in a duelling club already, because you’re asking for it.”

“Oh? Did I miss the mark on that one? I’m sure I could come up with something better.”

“Harry!” Hermione whispered beside him.

“You know what, Potter, I think I _will_ face you tonight,” Malfoy said smugly.

“I thought you’d never ask,” Harry replied. Immediately, the Great Hall grew quieter. Malfoy usually didn’t want to risk losing to him except in the end-of-year tournament. A duel between him and Harry wasn’t something to be missed.

“Harry, don’t antagonise him,” Hermione chided.

“Mione, I’ve wanting to hex somebody all day. Let me have this.”

“Alright, alright,” Remus read the signs and brought the meeting to order before anything else could happen. “It looks like we’ve got an exhibition duel tonight: Draco Malfoy challenging Harry Potter. Take your places.”

The club gathered around as Harry and Malfoy stepped into the duelling wards. “Duel on three,” Remus said. “One…two…three!”

Chaos reigned on the duelling platform as hexes and curses bounced against shield charms and lit the Hall in flashes of colour. Malfoy had definitely improved since last spring. He wouldn’t have taken his loss lying down, and Harry didn’t think his snake-conjuring trick would work again. But he had improved, too, and he was putting in extra effort for the Tournament. It was a hard fought duel worthy of some of the sixth-years, and the audience watched in awe.

But after the day he’d had, Harry really just wanted to see Malfoy faceplant on the duelling carpet. Unfortunately, it wasn’t as easy as it used to be. As the wandless spells got harder to cast, by now, Malfoy could parry most of the wandless magic Harry could throw at him…emphasis on _most_. Harry _had_ got silent, wandless summoning to work. Occupying Malfoy as best he could with his wand hand, he reached out with his empty left hand and thought as hard as he could, _Accio necktie!_

The Summoning Charm didn’t work on most living things, but that was no great obstacle. Slipping past Malfoy’s shield with careful timing, Harry yanked the blond boy forward. Unfortunately, Malfoy reacted to this in precisely the wrong way.

_“Depulso!”_

It sounded good at first glance, but with Harry pulling and Malfoy pushing, both of them flew through the air, accelerating out of control until they flew out the back of the wards and landed in a heap on the floor of the Great Hall.

“OW! Get your foot out my face, Malfoy!”

“Get your face off my foot, Potter! And that was my win. You went out of the wards first.”

“No way!” Harry said. “You crashed into me before I hit the ground. That was no-contact rule.”

“In your dreams, Potter.”

“Ahem!” Remus interrupted, stepping forward to help the duellists to their feet. “Actually, that was called the Diametric Spell Effect. It’s considered a draw under international rules.”

“Ooooo…” some of the onlookers said.

Both Harry and Malfoy raised their eyebrows and stared at each other, their undeclared dispute now technically unresolved. This was getting complicated.

Draco decided that discretion was the better part of valour in this instance. He had enough on his plate already. “Well,” he said, choosing his words carefully so that they couldn’t be directly challenged, “at least _I_ can make it through my day without crying.”

Potter hissed, but he knew he didn’t have any recourse there. Fortunately, he had an ace up his sleeve from talking with Luna yesterday: “Malfoy, I’ll have you know that _The Quibbler_ will be printing the full transcript of the press conference in its December issue, and I will _personally_ vouch for its accuracy.”

Draco stopped. That was a bold move, tying his reputation to a magazine that most people thought was a laughingstock, even if it _had_ produced some well-supported material over the past couple years. This merited further investigation. “Oh, really?” he said. “I didn’t think they’d go for something like that. Did you put your girlfriend up to that, Potter? What happened to the stuff about Cacky Snorglers?” He glanced over to where Lovegood had started up a duel with Lucretia Marquand.

“One, she’s not my girlfriend. Two, it’s Crumple-Horned Snorkacks. And three, Luna told me that Mr. Lovegood is pushing back his latest creature feature to January.”

Draco laughed. Potter was actually serious about this. “That’s not even the point. You’re standing up for that rag? You’re even thicker than I thought.” He was pushing it a bit, but the ironic echo was too good to pass up. He suddenly felt eyes on him, though. He looked back at Lovegood. Her creepy silver eyes seemed to be boring into him. She looked offended. He wasn’t sure he’d ever seen anything but that weird carefree look on her face before. Lucretia Marquand was now hopping around with bunny ears.

“That’s really unkind, Mr. Malfoy,” Potter said.

Draco didn’t miss the false politeness and the hard look on his face. “How is that, Mr. Potter?”

“ _The Quibbler_ is pretty much the only alternative voice to the _Daily Prophet_ ,” Potter said. “That alone warrants attention. And it may not look like much, but Mr. Lovegood has been trying to position _The Quibbler_ as an alternative voice on matters people are interested in. My family’s been pushing him to do that for the past couple years because we think there’s a need for such a thing. So it’s not surprising he’s putting a lot of coverage on the Tournament. And finally, while _The Quibbler_ prints a lot of unorthodox ideas, they _always_ confirm their sources.”

Draco saw Lovegood smile at Potter, and he strongly suspected that she’d fed him that line herself. “Really? A reputable _Quibbler_?” he said. “I’ll believe it when I see it.” Potter still glared, but he let it go at that.

* * *

Thursday night was the full moon, and Friday morning saw three of the castle’s four werewolves stumbling sore and bleary-eyed up from the Shrieking Shack. By breakfast, they were sitting up in the infirmary, and in what was fast becoming a routine, two Gryffindor first-years climbed up to visit directly afterwards.

Dennis Creevey, who still thought having a brother who was a werewolf was “cool” on some level, despite all the problems that came with it, went to the bedside of a very patient Colin to hear how his night had been. He still seemed disappointed that Colin wasn’t having adventures like Professor Lupin had done when he was a student.

Natalie McDonald, on the other hand, knew full well how much her new best friend was hurting. Being the only muggle-born in her crowded dorm room, she was the only girl in first year who really befriended Demelza. The others tolerated her, but none of them wanted to take the top bunk in her bed, so Natalie and Demelza had been thick as thieves since school started, despite a bit of initial friction. They made an odd pair. Natalie was a small, bookish girl who wanted to learn everything she could about magic, but wasn’t particularly comfortable on a broom. Demelza was jaded by the dark side of magic and had an aggressive streak that probably came from her lycanthropy. And despite her limp and her sickly appearance, she was a right demon in the air.

But this morning, she wasn’t here.

“Madam Pomfrey, where’s Demelza?” Natalie asked, seeing the empty bed.

Madam Pomfrey looked over from working on Professor Lupin. “Her parents haven’t brought her in today, Miss McDonald,” she said.

“They haven’t?” she said worriedly. “She’s been here the last two months. Is she alright? Did something happen to her?”

“I haven’t heard anything,” Lupin said hoarsely. “I’d guess she isn’t feeling well, and her mum and dad wanted her to rest at home.”

“But that hasn’t happened before!” Natalie squeaked. “Did something go wrong?”

“Please calm down, Miss McDonald,” Madam Pomfrey cut her off. “It’s heartening to see that Miss Robins has such good friends, given her condition, but I’m sure she is fine. Some months are harder than others is all, especially as winter’s setting in. If you’re truly worried about your friend, Professor McGonagall will probably have been informed by now.”

“Oh, of course! They would’ve had to tell her. Thanks, Madam Pomfrey!” Natalie ran out of the infirmary to see her head of house, leaving the Mediwitch shaking her head after the overexcited girl.

Unfortunately for Natalie, all Professor McGonagall would tell her was that Demelza was resting at home and would be back tomorrow, and she advised her to collect all her homework assignments from their classes—which Natalie was of course going to do anyway. It certainly didn’t stop her from worrying about her friend, though.

On Saturday morning, her dorm room once again felt too crowded, and Natalie found herself, as she often did, in the solitude of the clock tower, playing a melancholy song on her violin. It wasn’t that she was a very melancholy person. It was just this place: her crowded dorm room contrasted with the emptiness of the rest of the school, the soft ticking of the clock gears echoing off the walls. It seemed fitting here.

She was just working her way through one of the slower Mozart arrangements in her sheet music book when she saw Demelza coming in through the courtyard, supported by a woman she assumed was her mother. Demelza was walking with a crutch.

Natalie slammed her music book shut and ran down to the entrance, violin in hand.

“Demelza!” she cried. “I missed you yesterday. Are you alright? What happened to your leg?”

Demelza blinked as her friend wrapped her free arm around her shoulders. “Um…hi, Natalie,” she said in a voice that sounded wearier than usual. “Uh, Mum, this is my friend, Natalie. Natalie, this is Mum.”

“Oh, I’m sorry! How rude of me. Hello, Mrs. Robins. It’s a pleasure to meet you,” she said.

Mrs. Robins was signing Demelza back in with Professor McGonagall. She stopped to shake Natalie’s hand. “It’s good to meet you, too,” she said. “Demelza’s told us all about you. We’re very glad she made a friend so quickly.”

“I was worried about you, you know,” Natalie told Demelza, adjusting her square glasses on her nose. “What happened?”

“Oh, that…I sprained my bad ankle. I couldn’t walk yesterday.”

“You did? I thought that Wolfsbane Potion stopped you from hurting yourself.”

“It does. It was the actual transformation that did it. Professor Lupin says that happens sometimes. It takes longer to heal when that happens…or at least heal back to where it normally is. I’ll need the crutch for a couple more days.”

“Do you want to see Madam Pomfrey, Miss Robins?” McGonagall asked.

“NO!” Demelza yelled a little too loud. After a brief pause, she said, “Excuse me, Professor, but you know she’ll keep me in there all day for no reason. If I have to lie around all day, I’d rather do it in Gryffindor Tower.”

McGonagall pressed her lips together, but she conceded the point: “Well, then, if it really is only your ankle, I can allow it. But if it causes you to miss class on Monday, we’ll have to talk. Miss McDonald, if you wouldn’t mind helping Miss Robins up to your dorms?”

“Of course, Professor.” Natalie helped support Demelza’s free arm and led her to the nearest stairs, her crutch clicking on the floor as they went. “You know, this place isn’t very handicap-friendly,” she mused as they reached the stairs. “What do they do for people who can’t walk at all?”

“Are there a lot of muggles who can’t?” Demelza asked. “Most wizards can use magical leg braces that help them walk if they need it—unless they’re really sick in hospital or something. I don’t have one because I don’t really need it except on days like today.”

“Oh.”

Demelza looked over at the violin that was still clutched in Natalie’s hand, and the music book tucked under her arm. “How’s your music going?” she asked.

Natalie smiled: “Not bad. It helps me relax. I’m learning an arrangement of a Mozart violin concerto. I can play it for you if you want.”

Demelza had only a vague idea of what some of those words meant, but she did appreciate good music. “Yeah, I’d like that,” she said with a small grin. After a year living as a werewolf, she reflected how lucky she was to have not just the support of Harry Potter, but also a close friend who really cared about her. All in all, this year wasn’t going too badly.

* * *

Harry and Hermione took a day off for a pleasant Hogsmeade visit on Saturday—as pleasant as it could be with all the Hogsmeade residents having read Rita Skeeter’s article that week, anyway. Still, it was largely uneventful for a change. But they were back to work on Sunday, for that was the day that Dumbledore called them in to start looking over memories.

“I would like to take another look at your notes on your dream to refresh my memory, Harry,” Dumbledore began.

“And I never heard the story firsthand,” Remus said. “I was sleeping off the pain that day.”

“I know; I remember,” Harry said. He handed them his handwritten notes about the vision he had experienced last summer. He remembered it all too well, at least the part he had managed to put on the page. It would have been so much easier if they could just use the Pensieve to view it directly, but alas, it didn’t work on dreams.

“I believe we can begin narrowing things down from your descriptions,” Dumbledore said after he read the notes. “You saw the old man, of course—the victim. And you saw three Death Eaters—a man and two women.”

“That’s right, Professor,” Harry said.

“Now that’s unusual,” Remus said. “Voldemort never had that many female followers. Of course, some of them could have been Imperiused.”

“I don’t know,” he replied. “I know it’s hard to detect, but none of them really sounded like they were being controlled.”

“I know your instincts are good, Harry, but we shouldn’t count anything out,” Hermione reminded him.

“Agreed,” Dumbledore said. “And you also believe there were others present whom you did _not_ see?”

“I think so. I can’t remember exactly what they said. They mentioned some of their names, but I don’t remember any of them. I just think it was more than those three.”

“You _did_ hear a wolf howl?” Remus asked.

“Yeah. I mean, I’m pretty sure it was a wolf and not a dog.”

“Which in Britain would almost certainly mean a werewolf—if it _was_ in Britain.”

“The old man was British, so it probably was.”

Dumbledore nodded: “I think that is also likely. Now, there are two more potential players. You mentioned an elf?”

“Yeah, but I only heard it. I didn’t see it. I’m not even sure if it was male or female.”

“I see. What about the snake?”

“It was like a python, but with fangs. Or maybe a giant viper or something. It wasn’t a basilisk. It was the wrong colour. But it couldn’t have been a mundane snake, either.”

The Headmaster stroked his beard thoughtfully. “Most curious…” he mused.

“It’s not much to go on, Albus,” Remus said.

“No, Remus, but sadly, it is all we have. We must focus on these three Death Eaters. Can you tell us any more about them, Harry? Any small detail may be critical.”

Harry shrugged. “Not much more than I wrote down, sir. One of the women was tall and fancy-dressed…middle-aged, black hair. She had a foreign accent, too—maybe Spanish or something. And she acted like she was better than the other two. Her tone of voice—it was like she was in charge.”

“She couldn’t have been in charge too much,” Remus said. “Voldemort doesn’t share power.”

“If she was a foreigner, couldn’t she be some kind of ally from overseas,” Hermione suggested. “We know there are other dark lords in the world.”

Dumbledore’s eyes suddenly widened as if something had jogged his memory. “My word,” he whispered, “I should have made the connection before.”

“What’s that?” Remus said.

“My boy, I fear I have made a rather serious omission with you,” he said.

Remus, Harry, and Hermione instantly became wary. That was too much of the Headmaster’s old habit for their liking. “How’s that, Albus?” Remus demanded.

“I have not told you my full reasons for believing that Voldemort is planning his imminent return.”

Remus relaxed, but only a little: “You said you were hearing rumours from a lot of quarters,” he suggested cautiously.

“I have indeed, but there is one particular item that I failed until now to connect with Harry’s vision…” Maybe they were right, he thought to himself. Maybe he _was_ getting too old for this. He felt like he was losing his edge lately, what with Harry being entered in the Tournament and now this. “Last year, at New Year’s, Professor Trelawney made another prophecy.”

“She did?!” Harry and Hermione gasped in unison.

“Oh, that’s right, she did,” Remus said.

“You knew?!” the teens shouted.

“I’m sorry, I thought you knew, too. The Headmaster mentioned it to me in passing, but he said it didn’t tell him anything he didn’t already know.” He shot Dumbledore a questioning look.

“And I thought it didn’t,” the old wizard said, “but given Hermione’s suggestion, I fear I have misinterpreted it.” He rose from his seat and began riffling through the phials he had stored in the cabinet where the Pensieve was housed. He found the one he was looking for and brought it to the basin. “It was Professor McGonagall who witnessed the prophecy, and while she does not put much stock in divination herself, she dutifully reported it to me and gave me a copy. It would be simplest if I showed you.” He tapped a rune with his wand, and the ghostly image of Professor Trelawney rose from the surface, speaking in a raspy voice:

 

“ _The Dark Lord lies alone and friendless, but his followers have not abandoned him. Even now, they seek him. Tonight, before midnight, master and servants shall be united once more. The Dark Lord will rise again by the magic of a distant land, greater and more terrible than ever he was, bringing horrors from all corners of the world. Tonight, before midnight, master and servants will be reunited and begin their quest_!”

 

For a minute or so, the only sound in Dumbledore’s office was that of his constantly twittering devices. It was Hermione who spoke first, making the connection at once. “The foreign witch,” she said simply.

“Yes, I believe so,” Dumbledore agreed.

“And you didn’t think of this before?” Remus pressed him.

“Unfortunately not. Voldemort travelled far and wide in his youth in search of new forms of dark magic. I thought the prophecy merely meant he would use some spell or ritual he learnt overseas. I did not expect him to bring an ally. It is not in his nature.”

“It would be if he’s desperate—if he’s a wandering spirit.”

“So now Voldemort’s got an ally who can get away with talking back to him,” Harry summarised. “Could this get any worse?”

“Harry, don’t jinx it,” Hermione chided. “It definitely could.”

“Wait, what do you mean? That was rhetorical!”

“But it could,” she insisted. “For example, if Voldemort has one ally, then ‘bringing horrors from all corners of the world’ could point to more.”

Everyone in the room shuddered. That was a horror on par with Grindelwald’s War—something too ghastly to contemplate.

“This is very worrying…” Dumbledore finally said. He seemed lost in thought for another minute before he continued, “Remus, I think it would be advisable to begin contacting the old crowd now.” Harry and Hermione looked between the two men as Remus sat up straighter as if he’d been given a call to arms. “Please inform Sirius and Miss McKinnon and begin searching for possible candidates sympathetic to our cause. I will begin my own work.”

“What about the werewolves?” he asked.

“Greyback’s capture and Sirius’s foundation are already doing more than we ever accomplished in the last war. Continue along those lines.”

“Professor, what’s going on?” Hermione said nervously.

“Preparation,” Dumbledore said. “If Voldemort has allies now, things have become more complicated than merely hoping to finish him before he can regain his strength. Not to mention that we still don’t know where the other two horcruxes are. I think we should cut our investigation short for the day, but first, allow me to explore a hunch. Harry, what was your assessment of the other two Death Eaters?”

Harry blinked a couple times at being brought back into the conversation. Things seemed to be getting away from him very quickly. “They were a man and a woman,” he recalled. “They were both short and lumpy-looking, kind of ugly. They didn’t seem too bright, and they both had kind of a wheezy cockney accent.”

Remus stiffened again: “That sounds familiar.”

“It does?”

“Indeed it does,” Dumbledore agreed. “I don’t think we shall need the memories for this pair. Harry, are these the Death Eaters you saw?” He handed him two photos, one of a man with a lopsided, pig-like face, and the other a women with a pinched sneer and orange hair pulled back tight.

“Yes! That’s them! Who are they?”

“As I suspected—Amycus and Alecto Carrow. Two suspected Death Eaters who were acquitted on the (I believe misguided) word of their more respectable brother, Anteros. And who have been wandering the world under suspicious circumstances for most of the past two and a half years. It seems they have rejoined their old master, as Professor Trelawney said.”

“But there’s no way the Carrows are smart enough to pull off an operation like this,” Remus objected. “They were always just muscle.”

Dumbledore nodded: “Yes, I believe the perpetrator here would have to be the unknown person or persons whom Harry did not see in his vision. We will have to fall back on our alternative of examining Professor Moody’s memories of those who approached the Goblet. But that is a matter for another time. We now have rather more pressing matters to deal with.”

* * *

Ratsbane slunk down to Hagrid’s hut at midnight, the white mark on his head covered up with ink so that he could have been any black cat in the castle, almost invisible in the night. Hagrid had requested he bring his invisibility cloak when he and Professor Moody had caught up with him before dinner, but despite Hermione’s reservations, he had decided that going in cat form instead would be better because of his sharper night vision and sense of smell. The first task was in two days, and Hagrid had all but come out and said that this was about the task, so he didn’t want to miss anything. He’d already alerted his family to be ready for a mirror call afterwards.

Changing back to human form, Harry knocked on Hagrid’s door, hoping that Fang was asleep. He must have been because there was no torrent of barking. Hagrid softly pushed the door open.

“You there, Harry?” the huge man whispered.

“Right here, Hagrid.”

“Good—er, what’s with the hat?” he asked when he saw him.

Harry was wearing a stocking cap to cover the ink on his forehead. “It’s a cold night tonight,” he said.

“Ah. Got yer cloak?”

Harry grinned: “You won’t even know I’m here.”

“Good. Keep close, then. Yer gonna want to see this.”

Harry ducked around the corner of the house and changed back to cat form, following Hagrid at a safe distance. With his feline senses, he immediately caught on to something strange about Hagrid. Actually, Hagrid had been different all year, and tonight was no exception. He had attempted to comb his hair and was dressed up, at least by his standards. He also smelled of artichokes and burnt meat (the latter was probably from the Skrewts). And now, he was speaking to Madame Maxime with perhaps the most atrocious French accent Harry had ever heard.

So Hagrid was on a date. And the poor bloke was completely clueless. He meant so well, but he just didn’t have the street smarts when it didn’t come to dangerous creatures.

And more importantly, Madame Maxime was here! So Harry was most definitely not the only one cheating. As Ratsbane, he followed the large couple around the grounds and a short way into the forest. He became even more wary then, as he sensed the strange presences in the trees—and they weren’t just the creatures he expected to find out there. There were voices up ahead, along with the sounds of various animals, and exotic and unfamiliar scents wafting on the breeze. Someone had been busy importing _something_. He crept closer to find out what.

Ratsbane was startled to see several groups of witches and wizards from different parts of the world as he squinted into the firelight. Some looked European, but a large group of them were in African garb and another group was from somewhere in East Asia, and they were all wrangling large crates filled with squawking and screeching creatures. More from watching nature documentaries at home than anything else, he could pick out sounds of apes, exotic birds, and, oddly, pigs—or so he thought—and the smells seemed to support this. There was also a stack of trees bagged for transplanting. It wasn’t until he saw an African witch pulling on a rope that didn’t seem to be attached to anything that he realised that there was (literally) more to this than met the eye.

“Quite a selection yeh’ve got here,” Hagrid said to one of the African wizards.

The wizard replied with something like a French accent, but Ratsbane didn’t know what country he might be from: “ _Oui, monsier._ I feel sorry for ze kids zat will have to get through zis. Ze tebo alone will be a problem.”

Tebo—that was a clue. Now that he looked closer, Ratsbane could see animals that looked more or less like warthogs except that they kept blinking in and out of view in the flickering light. Warthogs that could turn invisible—natives of Congo and Zaire—and Class Four-X creatures to boot. It looked like the first task really would be a challenge.

Madame Maxime seized the opportunity at once and lapsed into French, taking advantage of Hagrid’s poor knowledge of the language to gather intelligence. _“How many did you bring, Monsieur?”_ she asked.

 _“Twenty adults, Madame,”_ the African wizard said, and Ratsbane had never been happier that he knew French, and that the man apparently had no idea that Madame Maxime wasn’t supposed to be there. _“And it wasn’t easy, let me tell you. They’re territorial with all the piglets. But it was the least we could do for Messieurs Dumbledore and Grayson after they defeated the Dark Lord of the East.”_

Several of the handlers very carefully drove two of the sows and their piglets across the clearing. Adults and piglets alike were on leashes. _“Keep hold of them,”_ one of the handlers said. _“If any of them get away, we’ll never find them again!”_

“Well, the littl’uns are cute, aren’ they?” Hagrid said cluelessly. “Eh…when yeh can see ‘em.”

“Yes, very cute, ‘Agrid,” Madame Maxime said sweetly. “Shall we see what ozzer animals are ‘ere?”

 _Yes, let_ _’s_ , Ratsbane thought, but at that moment, he heard a noise behind him. He turned around and saw a goateed wizard slinking through the trees. Karkaroff clearly thought he was trying to be sneaky, but by feline standards, he was failing miserably. Ratsbane darted around the next tree before he saw him and kept following Hagrid.

Another batch of African wizards was trying to control a large flock of flightless birds that looked like balls of feathers about three feet high. Ratsbane knew these animals well, even without magic: dodos. But the magical world knew them as diricawls. He had no idea how they were keeping them from escaping, since they could teleport like phoenixes, but they seemed to be doing a good job.

The European wizards were having the most trouble. They had surrounded a stand of trees and were standing perfectly still, staring seemingly at nothing. Ratsbane could only see dim outlines of something lurking here.

“What’s goin’ on here?” Hagrid asked, but he was immediately shushed by the nearest wizard.

“Shh…No sudden movements,” he said. “Everyone clear yet?”

Most of the wizards had their wands aimed into the stand of trees. Two seemed to be searching for something, motioning silently.

“Got one,” one of them said, aiming his wand.

“Got the last one,” the other said.

“Good. Stunners…now!”

Twelve voices roared, _“Stupefy!”_ and twelve subhuman shapes fell unconscious from the trees, suddenly becoming visible. The wizards quickly ran in and grabbed them.

“Phew, that was close,” the lead handler said. “Those chameleon ghouls are trouble, especially in groups.”

“Aye,” Hagrid agreed. “I’ve had to deal with a few o’ them in my time. Looks like it’s shaping up to be a tough task.”

“Oh, you haven’t seen the hardest part yet,” the handler said with a grin. “They’re with the Vietnamese folks.”

Chameleon ghouls. Almost invisible when they weren’t moving. Ratsbane was starting to sense a theme here, and at the mention of Vietnam, he had a hunch as to what the last piece was, which was soon confirmed when Hagrid led him to the last group of wizards, who were surrounding a troop of apes that looked much like orangutans except for their long, luxurious, silver fur—and the fact that they kept fading in and out of visibility. In the centre of the circle, and elderly Vietnamese witch was interacting with the apes with a crude sign language like a magical Jane Goodall.

“Hold!” the witch said when she saw them, holding up her hand. She stepped out of circle and approached them. “Don’t come any closer,” she said firmly. “I don’t need you spooking them.”

Madame Maxime seemed to recognise the woman because she bowed to her in the Oriental fashion and said, “Pardon. Madame Thanh, I heard a rumour zat you were ‘ere. Eet ees an honour to meet you.”

“I see my reputation precedes me,” Madam Thanh said. _“You are the Beauxbatons Headmistress, are you not?”_ she added in French.

_“Oui, Madame. You have brought a troop of demiguises for the task, I see?”_

_“Naturally. Although I’m doing this mostly as a favour to Dumbledore. I do hope the Champions will be scored on retrieving the fan without hurting them?”_

_“Of course, we wouldn’t want such rare and majestic creatures to come to harm,”_ Maxime said. _“Excuse me, but “the fan’?”_

Now _this_ was getting somewhere. She was telling the whole task. Madam Thanh reached into her robes and withdrew a rod roughly the size and shape of a runner’s baton, which unfurled into something like an over-size Japanese fan, except made of metal. _“Each of the champions must retrieve one of these from the demiguises,”_ she said. _“Those trees will be planted in the middle of the Quidditch pitch.”_ She pointed to the stack of transplanted trees, and Ratsbane winced. He didn’t appreciated them messing with the pitch. _“I’m instructing the demiguises to stay in the trees while—”_

“Excuse me, Madam Thanh,” a gruff voice interrupted, and a wizard in a broad-brimmed hat approached. It was David Monroe. “We don’t want to be giving away too much of this task. Madame Maxime, I don’t believe you’re supposed to be out here.”

“And are you, Monsieur Monroe?” she countered.

“I’m Head of International Magical Cooperation. I’m organising this task. You, however, are a potentially biased school judge…” He looked past her. “You, too, Karkaroff! I see you back there, snake!” he yelled with surprising vitriol. Ratsbane heard Karkaroff take off running.

“I apologise for zee intrusion,” Maxime said, not sounding sorry at all. “Zis ‘as been a lovely walk, Monsieur ‘Agrid, but I must return to my carriage.”

“Oh. Well. Er, see you in the mornin,” then,” Hagrid stuttered. “Bone New-eat.”

Madame Maxime left, and Monroe said, “And you, Mr. Hagrid? You’re the one who brought her out here?”

“Just wanted to show her the interestin’ critters.”

Monroe stared Hagrid down as if he was trying to read his mind. “Well, then, I think you should leave the…er, _critters_ until after the task.”

Ratsbane didn’t wait to hear the rest. Hagrid would understand that he would want to get out of there before he was caught. He easily sneaked back into the castle and up to Gryffindor Tower, where Hermione was waiting for him.

“It’s about time,” she told him. “Did you find out anything useful?”

“Jackpot,” Harry said, cleaning the ink off his forehead. “Get your mirror. We need to plan.”


	96. Preparations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: JK Rowling propped it up, at least gave it the illusion of being there...the way all reality becomes illusory and observer-oriented when you study Harry Potter. Or Buddhism. Or write fan fiction.
> 
> Well, this was one of those chapters that just kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger, and I was running out of time to get it done on schedule, so I had to cut it off before the actual task. Sorry. But at least you’ll get some action right at the start of the next chapter.

_“Well, you given me this list, Mr. Fudge, but I don’t recognise what some of these creatures are. I’m glad to see there aren’t any dragons or anything like that on it, but I’d like to know what you’re actually bringing into the country.”_

_“…Oh, very well. I have time. You see, a demiguise is…”_

* * *

“My Lord, I have done as you asked,” Barty said as he stood before Voldemort in Riddle Manor. “Potter knows what he must do in the first task…However, I do not know whether he has a viable plan to complete it.”

“That is unimportant, Barty,” Voldemort said calmly. “Potter does not need to win either of the first two tasks for our plan to work. He merely has to show up and survive, and now that he knows, I’m sure that is within even his pitiful means with Dumbledore and Black pulling his strings. Only the third task is important.”

“Of course, my Lord.”

“And now, perhaps we should be introduced to your travelling companion,” Voldemort said with a sneer. Even with his crippled, infantile form, the man beside Barty trembled. “You’re not an easy man to find, Gaius Avery. You have a talent for worming your way out of trouble. Ah, but you are surprised. Did you doubt that I would one day return?”

“Master!” Avery cried, falling on his knees. “Master, forgive me!”

_“Crucio!”_

“Get up, Avery,” Voldemort said when the man had stopped screaming. “Lord Voldemort does not forgive. Lord Voldemort does not forget. You abandoned me for thirteen years, and I demand thirteen years’ labour to cancel this betrayal. Amycus and Alecto have already repaid two years of their debt—and that of their own free will, while young Barty was prevented from returning to me until a year ago. He alone of the Death Eaters outside Azkaban is blameless. _You_ , Avery, have much reparation to make.”

“I will do whatever you ask, Master,” Avery said shakily, bowing low before him.

“Good. I’m sure you will. Your first task is to approach your friend Mulciber’s father and bring him before me. He has much to answer for, blaming all of his crimes on his own son. Do so without arousing any suspicion from his associates—or yours. Since you are out of practice, and I am at my leisure, you will have one month to complete this task. Be thankful for small mercies.”

“Yes, Master. Thank you, Master,” Avery said.

“You are dismissed.”

Avery bowed and walked out of the room.

“Good help is so hard to find these days, isn’t it?” La Pantera said. The Mexican dark witch had grown increasingly amused with each grovelling follower Voldemort had dragged back to his court, and Avery’s performance was particularly entertaining.

Voldemort hissed softly in his chair. “Most wizards have grown weak with the centuries,” he said. “Even those who have kept their blood pure have been contaminated by the culture. It is not surprising that three fourths of my followers ran scared at the first sign of trouble.”

“Ha! This never would’ve happened if you’d started a religious movement, you know. _They_ know how to stay loyal.”

“I know perfectly well how to manipulate people, Lady Pantera,” he said testily. One of these days, he wouldn’t need her anymore, and then… “Unfortunately, muggle Christianity has stamped out the old religions too thoroughly to begin a Druidic revival. Why do you think I changed the name of the Knights of Walpurgis to the Death Eaters?”

Barty listened intently. This was a part of the Dark Lord’s history he had not heard from the older members. Strange how little he knew about how it had come about. What was it like for the founding members who knew the Dark Lord before he was Lord Voldemort?

“Barty,” the Dark Lord snapped him out of his thoughts, “you have done well. You may spend the rest of the night with your…cousin, and then return to your duties.”

“Thank you, my Lord.”

“And make sure Lucius isn’t procrastinating. Getting Mr. Yaxley and Lord Jugson back on our side is critical.”

Barty smirked. Meeting with that coward was always fun. “Of course, my Lord.” He turned to go.

“Barty!” La Pantera called. Voldemort stiffened at _his_ servant being addressed in such a familiar tone by another, but he held his tongue.

“Yes, Lady Pantera?” Barty replied.

“I want another Skrewt. A female this time. I want to study their sexual development. Winky, look into building another nest.”

Barty’s harried looking elf, now sporting several Skrewt-induced scars, looked to her master pleadingly, but all he said was “It will be done, Lady Pantera,” after stealing a glance at Voldemort, who nodded his assent. He grimaced at the thought of trying to get those monstrosities to mate, but silently took his leave.

“I hope your studies have been productive, Lady Pantera,” Voldemort said dryly.

“ _Muy buena_ ,” she said smugly. “They’ll make excellent guardians with a few rituals. More manageable than the manticore parent with the same predilection to eat everything that moves, and the protective carapace from the fire crab parent will lend spell resistance and resistance to unconventional attacks like potions. If they grow as big as a manticore, which I think they will, they should rate Class Five-X.”

“Well, as amusing it would be if they finally finished that oaf Hagrid off, what about your work on the ritual I contracted you for?”

“Keep your pants on, Voldemort. We’re already ahead of schedule. I told you we wouldn’t need the whole year to do this. The only hard part will be capturing the unicorn. Anyway, I’ve got a surprise for you when it’s ready.”

His eyes narrowed at her: “Do I look like a wizard who likes surprises?”

“You don’t look like _un mago_ at all. And do I look like _una bruja_ who cares? Trust me, you’ll like this. Consider it a bonus for bringing me the Skrewts.”

“Hmm…If your _surprise_ causes the ritual to fail, the consequences will be _most_ severe.”

“With the followers I’ve seen? I doubt it, but the point is moot. La Pantera does _not_ fail.”

* * *

Harry was wide awake on Thursday morning despite not getting much sleep. After the excitement of last night, he was sure to be up and alert. Neither Fleur nor Viktor was sitting with him at breakfast this morning, for which he was grateful. He strongly suspected they were being briefed by their respective Heads about the task. Hogwart’s stricter contract with the Ministry as the host institution was really hampering its own champions—and Harry wasn’t even a champion for Hogwarts!

Still, he thought his plan would work, even if his family was less than enthused. It was just a matter of waiting and watching how the trees were set up on the Quidditch pitch to iron out the details. It wasn’t until halfway through breakfast that Harry realised they had a problem.

“Oh no,” he said.

“What is it?” Hermione said worriedly.

“Moody.”

“What about him.”

“Hermione,” he hissed, “Professor All-Seeing-Eye Moody?”

Her eyes widened as she made the connection: “Oh no. Harry, your plan! What are you going do?”

“I don’t know…” He thought for a minute. “I don’t know, maybe we should just tell him ahead of time and save the trouble.”

“Harry! Mum and Dad said you can’t!”

“I know, but—” He looked around and noticed their fellow Gryffindors staring at them. “After breakfast,” he said.

Hermione held him to that, of course, and as soon as they were alone before their first class, he told her his reasoning: “I think if we explain the situation to Mum and Dad, they’ll understand. This is still the best plan I’ve got. It’s this, or I try to muddle through with detection spells and hope I don’t get trampled. And besides, if there’s one person in this school who can keep a secret, it’s Moody.”

“Are you sure about that? He _is_ still the Defence Professor.”

“Yeah, but Dumbledore trusts him.”

“True…we definitely need to ask Mum and Dad first, though—and we should probably ask Dumbledore, too.”

“Yeah, we can do that,” Harry agreed.

“And we should double check the Marauder’s Map to make sure it’s really him. There’s still a possible impostor lurking about.”

“Good idea,” Harry said. He shivered a bit. “I think he’s rubbing off on us, Mione. We’re getting almost as paranoid as he is.”

Hermione chuckled nervously: “Right now, that’s not looking like such a bad thing…Oh, why does this always happen to you?” Without warning, she lunged forward and hugged her brother.

“Ack! Mione, calm down. It’s not that bad,” Harry said, patting her on the back.

She blushed and pulled away. “Sorry, it’s just that this Tournament’s got me so on edge. And I still don’t like this plan, even if it’s the best you’ve got.”

“Don’t worry, sis. It’ll be alright.”

Harry wished he were as confident as he tried to sound, though, and just after lunch, he noticed a second problem. Luckily, this one was an easy fix.

“Cedric, could I speak with you privately?” Harry asked when Cedric’s house mates had mostly scattered for their free period.

“Sure, Harry,” Cedric said. They quickly removed themselves to the nearest empty classroom. “What is it?”

“I know what the first task is.”

“Ahh…” Cedric replied, frowning. “I’m surprised you’re telling me that, frankly. And it’s considerate of you, but I was planning on doing the Tetrawizard Tournament without cheating, so…” He turned to go.

“Fleur and Viktor already know,” Harry blurted.

Cedric stopped. “They do?”

“Maxime and Karkaroff were both there last night. They’ll know by now. If I tell you, we’ll be all square.”

The older boy considered this. He would be walking into the task at a distinct disadvantage as it was now. It was technically cheating, but it twinged his innate sense of fairness. “Alright, what is it?” he said at last.

“Tebo,” Harry said. “A bunch of them—twenty adults plus piglets.”

“Oh,” he replied. “That sounds…tough.”

“There’s more. Diricawls, chameleon ghouls, and demiguises.”

“All things that can disappear,” Cedric reasoned. “And two of them are Class Four-X.” That would challenge any magic user. “What do we have to do with them?”

“We have to get past them. They’re gonna plant a stand of trees on the Quidditch pitch—” Cedric grimaced. “Yeah, I know,” Harry said. “Tearing up _our_ Quidditch pitch like that. But they’re gonna set all the animals loose there, and the demiguises will have this thing that looks kind of like a Japanese fan—one for each of us—and we have to take it from them.”

“Hm…That won’t be easy,” Cedric replied. “Demiguises are almost impossible to detect if they don’t want to be seen. Do you think you’re up for it?”

“I have a plan. I worked it out with my godfather last night. I think it’ll work. Are _you_ up for it, though?”

“I can probably think of something. Thank you for telling me Harry. You didn’t have to do that.”

“Sure I did. It’s only fair.”

“Well, good luck, then, Harry.”

“Thanks. You too.”

* * *

On Friday, Harry spent practically his whole day outside of classes and meals in the library, but he wasn’t reading books. He was sitting at the back window watching the Quidditch Pitch with his Omnioculars as the builders planted the miniature forest for the first task. He knew David Monroe and the other organizers probably wouldn’t let him near the pitch, but there was nothing to stop him from examining their work from a distance. He even took notes, marking as best he could the location of each tree as they planted it and estimating the lines of sight. He wasn’t leaving anything to chance today.

Madam Pince was not amused.

“And just what do you think you’re doing?” the dour librarian demanded when she spotted him.

“Watching the Quidditch pitch,” Harry said.

“In _my_ library?”

Harry looked up at her: “I’m not disrupting anything, am I, ma’am? It’s just that I need to prepare for the task tomorrow, and this is the best view of the Quidditch pitch in the castle.”

Madam Pince still looked sceptical.

“You know, Madam Pince,” he said, “since I’m watching the creatures they’re using out there, technically, I’m studying for Care of Magical Creatures, too.”

Madam Pince walked away with a “Hmph!,” but she couldn’t pin any rule-breaking on him, so there was nothing she could do.

It was strangely fascinating watching the animals as the handlers brought them in. Harry’s predatory instincts slowly kicked in, and he found himself devising how, if he were a leopard instead of a house cat, he could sneak up on a diricawl before it vanished in a puff of feathers and take it down. Though not as fat and slow as muggle illustrations depicted them—in fact, they could run fairly fast—it would still be a plain ambush—no chase. In fact, he thought he might be able to take one in cat form if he could get on its back and get his jaws around its throat, though he had no intention of testing it.

The tebo would be much tougher prey, and only partly because they could disappear. They were fast, ran in herds, and had wicked tusks on their heads. A predator taking them on would need to be careful to avoid being gored or trampled by something it couldn’t see. But an actual leopard could track them by scent and sound, pick out which of the sows looked slowest and weakest, and dash in and grab one of her piglets before she could react.

Harry shook his head to clear it. What would the normal people think if they caught him thinking like that? Professor McGonagall would understand. So would Sirius and Remus, and Hermione might; she was at least a carnivore. But someone like Ron or Neville?

Even so, it was a useful exercise for the task. The more he learnt about the behaviour of the animals now, the better chance he would have tomorrow. The chameleon ghouls would be tough. They were equally hard to spot for humans and cats, and they were fellow ambush predators. He’d need _constant vigilance_ , as Professor Moody would say, to keep out of their clutches. Ghouls weren’t very bright though, and generally wanted to avoid a fight. One solid swipe with his claws, and one of them would probably drop him.

And then, there were the demiguises: intelligent, complex social structure, and probably the most gifted animals in the world at hiding. There was a reason their hair was used to make invisibility cloaks. They really did look like silver orangutans—human-size or close to it, but built for climbing and swinging through trees. According to _Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them_ , they lived in troops like chimpanzees and gorillas, and unlike actual orangutans. They were not generally aggressive, but they would fight back fiercely when threatened. Harry had heard once that apes had the strength of ten men, but that was surely an exaggeration. However, watching the demiguises as the Vietnamese witch, Madam Thanh, led them to the trees he could tell they were probably stronger than humans.

One particular interaction was very telling. One of the demiguises—what looked like a larger and more dominant one—tried to steal some kind of exotic fruit from one of the beta males. The beta male evaded this attempt, however, by tucking the fruit into his fur and vanishing with it. This told Harry two things: they could hide from each other (probably not useful), and they could easily hide the fan he was supposed to take from them if they got it into their heads to keep it from him.

“Knut for your thoughts, Harry?” It was close to dinner, and he was losing daylight when Hermione came to get him. He did a double take when he saw that Remus was with her.

“Still watching them set up on the Quidditch pitch,” he told them.

“Have you learnt anything useful?” Remus asked. He sounded as worried as Hermione.

“I figured out an optimal strategy to rip a diricawl’s throat out.”

“HARRY!” Hermione shrieked as Remus started coughing.

“SHH!” Madam Pince said.

“Harry, how can you even _say_ that?” Hermione hissed. “Diricawls are rare and protected magical creatures, and—”

“Hermione, chill,” Harry cut her off. “I wouldn’t actually _do_ that. You can’t blame me for thinking about it though. I’m a natural predator, and I’ve had a really frustrating month.”

“You still shouldn’t say it. It’s disgusting and demeaning.”

“Oh come on, Mione, you’ve felt the predatory instincts, too.”

“Yes, but _I_ keep them under control and don’t fantasise about killing innocent creatures.”

Harry opened his mouth to retort, but Remus cut him off: “ _Ahem._ She’s right, Harry. It’s generally a good idea to keep those kinds of feelings to yourself, even with people who know your secret. Now, did you learn anything useful about the Tournament?”

“Yeah. I saw them setting everything up. I didn’t see any red flags, so I think our plan is good to go.”

Hermione crossed her arms and frowned at him.

“I know you don’t like it, but it’s the best I’ve got. You said it yourself.” He glanced at Remus, knowing he couldn’t really give confirmation.

“Yes, Hermione told me about your little plan,” he said. “I can’t give you any official advice, but it sounds risky—and not just because of who might see what.”

Harry rolled his eyes: “This whole Tournament is a lot more than risky, Remus. I could get run over by angry tebo no matter what I do, and all Dumbledore coul do is hope he gets to me fast enough.”

“Harry, don’t talk like that!” Hermione yelped.

“Be quiet!” Madam Pince ordered.

“Sorry, ma’am,” she squeaked.

“I might as well say it,” Harry insisted. “People have been trying to kill me for years. I’m using my abilities to my best advantage, and we agreed it was safer than taking the penalty from the contract. This is the best we can do.”

“And you’re sure you can pull it off?” asked Remus. “If you need more help—I’d have to resign my post, but I—”

“ _No_ , Remus,” Harry insisted. “I couldn’t ask you to do that. We talked this over with Mum, Dad, and Sirius already. No offence, but I don’t think you’ll come up with anything better by tomorrow. Look—” He pointed out into the fading sunlight. “The trees are close enough together to block some of the sight lines and to get from tree to tree without falling. Some of them have branches close to the ground so they’ll be easy enough to climb up _and_ back down, so there’s no risk of getting stuck. And my enhanced magic sense is my best chance to get past that many invisible creatures. I’ll be fine.”

“Oh, Harry!” Hermione lunged forward and hugged him. She’d been doing that a lot lately. “This is just so screwed up, making you do all this. I don’t know if I’ll be able to sleep tonight.”

“Not to mention your parents coming in the morning,” Remus said.

Harry and Hermione both spun around and stared at him in horror.

“What, didn’t I mention that?”

* * *

Hermione’s Saturday was not a pleasant one. It started with Harry waving kippers under her nose at breakfast and just went downhill from there.

“C’mon, Mione, you know you want them,” her brother said.

She rolled her eyes, grabbed the plate from him, and set it down on the table. “ _Some_ on us have table manners,” she said, resisting Harry’s attempt to spark her “predatory instincts.” Of course, otters were known for using rocks as plates, so that was rather apropos. She didn’t call him out for his immaturity for once. She knew Harry well enough to know he was plenty scared just like she was and was using humour to relieve the tension, so she could put up with a little annoyance, and she inadvertently annoyed him back, too. She was so nervous that morning that she kept going over the plan with him over and over again until he cracked and said, “Hermione, I’ve got it! I’ve been doing this kind of stuff longer than you have, you know.”

She let that go, too, because she could tell he was going over it in his own mind plenty, and, well, it _was_ true.

The champions’ families arrived in time for lunch, at which point Dumbledore introduced them to the school—her and Harry’s parents and Sirius, Cedric’s parents, Fleur’s parents and Gabrielle, and Viktor’s family, which was as large as all the other guests put together. Apparently, Viktor had an older brother, sister, brother-in-law, and sister-in-law, plus two young nephews, all of whom had come to see him compete, probably on Karkaroff’s sickle. Rather than greeting each other, though, each family was mostly keeping to themselves today.

“I would also like to introduce three special guests who assisted in with setting up today’s task,” Dumbledore added at the end of the introductions. “Canute Ravenscraft, Deputy Director of Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures.” An older man who was presumably Amos Diggory’s second-in-command stood up. “Rolf Scamander, grandson of magizoologist Newt Scamander.” A rugged-looking young man with a dark complexion smiled and waved at the audience. “And Thanh Trung Phuong, famed expert on the demiguises of Southeast Asia, which should give the champions their first _official_ clue to the task,” Dumbledore finished, giving a knowing look to the champions. The elderly Vietnamese witch stood and bowed in greeting to the Hall. “Both Mr. Scamander and Madam Thanh will be giving guest lectures tomorrow afternoon. And now, please tuck in.”

No sooner had the Grangers begun eating when there was a thump, and Love Lovegood sat down between Harry and Hermione with a huge grin on her face. “Aren’t you excited, Harry?” she said sounding a little more excited than usual, which meant a lot coming from her. “Madam Thanh is a legend in the magizoology world. I do so hope I get a chance to talk to her. And Rolf Scamander’s supposed to be as brilliant as his grandfather, too. I’ve only met him once, when I was very little. He looks very dreamy now, don’t you think, Hermione?”

Hermione started coughing and nearly fell out of her chair. Had Luna Lovegood just described a man as “dreamy”? You could find Luna’s own picture in the dictionary next to “dreamy”—but not in the same sense of the word. She never expected to hear the word come out of her mouth. “Um…I suppose he is, Luna,” she managed.

Dan, Emma, and Sirius were trying not to laugh at Hermione’s unease. “Oh, hello, Mr. and Mrs. Granger,” Luna said as if noticing them for the first time, instantly snapping back to her usual serene state. “It’s good to see you again. I hope Harry does well on the task today. It looks like it will be very challenging.”

“Um…yeah, we hope so too, kid,” Sirius stammered.

“I’ve got a good plan, Luna,” Harry assured her. It was hard to tell, but he knew her well enough by now to tell there was a hint of worry in her eyes. “I’ll be fine.”

After an uneasy lunch, the school walked down to the modified Quidditch pitch, where Harry was finally forced to split off and join the other champions.

“Be careful, Harry,” Emma told him. “Don’t worry if you can’t finish the task. Just stay safe.”

“I will, Mum. I know the plan. You know, don’t trust your eyes; they can deceive you, and all that,” he grinned. Very appropriate given this task.

Dan and Emma rolled their eyes, and Hermione smiled indulgently at him: “Go get ‘em, Skywalker.” She leaned towards him.

“If you kiss me for luck, you _will_ regret it,” he warned.

She slapped him in the back of the head. “I’d just as soon kiss a wookie,” she said. Then, she hugged him, like she’d intended, and Emma did kiss him on the forehead and sent him on.

The Grangers didn’t especially appreciate it when they got to the stands and saw the general excitement on the faces of most of the bystanders. Yes, the tournament was supposed to be a fun event, but it was less fun for them when a fourteen-year-old got roped into it.

“Stupid binding magical contract,” Hermione muttered, wringing her hands as she looked out at the pitch. What was once grass was now a dense stand of trees with dangerous creatures constantly appearing and disappearing in the shadows. The audience had only a partial view of what was happening, although it probably wouldn’t be too hard to track a human. “I could kick that Ludo Bagman down there. He looks so excited about Harry being in this thing when he was probably entered by Death Eaters. God, what’s Dumbledore even supposed to do if Harry gets run over? One wrong move, and he’ll be flattened out there!”

Neville saw Hermione’s distress and climbed up a row and put his arm around her shoulders before she could hyperventilate. (Dan kept his eye on him, but he didn’t interfere.) “He’ll be okay, Hermione,” he said. “Harry’s done more stupidly dangerous stuff than anybody else I know. He’ll get through it like he always does.”

Hermione sighed. “You’re right, Neville. Harry always has the craziest luck. He’ll probably go and win this thing somehow.”

“Well, Harry’s good, but I doubt he’ll win it,” Amos Diggory spoke up. “Our Cedric beat him head-to-head in the duelling tournament last year, you know.”

“You don’t know Harry like we do, Mr. Diggory,” Hermione said. “Cedric can take him in a duel because he has two years on him, but when Harry is in danger, he always seems to pull some crazy solution out of his hat.”

“Neville laughed: “I can see it now. They announce the scores, and he’ll say, ‘What? Are you guys nutters? I’m not even supposed to be in this thing!’”

Everyone laughed. That was a perfect Harry impression.


	97. The First Task

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: He awoke. He was alive. He wasted no time on prayer or thanks but continued the business of JK Rowling.
> 
> An interesting tidbit: it is surprisingly difficult to find information about what chemically (as opposed to medically) causes metal to have a “metallic taste.” It’s actually caused by the smell of the chemical oct-1-en-3-one, created by the reaction of lipids in the skin with metal ions. However, this mechanism wasn’t understood until 2006. There may also be a reaction from the taste buds themselves.

Harry was instructed to go up to what was normally the teacher’s box in the stands, which would give him a good view of the trees. However, Ludo Bagman met him alone at the base of the steps, grinning his boyish grin. “Hey there, Harry,” he said in a low voice. “Feeling alright? Anything I can get you?”

“What?” Harry said. “I—no, nothing.” This was weird. Bagman was crossing into creepy territory very fast.

“Well, you’ve probably worked out most of the task by now,” he continued. “You got a plan? Because I don’t mind sharing a few pointers—”

“Pointers?” Harry said in disbelief. “Aren’t you supposed to be an impartial judge? Don’t you have a contract or something?”

“Nah, the Ministry doesn’t like us signing too many magical contracts. You’re the underdog, Harry. Anything I can do to help—”

“No, thank you, Mr. Bagman,” Harry said quickly. “I’ve got a plan.”

“Are you sure, Harry?” he said in a whisper. “No one would know.”

Harry flared a crackle of magic around him that made Bagman’s eyes widen. The large man stepped back. “I’m a wandless magic prodigy, Mr. Bagman,” Harry said, starting his misinformation campaign. “My magic sense is very keen.”

“Oh…” Bagman said, clearly impressed. “Well, then, we’d better get started.” He rushed up the steps, and Harry followed.

Harry joined the other champions and judges in the teacher’s box. A Healer’s tent was set up directly beneath them, where Madam Pomfrey could deal with any injuries. Cedric, Fleur, and Viktor looked a little nervous, but they seemed at least as ready as Harry was. At two o’clock, Ludo Bagman stood up and addressed the crowd. “Welcome to the first task of the Tetrawizard Tournament,” he said in a magically-amplified voice. “It promises to be an exciting event today. Our champions are all here, so let’s get started.” The crowd cheered briefly. “Mr. Ollivander has graciously returned to inspect the champions to ensure they’re in peak working order for the task ahead. The first task is all about navigating the unseen. We have built a miniature forest on the Quidditch pitch, filled with all manner of creatures that can _disappear_. On the ground, we have tebo, diricawls, and chameleon ghouls, and in the trees, we have a troop of demiguises. The demiguises have been given four of these—” He pulled one of the large, baton-like fans from his robes and fanned it open. “—specially designed Japanese fans.” He showed the fan to the champions. Up close, they could see that there was writing on it. “Each champion must enter the forest and bring back one of these fans to the tent. Each fan has written on it an identical clue to the second task, so you’ll be at a big disadvantage if you can’t complete the task today.” He seemed to be looking at Harry when he said that.

So there _was_ something new that Harry didn’t know about yet, and he suspected the others didn’t, either. Of course, all it meant was that it was even more important to finish this. But were they all going to have to go in at once? Harry hadn’t considered that, and it could complicate matters.

Fortunately, that wasn’t the case, as David Monroe stood up and explained: “We originally wanted to send all four champions into the trees together, but Madam Thanh informed us that it might spook the demiguises to have too many people in the trees, so instead, the champions will be going in one at a time, selected by random draw. Going later will give them the advantage of seeing what worked and what didn’t for the other champions, but it also means that there will be fewer fans available, making them harder to find, so it should balance out.”

“Each judge will score the champions on a scale of zero to ten. Champions will be given points for speed, skill with magic, and the effectiveness of their methods, while they will be penalised for being injured, hurting the animals, and obvious incompetence. Now, if each champion will draw a number from my hat—?” He whipped his hat off his head, dropped four numbered cards into it, and passed it down the line. When they drew their numbers, Harry was dismayed to find that he was to go last. That wasn’t helpful to him at all. It would just give his family (and him) more time to worry.

“The first champion to enter the forest will be Cedric Diggory of Hogwarts,” Bagman announced. “Let’s see what you’ve got, Mr. Diggory.”

Mr. Ollivander quickly checked Cedric’s wand, and Cedric descended to the pitch and stepped onto the grass. There was a little open space between the stands and the trees where he was very conspicuous. The animals all turned to look at him. The mother tebo immediately vanished, but their piglets were too young to do so automatically, and many of them were still visible, huddling with their unseen brothers and sisters. Harry’s keen ears picked up a shuffling that suggested the invisible sows were placing themselves between Cedric and their piglets. That was a bad place to be with _invisible_ angry mother animals after you. Then, there were the chameleon ghouls, which eyed Cedric hungrily, and the diricawls, which were just disruptive.

Even though he was being timed, Cedric stepped forward slowly so as to appear less threatening, casting spells as he went. Each one made the nearby invisible animals appear as shimmering patches in the air. Another spell made the chameleon ghouls glow briefly on their tree trunks, but that caused them to quickly switch position.

“And it looks like Diggory is taking the straightforward approach,” Bagman said, “trusting in his skill with detection spells to get him past the animals. It’s working so far, but we’ll see how he does in the trees.”

“I considered doing that,” Harry said.

Fleur turned to look at him. _“Vraiment?”_

“Yeah, but we decided it would be too difficult. It would mean a lot of upper-year spell work, so I needed a more creative solution.”

 

_“Aren’t there detection spells for that kind of thing?” his dad had asked the night they planned his strategy._

_“Yes, but over that wide an area, for that long? It would be nearly impossible at Harry’s level,” Sirius replied, and that nixed that idea._

The strategy fit Cedric pretty well, though, Harry thought: talented, dedicated, but not particularly creative. It seemed a very Hufflepuff way of going about it. True, there were Hufflepuffs who broke the mold, like Cousin Dora, but most Hufflepuffs would probably choose the straightforward method first.

Harry might have been the only one in the judges’ box who heard the thumping of trotters that heralded one of the tebo charging, but Cedric certainly did. He’d be a fool if he wasn’t using a Supersensory Charm, and he wouldn’t even need it for this. Harry sucked in a breath, but Cedric spun toward the sound and yelled _“Protego”_ whilst dropping into a crouch. With a loud crunch, the charging tebo bounced off his shield, while he skidded back a couple feet. The animal stumbled about, dazed, and staggered back to her piglets.

 _“Depulso!”_ With no time to aim properly, Cedric swept his arm back at the tebo that was charging from his other side, kicking up a large cloud of dirt in its face in a move he’d clearly practised. Now visible, the tebo backed up and shook herself to get the dirt off. Cedric made a dash for the trees.

“Alright, he made it to the trees,” Bagman announced. “Some quick wandwork there. And he’s climbing up. Looks like he thinks it’ll be safer off the ground. But now he has to worry about…the chameleon ghouls!”

Chameleon ghouls were much better adapted predators than common ghouls. In addition to being able to camouflage themselves, they could also climb down trees headfirst. The trees weren’t too thick, and Harry still had a good view as Cedric began to climb. Unfortunately, he was immediately set upon by one of the ghouls. Harry had to admit Cedric cut an impressive figure, hanging onto a branch with one hand while jabbing his wand like a rapier, casting Stinging Jinxes and the like to try to chase the ghoul from the tree before it sank its claws into him. Eventually, he managed to knock it off the trunk, and it tumbled over his head and fell to the ground.

“Ooh! That’s got to hurt,” Bagman said as Cedric scrambled up the tree. The ghoul staggered to its feet and climbed back up after him. The resulting fight was mostly hidden in the branches (which boded well for Harry’s plan) until there was a flash of red light, and the ghoul fell back to the ground, unconscious. The crowd roared.

The canopy layer was the demiguises’ domain, and although he was safer there, Cedric was out of his element. He struggled to climb from one tree to the next, as he clearly _hadn_ _’t_ practised this bit. The demiguises were fast, intelligent, and very well hidden, and they swung away with ease whenever he pegged one with his detection spells. In contrast with the other animals, so much as detecting them was much harder. Cedric was reduced to mere trial and error to even get close to one, let alone inspect it for a fan. Slowly, he developed a strategy. He probably didn’t want to risk stunning the creatures this high in the branches, so he tried the Impediment Jinx instead to slow them down. It still took a lot of magic, mainly because most of his spells missed. Finally, his detection spell must have pinged something metal, and he fished one of the fans from the fur of a frozen demiguise. He held it aloft to cheers from the crowd.

Then, the problem remained to get back to the tent. This didn’t go so well. He made it back to the edge of the trees with no trouble, but as he was descending, he ran into another ghoul that assaulted him, scratching up his face and arms, at which he lost his grip, and they both tumbled to the ground in a heap. He got the ghoul off him with a rather nastier curse than he’d intended, but the fight had spooked one of the tebo, which charged him. He had just enough time to get a shield up, but not quick enough to stop it from pinning him to a tree. With few options available, he had no choice but to drop his shield long enough to stun it. The tebo slashed him across the stomach with a tusk before it went down, but the wound didn’t look deep to Harry, especially considering Cedric was still able to sprint to the Healer’s tent.

“And let’s hear it for Cedric Diggory,” Bagman said, and the Hogwarts crowd roared again. He’d got through the task without any major injuries, though Madam Pomfrey might not see it that way, Harry thought. Indeed, there was a delay as Cedric was patched up, and Dumbledore descended to the tent to investigate, and he returned a few minutes later, levitating Cedric in something that looked like a hospital _chaise longue_.

“Madam Pomfrey insisted,” the boy said as he transferred back to a regular seat. “It’s not that bad, really.”

“Well done, Diggory,” Bagman said, “and now, let’s have the scores.”

Each of the six judges scored Cedric in turn. He lost points for throwing ghouls out of the trees, his poor performance navigating the troop of demiguises, and for getting injured himself. In the end, though, he earned a respectable forty-five points.

“Our second champion today will be Miss Fleur Delacour of Beauxbatons,” Bagman kept it going. “Whenever you’re ready, _Madamoiselle_.”

Harry was interested to see what Fleur would do. With a different school and likely different strengths, he wasn’t quite sure what to expect. He wasn’t sure whether to laugh or smack himself when she stepped onto the pitch and said, _“Accio fan!”_

Nothing happened.

“Eet was worz a shot,” she said.

Her next move was to kick off her shoes, something that confused most of the spectators, but her real trick was to use her affinity for fire to her advantage. She waved her wand back and forth and conjured billowing clouds of thick, black, ashy smoke, and then cast _Ventus_ to blow them away from her and into the trees. The tebo fled the smoke, as all forest creatures did, and what was more, the ash clung to their fur so that they remained slightly visible even when they tried to vanish.

“Oh, _very_ clever,” commented Bagman. “That’ll keep the tebo away from her for a while. But it won’t help her so much in the trees.” Indeed, the tebo were already stomping back and forth between the trees, making the actual forest part of the arena even more dangerous.

“Tsk. Smoke,” said Cedric. “Why didn’t I think of that?”

“I think Fleur is a natural Ravenclaw,” Harry said. “Hmm…that could be just what I need,” Harry said. “I’ve got a plan, but I wasn’t sure about my opening move.” His current opening move was to use Simple Block Charms and his keen hearing to get to the trees as fast as possible.

“It could be useful, _da_ ,” Viktor agreed, “but I think my plan vill be better.”

“Oh? What’s your plan?” Cedric asked curiously.

Viktor smirked: “Dat is for me to know and you to find out.”

Fleur got up the trees quickly, using her veela ability to transform her fingernails and toenails into claws to dig into the bark. Even if they weren’t full talons, she could climb like a cat. That would give Harry some serious competition. Halfway up the tree, she was set upon by one of the chameleon ghouls. A shriek of anger shook the pitch, which made the spectators cringe, male and female alike. And after half a minute of animalistic squawks, the ghoul ran scared, and Fleur’s fans cheered. Harry couldn’t quite see the fight, but he could imagine it—Fleur fighting the ghoul on its own level, tooth and claw, plus her veela ability to project intense heat from her hands.

Bagman looked impressed: “Well, well, well, the little flower can fight. But let’s see how she fares when a gentler hand is required.”

Harry wondered if Fleur’s veela allure would work on demiguises, but then he realised that would be a bad move. Her allure wouldn’t calm them down at all; it would just excite the males. Instead, she took a subtler approach once she was in the trees. It took a while to figure it out, since she seemed to be casting at nothing, but he realised that she was trying to charm the demiguises to sleep one whole tree-full at a time. Then, when they passed out, their invisibility lapsed, and she could inspect them for a fan. It took time and effort—those were big area-effect spells she was using—but she found one and returned to the ground.

Then, she got knocked on her arse when a diricawl popped into existence right in front of her and tripped her up. The diricawl spooked a nearby tebo, which charged. The diricawl promptly vanished again in a puff of feathers, leaving Fleur to fend it off herself. The crowd gasped as the tebo ran right over her, but they cheered when she sprang back up at once and stunned it from behind. Apparently, she’d managed to shield herself just in time.

Fleur’s injuries mostly consisted of her getting scratched up by her fight with the ghoul, which also lost her some points, and exhaustion from all of those sleep spells. She’d been a little slower than Cedric, too, but she was clearly better overall, and the judges agreed, giving her fifty points.

“The third champion today will be Viktor Krum,” Bagman announced next.

Viktor descended to the pitch looking very confident. Harry had no more idea what he was up to than he had Fleur, but he was very surprised when Viktor turned to the side and bellowed, _“Accio broomstick!”_

“He’s summoning his broom?” Bagman said in surprise.

“No way!” Harry protested. “There’s no way he could summon it from the ship.”

“Maybe he had someone bring it out for him,” Cedric suggested.

“Maybe. I _did_ consider that…”

_“You could maybe summon your broom from the pitch,” Hermione had said._

_“All the way from the castle?” Harry said incredulously. “I couldn’t do that. I don’t think_ you _could do that._ _”_

_“It was worth a thought. I could take it out to the pitch for you,” she offered._

_“Hmm…tempting,” Sirius agreed, “but that might be a little too much blatant cheating. I wouldn’t want to try it unless we can’t come up with anything better.”_

But Harry’s thoughts were cut off when, much sooner than he expected, a broom flew onto the pitch and straight to Viktor. “That’s not a Firebolt!” He said at once, and then he smacked himself in the forehead. “I’m an idiot. It’s a Comet 260! He summoned one of _our_ brooms from the broom shed!”

“A school broom?” Fleur said in surprise. “Zat is so easy. I could ‘ave done zat.”

Harry agreed. He should have thought of that before. It was such a Gryffindor-ish move. And here he was with a sneaky plan more fitting for Slytherin. “Alright, that’s my new plan,” he said. Maybe there was an advantage to going last after all.

“Hmpf,” Fleur said. “Even wis only one fan to find, eet seems you ‘ave zee advantage, ‘Arry. I suppose I should not be too angry because you are zee youngest.”

“Well, I thought your way was pretty clever, Fleur—hold on, what’s going on?”

Spellfire had erupted in the canopy of the trees, and there seemed to be a lot of thrashing going on. Viktor had discovered that a Comet 260 wasn’t very manoeuvrable in a confined space, and he couldn’t get close enough to the demiguises around the branches to search them for a fan. Worse yet, the demiguises were angered by him shooting spells at them and jumped him. Unable to see them, it was an alarmingly short time before they pulled Viktor off his broom, and he fell clear through the canopy and down to the forest floor.

_“Mon Dieu!”_

“Oh crap, is he alright?” Cedric said, wincing.

Viktor groaned and staggered to his feet. Presumably, he’d taken falls that bad in Quidditch before. After fending off both a diricawl and a chameleon ghoul that were getting too curious, he pointed his wand up and said shakily, _“Accio broom.”_

“Nope. Nope. Nope. Back to Plan A,” Harry said.

“Good idea,” Fleur and Cedric agreed in unison.

“ _Ooh_ , that was a _nasty_ fall for Krum,” said Bagman. “Well, if you wanna go big, you gotta take big risks.”

After summoning his broom again, Viktor went back into the trees, but his fall had made him more aggressive, and he started hexing demiguises left and right whilst casting detection spells to find one of the fans. Once he found one, he flew back to the stands as fast as he could. All of the other champions were too afraid to say anything, but he spoke up and said, “Vell, that could have gone better.”

Viktor probably should have got a lower score after hexing all those demiguises, despite his speed, but Karkaroff, not even pretending to be impartial, gave him a perfect ten. So he wound up with a total of forty-eight points.

“Well done, Mr. Krum,” Bagman said. “And now, let’s hear it for our fourth and final champion, Harry Potter, representing Uluru!”

The crowd cheered, and Harry handed his wand to Mr. Ollivander for checking.

“Still in excellent shape, Mr. Potter,” the old wizard said. “Good luck.”

“Thanks. I think I’ll need it.” He descended to the pitch. As he did, he reflected that the four champions’ methods had the qualities of the four houses, even though two of them weren’t from Hogwarts—and his own was for a different house. Did that make this in some way a contest between the houses? That might be going a bit far, but it was interesting nonetheless.

Madam Pomfrey shook her head as he passed her. “I don’t know _what_ they’re thinking,” she muttered. “Do try to come back in one piece, Mr. Potter.”

“Don’t worry, ma’am,” he said, trying to sound confident. “I have a plan.”

Harry stepped onto the pitch. He could hear the tebo running around in and out of the trees. But instead of making a run for it, like he’d initially planned, he waved his wand and started casting a dense smokescreen.

“And it looks like Potter is borrowing Miss Delacour’s opening move,” he heard Bagman announce from the staff box.

Harry borrowed her opening move, alright, but he modified it for his purposes. First, he blew smoke all over in front of him until he was sure it covered the whole space to the trees. Then, as the tebo ran away, he spun around and cast the smoke all the way around himself, thick and dark, turning around twice to make sure his view of the stands was completely blocked so that no one could see him. Then, he dropped to his knees and changed to cat form.

 

_“No,” Emma had said when he suggested the plan. “That’s a bad idea for so many reasons.”_

_“You’re smaller as a cat,” Dan agreed. “You could get trampled even more easily.”_

_“Not to mention, how are you going to hide it from the crowd?” Hermione said._

_“I’m faster as a cat, and more agile. Plus I have sharper senses that way. I can avoid the animals by sound and smell_ and _by magic. And I can hide behind a tree if they_ _’re thick enough. And even if they’re not, worst case, I can put up a smokescreen and climb a tree in cat form before it dissipates.”_

 

Honestly, he should have thought to lead with the smokescreen before. It made things so much simpler.

“And Potter smokescreens himself. Not sure if that’s gonna help him…” Bagman said as Ratsbane took off running. The smoke irritated his sensitive nose, but he could still pick up the scent of the tebo, and more importantly, as a cat, his sharp magic sense could pick up on where they were whether they were visible or not. Some of them were still running around blindly in the smoke, trying to get out, especially the piglets. With his feline agility, he darted back and forth around the beasts and, when he had to, dodged between their legs. He could smell the woody scent of the trees and knew he was getting close. He bypassed the first tree, since it would still be very exposed, dodged a tebo and diricawl, and sneaked under a bush beneath the second tree, to wait to see how the trees were arranged. By the time the smoke cleared, he was completely inconspicuous.

“Okay, the smoke’s clearing out—wait, where did he go?” Bagman said.

Ratsbane could have laughed at the wizard’s confusion. If everything went well, he would be fooling the entire audience—at least those who didn’t know of his ability. Now that he could see, he slunk around and decided which side of the tree was least visible, dug his claws into the bark, and started to climb.

Unfortunately, there was a chameleon ghoul in that tree. He smelled it about two seconds after he started to climb the tree, which was two seconds too late. It grabbed him, wrapping its spindly hands around his ribs and one foreleg. Ratsbane scratched at both hands with his free paws, but it held him fast, wrestling to try to get hold of the scratching claws.

Ratsbane was terrified the ghoul would break one of his legs. He’d broken bones before and knew what it felt like as a human, but not as a cat. If he had to, he would change back to human, and damn the consequences, but he wasn’t sure he could react fast enough before something snapped.

One of the ghoul’s hands tightened around his ribcage, and he slashed harder, again and again, trying to tear into the muscles around the beast’s thumb with his short claws. He must have weakened it enough because its grip slackened, but it pulled him closer to its face to try to restrain him with its dirty, pointed teeth.

But that was what Ratsbane actually wanted. He’d learnt his lesson from Greyback last year and went straight for the eyes.

The ghoul howled in pain and dropped him. It wasn’t used to fighting an opponent smarter than a normal cat. Ratsbane flailed and caught his claws on a low-hanging branch that was close enough to the ground for him to jump the rest of way. Trying to stay out of view of the crowd, he ran to the next tree, made sure there wasn’t a ghoul in it, and started climbing again.

Bagman was still trying to give commentary, even though he had no idea what was going on: “Well, Potter’s definitely doing _something_. It sounds like he nailed a ghoul in there.”

There was only a sound of rustling branches and the calls of demiguises as Ratsbane darted through the upper branches of the trees. This wasn’t his natural habitat—he was a cat, not a squirrel—but the branches were large enough to support demiguises comfortably, so he could navigate them easily enough.

“I think Potter might have disillusioned himself. Can anybody see him? I can’t see him. Fighting invisibility with invisibility? It sounds crazy, but it just might work.”

Ratsbane grinned. Bagman was being a perfect useful idiot to hide his true plan. If this worked out, he wouldn’t even need his cover story.

 

_“How about this?” he’d said. “If anybody asks, we’ll tell them that my strategy is to transfigure a cat to go up and get the fan for me.”_

_“Will they believe that?” asked Dad._

_“I’m Harry Potter. They’ll believe anything.”_

_Hermione whacked him in the back of the head._

_“Ow! Sorry.”_

_“It’s probably true, though,” Sirius offered. “After you kill a basilisk, a lot of people will be expecting great deeds. It might even be a good actual strategy if you’re good enough at transfiguration. James might have been able to pull it off. McGonagall certainly could.”_

 

He wasn’t quite that good at transfiguration, but it was a good cover story all the same. The hard part was finding the last Japanese fan that the demiguises had hold of. Cats could smell metal—heck, even humans could smell metal—that “metallic taste” you got if you tasted iron, copper, or blood. He didn’t know what chemical caused it, but he could smell it. Unfortunately, all of the demiguises had been handling the fans, so he had quite a trail to follow to find the one that was still there.

Also, a cat running through the branches riled up the demiguises, and that was a dangerous position to be in. Though less aggressive than chimps and gorillas, the demiguises were curious creatures and were no strangers to roughhousing, as Ratsbane quickly learnt when one adolescent male grabbed him by the hind legs and tossed him to the next tree. He barely got his claws into it and hung on.

He started moving faster, which just riled them up more. The older apes shook their fists as him, while some of the juveniles took to chasing him around. He had to zigzag a lot, double back, and jump from branch to branch, trying to stay ahead of them, navigating around them more by magic than by sight, all the while still trying to sniff out that last metal fan. The demiguises seemed to be frustrated that they couldn’t sneak up on him while they were invisible, and they started chasing him more aggressively. Ratsbane knew he had to evade them as much as he could. If he had to start scratching, it would only make matters worse.

“Well, Potter’s certainly got the demiguises riled up, but I still can’t see what he’s doing,” Bagman said. “There’s _something_ running around in the trees, but I can’t make it out from here.”

Down in the families’ section, the Grangers and Harry’s friends who knew the plan were growing increasingly anxious. “Oh God, oh God, oh God,” Hermione whispered. “We didn’t think about how the demiguises would react to a cat. How’s he gonna get out of there?”

“Calm down, Hermione,” Sirius said, even though he didn’t look very calm himself. “Harry’s smart. I’m sure he can find his way out.”

“But what if they bash him in the head? If they’re anything like chimps—”

“But they’re not,” Remus assured her. “Troops of demiguises don’t send out raiding parties to slaughter rival troops. Chimps have been known to do that. Troops of demiguises tend to maintain their territories with mostly-harmless dominance contests. They won’t have a reason to actively try to kill a smaller animal.”

“God, I hope not,” Emma said. “I told you this was a bad idea.”

“It was the best thing we could come up with,” Sirius said. “You’ll see. It’ll all work out—I hope,” he added under his breath.

“I hope it does,” said Professor Moody, who could see the boy-turned-cat clearly with his magical eye. “The lad’s having a rough time in there.”

It took some doing, but Ratsbane finally found the Japanese fan. It was in the hands of an adolescent female who seemed to like the shiny object. Bracing himself, he did what he hadn’t done with any of the others. He approached her, climbing up her side, clamping his jaws around the closed fan and wrenching it from her grasp. It was heavy, and he could barely get his jaws around it, but he pulled it off. But as he tried to jump away, the demiguise grabbed him by the tail.

He fought to keep his jaws clamped around the fan as he yowled in pain. He tried to kick with his hind legs, but he couldn’t quite reach the ape’s hand. It was only when he relaxed for a second and let her pull him closer that he could make contact. She squealed and let go, but her brothers—he could smell that they were her brothers—didn’t like that. They climbed after him through the branches frighteningly fast and grabbed him by the hind legs—one apiece. He yowled louder as they pulled him back hard, nearly pulling his hips from their sockets. He was just at the point where he would change back to human and blast the beasts with magic before they ripped his legs off, but he made one last, desperate move, which paid off. He bent double and swiped at one of the ape’s knuckles, successfully making it let go.

The other ape lifted him up and shook him, making a grab for the fan, and Ratsbane knew he had to get away fast. Madam Thanh wouldn’t like it, but he swiped for the eyes again. The angry demiguise threw him hard, and he slammed against a tree trunk and fell to the nearest limb. He struggled to his feet, but it didn’t feel like anything was broken. He’d surely have bruises in the morning, though.

That was enough for him, and the demiguises were still after him, so he hightailed it out of there. Coming near the edge of the trees, he leaped down from one branch to the next to the next until he hit ground level in the most hidden place he could. He considered his options quickly and changed back to human form so he could use his wand. He started producing another smokescreen. This was a little riskier in terms of being seen, but it was safer with regard to not getting trampled by the animals, and if he pulled it off, it would be a brilliant piece of theatrics that would make the elder Marauders proud. First casting around himself, he fully concealed himself from view. Then, he used a wind charm to blow the smoke in the direction of the Healer’s tent. He had to rely on the cloud being thick enough to make it back to the starting point, but it panned out. When the smoke cleared, Harry Potter stood proudly at the edge of the pit with all the fanfare of a stage magician, his wand raised in one hand, and the fan clutched like a runner’s baton in the other.

“AMAZING!” Bagman roared. “Potter’s done it! He made it all the way back without being spotted by wizard nor beast. Now _that_ _’s_ showmanship.”

Harry groaned, only partly at Bagman’s words. He didn’t need people thinking of him in those terms, even if there was a fine line between showman and prankster at times. Still, he had to complete the act. He stood straight and tall and walked in a dignified fashion into the Healer’s tent…where he promptly collapsed into Madam Pomfrey’s arms.

“Goodness, Mr. Potter. For a minute there, I thought you’d made it through without your usual disaster.”

“Oi, I got back in one piece, didn’t I?” he answered. Still, he’d be questioning the wisdom of his turn-into-a-cat plan for a week. He had bruises in places he didn’t know he had, and he didn’t consider until Madam Pomfrey started scanning him that he might be bleeding internally.

“Mr. Potter, what on earth happened in those trees,” the Mediwitch demanded. “These bruises look almost like giant finger marks. If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were nearly torn limb from limb by a mountain troll!”

Harry winced. Of course, she’d notice something like that. “A bit of a miscalculation in the trees,” he said vaguely.

“I should say so! You’re very badly bruised, and…and you haven’t broken anything,” she said in surprise. “I don’t know how, but by some miracle, you didn’t break anything.”

Harry gave her a lopsided grin: “What can I say? I know how to land on my feet.” That, and cats weighed a lot less.

Madam Pomfrey didn’t respond to this, though she continued muttering imprecations against the Tournament and its organisers. Slowly, she fixed Harry up with bruise-removing paste, and Dumbledore arrived to return Harry to the staff box.

“Well, Mr. Potter,” she said, “since the Headmaster insists on removing you from proper care, do try to stay off your feet until tomorrow, and come see me again in the morning. Whatever it is you’re not telling me about did quite a number on you.” Harry suspected she said something similar to the other champions, though.

Once Harry was back, Bagman called for the scores. He himself gave Harry a ten, which was surprising. He’d made it through the task in good time, and he’d done the least injury to the animals, but it was hardly a perfect run. Sure enough, Professors Dumbledore and Grayson both gave him nines, and Madame Maxime gave him and eight. Then, David Monroe gave him a ten, which shocked Harry even more. He’d thought Monroe was the most impartial one.

Then, Karkaroff raised his wand and produced a large number four. The crowd booed. “Vhat?” he said loudly. “You couldn’t even see him whole time! Who knows vhat he did or vhether he cheated.” That didn’t calm the crowd, but the score stood. Harry was tied for first.

“What? Are you guys nutters? I’m not even supposed to be in this thing!” he said.

“You!” Fleur snapped at once, fire flashing in her eyes. Harry drew back in bewilderment. “You ‘ave tied wis me? You would ‘ave beaten me eef zee judges were fair! ‘Ow ‘ave you done zis? You are only a fourteen-year-old upstart.”

“Hey! I said I’m not supposed to be in this,” he said. “You know that, Fleur.”

“You said you were not trying to win,” she protested.

“I wasn’t! I was just trying to get out in one piece, which wasn’t easy, let me tell you.”

“Hmph! You ‘ave made a fool out of me! You will not ‘ave eet so easy in zee second task. I will make sure of it.” Fleur stomped off, leaving Harry very confused.

“Veela temper,” Krum said, noticing his confusion. “Ve are very familiar vith it in Bulgaria. She vill come around in time. And Professor Karkaroff vas not being fair to you. You had best strategy, even if ve do not know vhat it vas.” He offered Harry a sportsmanlike handshake, which Harry returned. “Of course, I vill now have to crush you at Quidditch,” he added.

“You can try,” Harry said with a grin, knowing just how badly he’d be crushed.

“Congratulations to all of the champions,” Bagman concluded the event. “The second task will be held on Saturday, the twenty-fifth of February, so you have that long to figure out your clues. Good luck.”

The champions were greeted by their families right after the scores were announced, and Harry was enthusiastically hugged by his distraught mother and sister.

“We knew you wouldn’t die, Harry,” Sirius said lightheartedly as he was being bowled over.

“Might lose a leg,” Remus grumbled at him. “Or an arm.”

“But pack it in altogether?” Sirius grinned.

“Never,” they said in unison, Remus humouring him.

“You look dreadful, Harry,” Emma told him with concern. “Can you _please_ try not to almost die next time?”

“I’ll do my best, Mum. Hey, at least I got the clue.” Harry held up the fan in one hand.

After a short visit in which he assured everyone he would be fine in the morning, the crowds began to disperse to return to the castle. Unfortunately, before he could join them, Rita Skeeter popped up practically in Harry’s face. “Congratulations, Harry!” she said. “I wonder if you could give me a quick word?”

Up close, Rita Skeeter looked too heavily made up above her heavy jaw, as if she were trying to cover up a slightly dumpy appearance. The pencilled-in eyebrows and gold teeth Harry spotted made him start to think she was nearly as fake as Lockhart had been. She had a short, scuttling look about her that he couldn’t quite place. He didn’t like it.

“Yeah, you can have a word,” Harry said as Hermione and Remus supported him to lead him back to the castle. “Goodbye.”

“But there are three other champions here who might be interested,” Remus said.

“Or maybe not,” Hermione added with a smile.

* * *

By the time Harry got to Gryffindor Tower, there was already a party underway. Fred and George moved fast. His house cheered when he staggered into the room, supported by Hermione, even though he wasn’t officially representing Hogwarts. He already felt a lot better than he had right after the task, but Madam Pomfrey wouldn’t appreciate him overexerting himself, and he took a seat quickly. Still, there were mountains of cakes and Butterbeer on tap and fireworks lighting up the Common Room, and Gryffindor was making a big deal out of it.

“Congratulations, Harry,” Natalie McDonald said when she could get close enough to talk to him. “How did you do that? All the other champions had so much trouble, but I couldn’t even see you.”

Harry smiled and laid his finger aside his nose like Tom Baker always did in the old serials: “Ah, a magician never reveals his secrets.”

Demelza Robins gave him a confused look and said, “But you’re a wizard.”

“It’s a muggle expression, Demelza,” Natalie told her friend. “A muggle magician makes it _look_ like he’s doing magic by hiding things up his sleeve and stuff.”

Demelza gave her an even more confused look. “Muggles actually fall for that? You said they weren’t stupid.”

“They’re not stupid! Magicians have lots of secret tricks so you can’t tell they’re hiding things up their sleeves. And they say a magician never reveals his secrets.”

“Huh. Weird.”

“Say, Natalie,” Harry spoke up, “you know what would make this a _real_ party?”

“What?”

“Live music.”

“Eep! Y-you want me to play?”

“If you want to. I’ve heard you play. You’re definitely good enough.”

“I think so, too,” Demelza said.

“Wow, thanks! I’ll go get my violin.”

She ran upstairs, and Hermione gave Harry a suspicious look. “Was that just a ploy to get the attention off you?” she asked.

“Yes.”

Natalie soon returned with her violin and thought for a moment: “Hmm…now which songs would wizards know?”

“Ooh, do you know anything by the Weird Sisters?” Ginny Weasley piped up.

“Um, no. Muggle-born. Sorry.”

“Oi, how about “The Wand of the County Down’?” asked Seamus, half joking.

“Now that one I can do,” she said happily. “At least if it’s the same tune as the muggle version,” she muttered to herself. But she put her bow to the strings and started playing the Irish tune. The rest of the Common Room took notice and started listening. Some of them started dancing, especially Seamus, although that might have been due to him having too much Butterbeer. They applauded when she finished the song, causing her to blush furiously. But Harry had succeeded in his twin goals of getting some recognition for Natalie and drawing some attention away from himself.

The party went on for a while with Natalie playing off and on. She went through most of the folk songs she could play off by heart, and she tried a couple of modern muggle songs and attempted to recreate one of the Weird Sisters’ songs when it was sung to her, with limited success. Fred and George showed off their latest prank products in the meantime. It was only as the party was winding down that anyone brought up the clue that was supposed to be in the fan.

“It’s supposed to be written on it, right?” Ron said. “Go on, Harry, open it up.”

“Alright, then.” Harry dug his fingernails into the groove that ran the length of the fan and opened it. It was, as he had first thought, an outsize replica of a traditional Japanese fan, made of about two dozen metal slats. Sure enough, there was writing on it. He read it aloud:

_“To unlock the secret, it must first be locked._

_“To uncover it, it must first be covered._

_“The ancient spell to seal it is the key._

_“The eldest spell to block it sets it free.”_

“What kind of riddle is that?” Ron said.

“It must be charmed to react to a certain spell being cast on it,” Hermione said. “Like a password.”

“Yeah, but which spell?” Harry wondered.

“Obviously, a spell to seal or block it,” she replied.

“But those are two different things.”

“Not necessarily,” Neville spoke up. “Magical seals can block things—block things from getting in, you know, not just from getting out—like a shield.”

“Yeah, he’s right,” Ron agreed. “Bill’s always talking about seals on the old tombs.”

“Okay, but that still doesn’t narrow it down much,” Harry said. “Is it a shield spell or a locking spell? They’re still different, even if they kind of do the same thing.”

The Common Room thought this over for a minute. No one had an idea they were comfortable voicing, except that Angelina Johnson said, “Well, we know it’s not just any spell. It’s a really old spell.”

“Of course!” Hermione said. “It said “the eldest spell.” That means it’s the oldest spell in use in that category. It won’t be built from Latin roots, like most spells. It’ll probably be Greek, or maybe even something older.”

“Does anyone know what the oldest locking spell is?” Harry asked.

“Probably out of luck there, mate,” Ron said, shaking his head. “They’ve been using magical seals on Egyptian tombs for, like, four thousand years. I dunno where you could find the oldest one.”

“What about a shield spell?” asked Neville. “Are there old ones of those?”

That took some more thought. Angelina was counting on her fingers. “ _Aegis_ is the only one I can think of that’s clearly pre-Latin,” she said. “And I got top marks in Defence.”

“Can you cast it?” Harry asked, laying the fan on the table.

Angelina looked down at the fan and back at him. “Isn’t that cheating?” she said with a grin.

“The contract only says the teachers can’t help me,” Harry said smugly. “It doesn’t say anything about the students.”

“Ooh, he’s gotcha there, Angie,” Fred said.

“Do you think you should do it, though?” asked George. “After all, he’s not technically representing Hogwarts.”

“Oi, he’s still a Gryffindor, isn’t he?” Angelina shot back. “I’m going for it. Set it down there.” Harry did. She waved her wand at the fan and incanted, _“Aegis.”_

A silver dome appeared over the fan in the shape of a shield, and, to general astonishment, the fan changed shape, opening wider until it formed a complete disk that fit snugly under the shield. When Angelina cancelled her spell, Harry picked it up again. It was about a quarter-inch thick, with many concentric rings cut clear through it, which could slide freely without falling out. There were patterns marked on the rings, but they didn’t quite line up.

“It’s like a circular puzzle,” Harry said. “It must be supposed to make a picture.” And yet, when he tried to turn the rings, he noticed a problem: they didn’t line up in any position. Even picking two adjacent rings and rotating one all the way around, there was no position in which the designs lined up perfectly. “That’s weird. It doesn’t look like it’s solvable…hold on,” he said. “I think this is writing.”

There were a few markings that were clearly letters, and he soon determined that they _did_ have a position where they were all aligned. “It’s another clue,” he said excitedly. And then, he looked a little closer and suddenly felt a little less enthusiastic: _“All will be revealed when the stars are right.”_

“When the stars are right? What’s that supposed to mean?” asked Hermione. “I thought that would solve the riddle.”

Harry groaned: “I have no idea, but if the second task involves summoning Cthulhu in any way, shape, or form, I’m running away to Australia and not coming back.”


	98. Released

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: For thus hath JK Rowling said unto me, Go, set a Harry Potter, let him declare what he seeth.
> 
> With the kind of circles Neville’s Gran operates in—in fanon, that is—I have a hard time believing Neville can’t dance. Also, he seemed to be a good dancer in the movie. So I’ve made him a good dancer here, too.
> 
> For my description of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, I’m going by its implied content in canon, which I think should trump the content of the real-world book.

_“Yes, I_ know _it_ _’s traditional, Bagman, but we can’t actually hold the Yule Ball on Christmas Day. None of the students would want to come. We can move it up to the twenty-third and send them home on Christmas Eve.”_

_“Alright, alright, Professor McGonagall. We can make the schedule work.”_

_“Very good, and now, Albus, I’d like to discuss this rule that only students fourth year and up are invited to the ball.”_

_“Is there a problem with that, Minerva?”_

_“You know as well as I do that many of our students begin romantic relationships in their third years when Hogsmeade visits begin. And while that may be young, it only seems appropriate that we use the same standard for the Yule Ball.”_

_“The fourth year cutoff was a compromise. The Great Hall isn’t large enough to accommodate the whole school at a ball comfortably, especially as we will hosting more guests than we originally expected.”_

_“Yes, it will be tight, and if we had a full school this year, things would be different. But the third year class is tiny this year. We can make it fit.”_

_“Very well, Minerva. If the other heads are agreed, I will trust your judgement.”_

* * *

“I spoke with Lord Potter this morning, Your Majesty,” Maxwell Barnett told the Queen in their next meeting. “He was very surprised that he did so well, and he is of the opinion that his high score and the blatantly unfair scoring of the judges make the Tournament an obvious farce. However, his sister _did_ make an interesting point.”

“Which is?” the Queen asked.

“We now have a plausible reason to suspect that the unknown witch or wizard who entered Lord Potter in the Tournament may have genuinely thought he could win.”

“Hmm. And does that give us any further leads as to who did it?”

“Not exactly, ma’am, but it could expand the suspect list to include several of the Hogwarts teachers, although Headmaster Dumbledore insists that not many of them could have pulled off something so difficult. He’s still actively investigating, but he has few clues.”

“And you are certain that Dumbledore himself is above reproach, Mr. Barnett? He always seemed the eccentric sort the few times I met him.”

“Eccentric, yes, but not irresponsible,” Barnett answered. “I’ve seen enough of Dumbledore’s interactions with Lord Potter to know that he wouldn’t dare endanger the boy’s life like this.”

“Fair enough,” the Queen said. “Now, I see that you were able to acquire a Pensieve for this meeting.” She motioned to the shallow stone basin that Barnett had placed on the table. “You can show me your memories of the first task, I take it?”

“Yes, ma’am. Algernon Croaker lent this to me. He’s the chief research wizard at the Ministry.” Barnett didn’t question how Her Majesty knew what a Pensieve looked like. Given that she’d met with Dumbledore during the Cold War, she’d might well have seen his at some point.

Barnett began playing back the memories at once, and the Queen watched with interest as each of the four champions entered the trees to complete their task, each with a very different strategy. William and Harry were going to love this, she thought. It was too bad she couldn’t bring all of her grandchildren in on this, but even she had to make concessions to secrecy. It was Lord Potter’s performance that was most intriguing. He was the youngest and least experienced, and yet by rights, he should have received the highest score undisputed.

“Do you have any idea what Lord Potter actually did?” she asked when the playback was completed.

“I have a strong suspicion, ma’am, but that is not my secret to tell. I’ll inform you if there are any major developments before the second task in February.”

“Very good, Mr. Barnett.”

* * *

“You might wonder why, if my grandfather spent nine years working on the first edition of _Fantastic Beasts_ , it wasn’t comprehensive, even for its time,” Rolf Scamander began his guest lecture, which was titled “Magizoology: Still a Living Science.” Essentially, he was describing his own work and relating it back to the work that old Newt Scamander had done over the past century. Much of the school was excited, but Luna was practically bouncing in her seat.

“The answer is complicated,” he said. “It would be easy to say, “It takes a genius of the highest order to compose a comprehensive guide to a single class of creatures on a single continent. Just look at the efforts by muggles to catalogue all of the mundane animals in the world. Consider John James Audubon, who spent eleven years writing a book that included just half of the native species of birds in North America alone. This is a big job.’”

“It would be easy to say that, but it would be wrong. Not that it’s not a big job, but it’s not _that_ big. Just like there are far fewer wizards than muggles in the world, there just aren’t that many species of magical creatures. The few dozen entries for Western Europe in _Fantastic Beasts_ are pretty nearly comprehensive—at least for species that are widely agreed to exist. There are quite a few species of magical creatures that aren’t certain to exist. A few of these have been confirmed over the years, but most still remain theoretical. According to Grandpa, one of the more elite books on magical creatures in his time was called _Rare Arcane Faunae of Western Europe_ by Livia Lovegood. I’m not sure I could even _find_ a copy today, but it included as many unknown magical creatures as known ones.

“And that brings me to my first point. Many magical creatures are hard to find, even with magic. Madam Thanh will explain how hard it is to even find a demiguise, let alone study it, and Grandpa didn’t want to include any entries that he wasn’t able to study himself. He’s spent his whole life finding and studying new creatures since the First Edition, and I’ve been following in his footsteps.

“Some creatures are very dangerous to study and take a long time to get close enough to do it safely. Some are very rare _and_ dangerous because they’re magically created. Take the basilisk, for example. There’s never been an entry on the basilisk in _Fantastic Beasts_ because Grandpa was never able to find one. There probably isn’t a live basilisk being legally kept anywhere in the world. However, when Lord Potter and Heir Longbottom killed the basilisk in the Chamber of Secrets here at Hogwarts, Grandpa and I were able to take a look before it was rendered down, and I am pleased to announce that the _next_ edition of _Fantastic Beasts will_ include an entry on the basilisk.

“Or consider another very dangerous creature that has been in the news recently: the nundu. There actually _has_ been an entry on the nundu for a few decades. This is because Grandpa was called to consult with the ICW to deal with the Algerian Nundu Breeding Incident of 1960…I believe his exact words were, “Nuke it from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure.’”

Harry and Hermione were almost as interested as Luna as Rolf Scamander described his line of work, searching mostly the tropical regions of the world for new magical creatures and studying them in their natural habitats. Sometimes, he found one that was only a legend, even to wizards. It was in this work that he met Thanh Trung Phuong in Vietnam and spent a year studying demiguises under her tutelage.

Madam Thanh’s talk was far more popular than Rolf Scamander’s, mostly because she brought an actual demiguise up in front of the audience.

“This is Lieu Hanh,” she said, leading the ape by the hand. The ape appeared semi-transparent, looking eerily like a ghost orangutan with her especially-silky silver fur. “She was orphaned as a baby, and I helped raise her with the troop I was working with. Unfortunately for her, she became more comfortable with humans than with her own kind—sometimes, it can’t be helped—so I’ve kept her close to me and the other demiguise handlers in Vietnam.”

Some of the younger students waved to Lieu Hanh, and she made a gesture that looked a little like tipping a hat followed by one that looked very much like she was waving an invisible wand.

Madam Thanh smiled and told them, “Lieu Hanh says, “Hello, wizards.” When she was young, I began teaching her a form of sign language, based on the experiments of some muggles who tried the same thing with mundane apes. I wasn’t sure it would work at first, but she has learnt it very well. She speaks as well as a bright three-year-old. Many people think of demiguises and other apes as just “dumb beasts,” but they are more human than we think.”

Madam Thanh went on to lecture about her life studying the demiguises and generally talked about their nature and behaviour. She coaxed Lieu Hanh to interact with the audience to some extent, including holding a simple conversation through sign language and appearing and disappearing on cue, though she kept close watch to make sure she did not cause trouble. Apparently, Lieu Hanh could be quite fierce when provoked.

The students thought both lectures were brilliant. It was rare that they got to hear from a professional or interact with a creature from outside Europe, let alone such a rare and exotic one. And by the end of the day, Harry and Hermione weren’t the only students telling their teachers that they thought they should have guest lectures more often.

* * *

Nearly a week had passed since the first task, and Harry’s unorthodox performance was still the talk of the school, even over what he thought were very interesting public lectures about magical creatures by Madam Thanh and Rolf Scamander. Harry was not amused by the attention. However, that Friday, Dumbledore gave them all something much more exciting to talk about.

“It is time to announce what many of you will have already suspected, seeing as we asked you to pack dress robes this year,” he said at breakfast. “As part of the Tetrawizard Tournament, Hogwarts will be hosting the traditional Yule Ball on the twenty-third of December.” Excited whispers and distinctly feminine giggles filled the Great Hall. “All students third year and up are invited, although you may invite a younger student if you wish. For those of you who are not attending, the house elves will organise special dinner parties in your common rooms. Students will be able to do any last-minute shopping for the ball during the next Hogsmeade visit on the seventeenth.” Several girls squealed with delight. “The Hogwarts Express will return to London normally on Christmas Eve.

“The Yule Ball is a traditional event to socialise with our foreign guests in a more relaxed setting than the competitions. The Ball will run from eight o’clock until midnight and will include dinner, and as per tradition, the champions and their partners will open the dancing. I expect to see everyone on their best behaviour that night.”

“Oh, this is wonderful,” Hermione said excitedly. “I was hoping it would be a dance.”

“Yeah, I guess,” Harry said unconvincingly.

“Don’t like dancing much, Harry?” Neville said sympathetically.

“Not really.”

“Honestly, Harry, it’s not like you’re bad at it,” Hermione insisted.

“Still don’t have to like it.”

“It won’t be that bad, Harry,” Neville assured him. “At least the girls will be nice. The kinds of parties my Gran takes me to, most of the girls are either old enough to be my mother or are Slytherins.”

“Ooh, tough luck, mate. I guess this’ll be better than that.”

* * *

However, Harry could never have prepared himself for the change that came over the school after the announcement of the Yule Ball. Girls were giggling and whispering to each other in the corridors, comparing what they were planning to wear, and laughing whenever a boy passed by. He wondered if Dumbledore should have announced it at dinner instead, since it was definitely disrupting classes.

Harry in particular started to feel like he had a target on his back. After his first class, a curly-haired Hufflepuff girl to whom he had never spoken in his life asked him to the ball. He was so surprised that he said no before he could think—at least he hoped he said no. It was so surreal he couldn’t be sure it had really happened. But the girl had walked away disappointed, so he was pretty sure he said no. That was when he realised it.

_Oh, bloody hell, I_ _’m Harry Potter, aren’t I?_

She wasn’t the only one, either. By the end of the day, he’d had a total of four offers. He nearly tripped and fell down the stairs when a sixth-year Ravenclaw boy asked him after dinner. Harry stammered out a half-coherent “You know I’m into birds, right?” to him before making a run for it. He made it to the Common Room and slammed the door behind him.

“Mione, you’ve gotta help me!” he said, spotting his sister.

“Help you with what?” Hermione said, unconcerned and not looking up from the book she’d just cracked open.

“Girls!”

“What, finding a date? Can’t you do that yourself?”

“That’s not the problem,” he insisted. “I’ve been asked by three girls and one boy already, and it hasn’t even been one day!”

Hermione still sounded annoyingly calm: “Well, you _are_ Harry Potter, aren’t you? You’re probably the most eligible bachelor in the school besides maybe Viktor.”

“But what do I do about it?”

“You have an invisibility cloak, don’t you?”

“Hermione!”

“Calm down, Harry.” She finally looked up. “I know you don’t like your fame, but it comes with the territory. Use your cloak, and see if you can find a date soon so you can say no without feeling bad.”

Harry sighed melodramatically: “I just _had_ to break up with Cho when I did.”

“Really? Would you and Cho have enjoyed staying together this much longer?”

Harry groaned and slumped into a chair.

“You could go back to one of the girls who already asked you,” Hermione said. “Apologise and say you panicked when you said no. It’s still early enough that they probably won’t mind.”

Harry gave her a disapproving look: “I didn’t even know them. They only asked me because I’m famous. I’d rather go with a girl who doesn’t care that I’m the Boy-Who-Lived. At least Cho didn’t buy into that as much as some of them.”

Hermione set down the book she was reading for the first time in the conversation. “Well, if you’re looking for someone who doesn’t care about your fame, you might be better off going to the visiting students. “I think Fleur would go with you if you asked her.”

“I don’t know. I think she’s still ticked I showed her up in the first task.” Fleur had calmed down since Saturday, but she was still acting annoyed with Harry. “And I don’t know any of the others at all. Do you think I’d have _any_ luck with Hogwarts students?”

“Hmm, hard to say. Our year, you’d have Daphne Greengrass, Tracey Davis, and Susan Bones. Maybe Sophie Roper—muggle-born and all.”

“No. I’d be too political for a Slytherin to touch. I think Sophie’s caught the hero worship bug, and even Susan’s been looking at me more like the Basilisk-Slayer for a while.”

“Well, you _did_ slay a basilisk.”

“Only because I had to. And besides, _you_ never had a problem with taking me too seriously.”

“Harry, I could never take you seriously after the Catnip Incident.”

“ _We agreed never to speak of that_!” he hissed.

Hermione grinned at him, and he glared at her. “Oh, Harry, you’re too easy,” she said. “Those are probably your best bets in our year. I can’t tell you as much about the other years. What about the girls on the Quidditch team?”

“Yeah, maybe Katie Bell would be good,” he said unenthusiastically.

“There you see? Or if you want to take Demelza Robins to make a statement.”

Harry smiled a little. “Well, I’d consider her over someone like Romilda Vane.” Suddenly, he looked around worriedly. “You haven’t seen her, have you?”

“No…You mean you haven’t?”

“Uh-uh. Oh boy, she’s planning something, I just know it.”

“So? Just find a date you do like. She doesn’t have to be perfect. She doesn’t even have to be someone who’s over your fame. I’m sure there are plenty of girls in this school who would be great once you spend some time with them.”

Harry still looked unconvinced. He gave another put-upon sigh and said, “I don’t know, Mione. Sometimes, I feel like the only girls in this school who really see me as ‘just Harry’ are you and…I’m an idiot.”

“Yes you are,” she said primly. “Wait, where are you going?”

“Gotta go find my date,” Harry called as he ran off. “Thanks, Hermione!”

“Ugh. Boys,” she muttered and went back to reading.

* * *

Harry wasted no time in grabbing his invisibility cloak and the Marauder’s Map and locating his target. He saw her dot aimlessly wandering the corridors near Ravenclaw Tower—Merlin knew why, but he didn’t care. Slipping out of the tower and putting his cloak on, he reached her quickly and found her skipping down an empty hallway.

“Hello, Luna,” he called, showing himself again.

She turned around with a dreamy smile and a flash of straw-coloured hair. “Oh, hello Harry,” she said and, seemingly sensing he wanted something, added, “Can I help you?”

“Yes,” he said with an easy smile as he walked up to her. “Luna Lovegood, would you do me the honour of accompanying me to the Yule Ball?”

Luna’s eyes grew about as wide as Harry had ever seen them. She hadn’t expected anyone to ask her to the ball. She had few friends, and the ones she had were older, more likely to be interested in the older girls. And besides that, she had never really seen herself as the sort of girl boys would take any romantic interest in. She was well aware that she was considered odd, and if she took after her mother, she wasn’t likely to grow tall or develop generous curves.

And this was Harry Potter. Well, to her, he was just Harry, her friend who had protected her from the bullies since her first year, but still, he was her closest male friend, and for _him_ to express an interest was a little overwhelming. And she liked to think she knew him well enough to know he didn’t mean going just as friends. Even if she’d made a few playful jabs at Harry along those lines—the bird-watching comment, for example—she hadn’t meant anything by them. She was just trying to be friendly and had thought Harry would take it the same way. Not that she was displeased, of course.

Luna was silent for so long that Harry almost worried he’d broken her, but this was Luna, and he was used to her being a bit odd—even liked it sometimes. But just as he was about to ask her if she was alright, she broke into a wide smile and said, “Yes, Harry, I’d love to go to the ball with you…although I should warn you I’m not much of a dancer.”

“Great!” Harry said, greatly relieved. “Wonderful! Er—I mean, that’s fine. I’m not much of a dancer either.” He awkwardly took her by the hand and then dropped it, unsure of what to do. “Thank you so much, Luna. You have a dress?”

“No, but I have dress robes.”

“Right. Dress robes. That’s what I meant. If you—er—if you want some accessories, I can write my Mum and have her bring some at the Hogsmeade visit…or something…” He trailed off uncomfortably.

Luna giggled. “You’re cute when you’re flustered, Harry,” she said. “Thank you for asking me. I was expecting to go to the ball on my own.”

“I don’t think you would’ve had to go alone,” he said, causing Luna to show a very rare blush. “Well…I’d better get back,” he went on after a minute, still not quite sure of the correct way to end these conversations. “I’ll, uh, see you around. Thanks again, Luna.” On an impulse, he leaned forward and kissed her on the cheek before hurrying away.

Luna stood frozen for quite some time. At first, she started to feel faint, but she soon recovered and skipped back to Ravenclaw Tower with an uncharacteristic wide smile on her face.

* * *

Harry returned to Gryffindor Tower with a grin on his face, but that grin faded when he walked in straight into an argument.

“I told you, Harry just left to ask someone else to the ball,” Hermione said to a pretty, dark-haired girl.

“Oh yeah? Who?” the girl said, and Harry recognised her high, simpering voice: Romilda Vane.

“I don’t know, Romilda. He didn’t tell me—oh, look, here he is.”

Harry glared at his sister before saying, “What do you want, Romilda?”

Romilda Vane had obviously put her plan into action. She was wearing a very expensive-looking set of dress robes, and she was made up as much as a twenty-year-old beauty queen. The look was disturbingly convincing considering she was barely thirteen, and it only became more disturbing when she sashayed her hips and approached Harry with a flip of her long, curly hair, which made it clear that she was wearing far too much perfume. “I wanted to ask you, Harry,” she said, batting her eyelashes at him, “would you go to the Yule Ball with me?”

She _was_ very pretty, Harry thought, even if she was trying way too hard. He knew she was good-looking—er—for her age, but he had no idea she could clean up like that. For a fleeting moment, the thought of actually going to the ball with her crossed his mind, but he recoiled in horror from it. He’d just got a date who was a lovely girl with a far more agreeable personality. “Sorry, Romilda,” he said flatly. “I’ve already got a date.”

“Oh, but who is it?” she said, flipping her hair again. “No one important, I’m sure.”

Harry bristled at that assessment: “That’s for me to know and you to—” He stopped and took another sniff of her perfume. “—for you to find—” He sniffed again and took a step back. “Is that catnip?” he said. Hermione stiffened.

“Um, no, I don’t think so,” Romilda said in confusion.

“Good. I’m allergic to catnip.”

“Huh?”

“I thought it was some new Quidditch players’ perfume,” Hermione said. “Eau de Turf or something.”

“Well, whatever it is, you need to tone it down,” Harry told a very miffed-looking Romilda.

“About seventy-five percent,” Hermione muttered.

“Yeah, no offence, but it’s a little overpowering.”

“That’s what I told her about the makeup,” Hermione added.

“AUGH!” Romilda turned around and stomped up the stairs.

Hermione shook her head as she left. “That girl’s gonna be trouble at the rate she’s going,” she said. Harry nodded in agreement. That perfume was still making his mind fuzzy. “So you got your date?” she asked. He nodded again. “Who is it?”

Harry leaned close and lowered his voice: “Luna, but I think maybe we should keep it under wraps. I don’t need her getting this kind of heat.”

“Oh, that’s so nice of you,” Hermione said. “Luna’s such a sweet girl. I’m sure you’ll both have a wonderful time.”

“Yeah, I think so, Mione. I just hope I don’t run into more trouble like this.”

* * *

Harry used the Marauder’s Map again the next morning to find Luna in a private location and suggested they keep the fact that they were going to the Yule Ball together a surprise for the rest of the school. To his relief, she was amenable to the idea, although he still resolved to try to be friendlier with her before then. The news soon circled the school about Harry’s mystery date, but all efforts to figure out who it was were rebuffed. Some girls even started trying to figure it out by process of elimination. Harry was sceptical that they would succeed.

The main event that day was Professor Grayson’s next wandless magic seminar, his first since the visiting students had arrived. Fleur and Viktor both took an interest in the subject after seeing some of Harry’s and Hermione’s parlour tricks, as well as some of the other students practising. A few of the most dedicated students were already pulling off little things like levitating coins and the like.

Since the visiting students were joining the seminar for the first time, Grayson repeated his original show of walking across the surface of the Black Lake at approximately the speed of a Formula One race car. None of the Beauxbatons and Durmstrang students had ever heard of magic like that, any more than the Hogwarts students had, and they were equally impressed.

“Thank you,” he said to the applauding newcomers. “That was a demonstration of one of the most important Australian magical traditions: travelling by songlines—or ley lines as you say here. It takes years to master, but it’s faster than brooms and a much more pleasant alternative if you suffer from Portkey sickness.”

Some of the newcomers were surprised to find that the great Edward Grayson had a weakness as mundane as Portkey sickness.

“Today, we’ll be recapping what we studied in our first session for the visiting students,” he explained. “Specifically, feeling the magic in the school’s wards and manipulating it.” He led the group out to the gates and had them line up along the wall, like they had before and had them focus on pulling on the cords of magic that infused the wards.

Fleur began laughing uncontrollably within a couple minutes of standing in the ward boundary. Harry and Hermione quickly pulled her away while onlookers watched with a little too much interest. She gasped for breath and nursed a sudden headache. “Zat was much more powerful zan I expected,” she said. “I did not know raw magic could affect me like zat.”

“The Hogwarts wards are the most powerful in Western Europe,” Hermione informed her. “At least they make you feel good, though.”

“ _Da_. I have not done this kind of thing before,” Viktor agreed. “It is like being under too many Cheering Charms. It is very different perspective on magic.”

“Most definitely,” Fleur agreed. She got up and tried to dive into the wards again, but she had to back off quickly to catch her breath. “Ees zis ‘ow I affect zee boys?” she wondered aloud, causing many of the boys _and_ girls around her to blush.

“Mm…sorta,” Harry said. “They’re both kinda intoxicating, but in, er, different ways.”

“It could be that you veela blood reacts more strongly with the wards,” Hermione suggested. “It might be something to look into.”

“ _Oui_. I will write _ma Grand-m_ _ère_.” It took Fleur a little longer than most people, but she eventually managed to pluck the strands of magic by the end of the lesson. “I never thought to learn wandless magic before you showed Gabbie,” she said. “Eet ees a fascinating subject and could be very useful.”

“And it is not as difficult to learn as most say,” Viktor added. “I did not think I could make progress today, but I think I already understand magic better.”

“That’s why we learnt it,” Hermione said.

“Well, more because Hermione’s a massive overachiever, and she was jealous that I could do magic without a wand and she couldn’t,” Harry said earning a glare from his sister.

Fleur raised one elegant eyebrow at him: “You could do wandless magic already when you were first adopted?”

Harry and Hermione both froze. They hadn’t realised he was thinking about his animagus ability. “Er…accidental magic, I mean,” he said truthfully. “I did a lot more accidental magic than she did when I was little.”

“Oh, of course,” Fleur said, seeming to accept it.

* * *

On Sunday, Professor Dumbledore called Harry, Hermione, and Remus back to his office for another look at the memories he had collected.

“I took the liberty of isolating the most interesting parts of Professor Moody’s memories of guarding the Goblet of Fire,” he said. “There were long stretches of time when no one came near the Goblet. But these are the periods when the most people were around and had the greatest opportunity to slip something in. Also, I should warn you that memories collected with Professor Moody’s eye are a little…unusual.”

The four of them entered the Pensieve and blinked around in confusion. Mad-Eye Moody’s memories were an almost psychedelic experience. They could see the normal colour view of the world, but his magical eye could see through anything, including invisibility cloaks. It made everything in the memory look semi-transparent—half-solid and half-some kind of Superman X-ray vision. They could see outlines of people walking behind the walls, they could see people’s faces straight through the backs of their own heads, and while they couldn’t quite see through people’s clothes, by some mind-bending impossibility, they could see all of the layers of their clothes at once and everything that was in people’s pockets.

“As you can see, nothing suspicious is hidden from his gaze,” Dumbledore said. “Except, of course, that he can only focus on one thing at a time. In the Pensieve, we can examine all of these events at our leisure.”

In this session, the four of them kept a close watch on the Goblet of Fire itself, and everyone who came near it. Thanks to Moody’s vision, they could see any spare pieces of parchment hidden up their sleeves, or anywhere else, so that no sleight of hand could fool them, and since he was able to see through concealment, trick parchment or invisible ink wouldn’t do the trick, either.

“We know the parchment my name was written on came off one my homework assignments,” Harry suggested. “We should look for any parchment that’s the same shape.”

“But what if was transfigured?” Hermione said.

“It would have to be untransfigured when it was actually placed into the Goblet,” Dumbledore replied. “The same applies to any switching spell or other magical way of transporting it _to_ the Goblet. The Goblet’s enchantments repel virtually all other forms of magic. We must watch very closely at the moment each name is dropped in.”

For the time being, they looked specifically at the memories of each entrant as they put their name in. It took quite a long time, but no matter how closely they looked, none of the students appeared to be doing anything but entering their own name—or trying to, in the case of a few hapless younger students.

“Of course, a highly gifted wizard could surely find a way to fool even Professor Moody,” cautioned Dumbledore. “However, if we could not detect any foul play from the entrants, it becomes much more likely that someone else was involved.”

“None of our top suspects were students anyway,” Remus observed.

“Indeed, but it is best to rule out the easy possibilities first. I believe we’ve take enough time for today, but next week, we shall examine the Tournament organisers’ interaction with the Goblet. Hopefully, that will reveal something more useful.”

* * *

Two days later was another big day in a busy year at Hogwarts. It was a slightly different experience than normal at breakfast when a number of delivery owls brought copies of a certain book people had pre-ordered. Several went straight to Harry, since he had bought some copies for his friends.

“Well, I knew this was coming,” he said. “At least they got my good side.”

Harry held up a copy of the book. He had initially resisted putting his face on the cover, but even his family told him that was ridiculous because all of the children’s books showed a drawing of him, and he was trying to supplant them. He drew the line at an actual photograph, though, so instead, they went with a dramatised and not entirely accurate illustration of himself holding a wand in one hand and a red stone in the other, protecting Hermione (who also had her wand out, at his insistence) from a wizard in a purple turban. That was the closest he felt he could get to giving Hermione due credit for her role.

“Hey, that looks pretty good, Harry,” Neville said.

“Will you sign one for me, Harry?” asked Colin Creevey.

Harry sighed and rolled his eyes. “No autographs, please,” he insisted. “If you insist on getting one, there’ll be a book signing over the holidays…Since I couldn’t get out of it,” he added under his breath.

His “fan club” seemed disappointed, and he still had to endure copious praise both for writing a book and for his feats described _in_ the book, but he’d brought it on himself. In his opinion, it wasn’t nearly as good a book as it could have been if he’d been able to tell the whole story, but such was the life of Harry Potter.

“You know you asked for this one, Harry,” Hermione reminded him as he tried to get back to his breakfast.

“Yes, Mione, I know.” He said. He pushed the books aside and opened the one envelope he’d received that didn’t look book-related. Suddenly, he froze, and every floating candle within twenty feet of him, including vertically, blew out at once. A cold breeze swirled around him. The Great Hall fell silent in moments.

“Harry?” Hermione said worriedly. Harry stayed frozen in place.

“Harry, what is it?” she demanded. He still didn’t answer. White flakes began to fall from the ceiling. She could feel the cold magically seeping into her robes. “HARRY! You’re making it snow! What’s the matter?!”

“Aunt Petunia just got out of prison,” he said.

It was hard to believe it had been nine years since Vernon and Petunia Dursley had been sent to prison for child abuse and neglect. Harry rarely thought about them anymore and hardly ever thought about them getting out. Now, Vernon had one more year to go, but Petunia had finished out her sentence and had just been released. His parents had forwarded the notice letter that the police authority had dutifully sent to him, and it just had to come today, of all days.

“Aunt Petunia?” Hermione said, baffled by the change of subject. She gently took the letter from his hand and read it over to refresh her memory of exactly what was going on. “Oh, Harry, are you alright?” she asked.

“I’m…not sure,” he said numbly.

Hushed whispers were spreading through the Great Hall, as those who remembered who “Aunt Petunia” was explained to everyone else what had just happened. Some of the Slytherins guffawed at Harry’s plight, but most of them waited anxiously to see what the Boy-Who-Lived would do. They almost never saw him frozen up like this, and it seemed like anything could happen.

“Well, it’s not that bad, is it, Harry?” Hermione tried to assure her brother. “We adopted you fair and square. It’s not like she could take you away from us, even if she wanted to. And she probably doesn’t want anything to do with you, anyway.”

“I know, it’s just…It’s weird to think about…after all this time.”

“Anything we can do, mate?” Neville asked.

“No, I just need some time,” he said. He tried to go back to his breakfast again, but with the stares and whispers focused on him, it was just too much. “I don’t think I’m hungry right now.” He pushed his plate away and got up to leave.

He made it two steps before another thought struck him. He leaned back over the table: “Actually, yes. There is something you can do. Spread the word that I don’t want anyone taking revenge in my name. She’s not worth it. That’s not going to help anybody.” He’d probably have to have Cousin Andi release a statement to that effect in the _Prophet_ , too.

“Of course,” Hermione said.

“Sure thing, Harry,” Neville agreed.

Harry took off wandering around the castle. His first class was History of Magic, and he wasn’t planning on going. Remus wouldn’t be pleased, but he’d understand. He considered shifting to cat form, but he stopped long enough to be smart about it. He pulled his inkwell from his robes and rubbed a heavy black streak across his scar. Only then did he change to Ratsbane, and, finally, he could relax.

With the muted emotions of a cat, the overwhelming and indefinable feelings he was experiencing became less pressing, and he could take a step back and sort them out. He scampered through the halls to reach the Clock Tower, which he hoped would be sufficiently secluded at least for the rest of the morning.

He felt a little bit afraid, he could see clearly now, even though there was no realistic reason to be. But it was hard to suppress it. The last time he had seen Vernon and Petunia, he had been a terrified five-year-old boy who knew nothing of magic and was being beaten for reasons he couldn’t understand. He hadn’t realised how much of that little boy was still in him, buried deep down.

But more than that, he felt anxious—anxious about having to deal with all this again. Anxious about how people would react. He resented people trying to make Harry Potter intp the tragic hero when he didn’t want to be defined by that part of his past at all, and he felt even more resentful about the ammunition it gave the muggle-haters.

And of course he had to get that letter today, of all days. That was the classic Harry Potter luck right there.

Suddenly, he heard footsteps approaching. Ratsbane considered hiding in the shadows, but he decided against it. He didn’t know if it was Hermione looking for him, Natalie come to practice her violin, or perhaps Susan or someone else he might actually want to talk to. He quickly shifted back to human and used a wandless cleaning charm to get the ink off his forehead before the footsteps could reach the Clock Tower.

It was Luna.

“Harry, are you here?” she asked softly.

“Oh, hi, Luna. What are you doing here?” he asked, even though he felt a bit better seeing her.

“I didn’t want you to be alone, Harry. I know you come up here sometimes when you’re sad.”

“Er…” Sometimes, Harry could forget Luna’s unsettling habit of making uncomfortable observations like that.

“I could see you were hurting badly when you read that letter about your aunt,” she said. She came closer to him and lightly grasped his hand.

Hurting—that’s what he was feeling. He could actually feel the pain in his chest when he thought about it. After this many years, and even after writing that book, which _did_ help, a part of those wounds still felt raw. “I just need some time,” he said, trying to convince himself.

Luna just nodded and nudged him towards the balcony. A light snow was falling but it was still warm if they stayed inside the arch where the portcullis was raised. “I read the first chapter of your book,” she said. “Where you write about your aunt and uncle. I wasn’t at Hogwarts yet when the _Daily Prophet_ stories came out, and I didn’t pay much attention then. You’re a good writer, Harry…You can talk about it if you want,” she said.

“I’ve talked about it plenty…” Harry said. “It’s just that it’s different knowing she’s served her time and out again.”

“A new perspective can change the situation a lot, can’t it?”

“Yes, it can…You didn’t need to come looking for me, Luna…so thank you for that.”

“It was the right thing to do,” she said, moving her hand up to take his arm properly. “You stood up to be my friend in my first year when Ginny wasn’t in a condition to, and no one else wanted anything to do with me. Also, you asked me to the Yule Ball, and it’s only right that I do something nice for you in return.”

“Luna, you agreeing to go with me is all I need. I’m the one who always causes trouble around here.”

“That’s very sweet of you, Harry. Would you like to sit down?”

“Alright.”

They sat down where they could still see the snow-covered mountains over the railing. Luna, small as she was, pulled Harry a little closer so that he was leaning against her shoulder for support. Distantly, Harry thought she would probably be doing all this even if he hadn’t asked her to the Yule Ball. Luna was stoic in the face of ridicule, but she was loyal to a fault to her friends. They sat in silence for a few minutes, and Harry felt a little better.

“You know, Harry,” she said after a while, “there are a lot of people who would have wanted your aunt and uncle locked up for life for what they did, or even executed.”

“Only because I’m a national hero,” he said.

“True.”

“It’s not fair,” he insisted. “It’s not any more fair that Lucius Malfoy getting off on worse than they did because he has money.”

“No, it’s not fair,” she agreed. “Do you think what _did_ happen to your aunt was fair?”

“Yeah, I do. It was all legal and everything. It just hurts because I didn’t want to ever have to worry about her again. And she probably won’t ever want to contact me, still, but…well, it’s kind of an unknown, now, isn’t it?”

“Yes, I suppose it is. But you can’t escape the unknown. Well, unless you’re a Seer. Professor Trelawney _thinks_ she can escape the unknown, anyway, but I’m not so sure she’s reliable.”

Harry laughed. Trelawney had a couple of hits, but her track record was abysmal on the whole. “Thanks, Luna. You’re right. It’s just something we have to deal with. Anyway, I’ll still probably never see her again.”

“That seems rather sad, doesn’t it?” she mused.

“I suppose so, but she broke ties with me, not the other way “round.”

“Mm hmm,” Luna said, so softly he could barely hear it. They sat in silence for a few more minutes, but Harry was glad for her presence. Her usual serenity seemed to have a calming effect on him.

“Uncle Vernon gets out in another year,” he said idly.

Luna made the connection at once: “He was worse, wasn’t he?”

He nodded. “Uh huh. It’s not as big a deal with Aunt Petunia. She didn’t really do that much to me even though she had all that bad blood with my mum. But Uncle Vernon…what kind of man can beat up a five-year-old kid?”

“Some people are just broken, Harry.”

“Yeah…maybe…”

Luna pushed away enough so she could turn and look directly in the eyes. “You have a good soul, Harry Potter,” she said. She leaned in and kissed him on the cheek. Then, she stood up and offered him her hand. “You should come along. You really don’t want to miss Potions. You could be set upon by snabberwitches.”

Somehow, Harry wasn’t at all surprised that Luna knew his schedule by heart. And if by “snabberwitches’ she meant “Snape’s detentions,” she was probably right. He smiled as he took her hand and walked her back.


	99. Dates

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Christ, what an imagination JK Rowling’s got.

That Saturday was the Durmstrang versus Hufflepuff Quidditch game. Viktor crushed Cedric in fifteen minutes. Harry was surprised, though, when Viktor joined him and Hermione in the library afterwards. He would’ve thought he’d be off celebrating. More accurately, he joined Hermione. It so happened that Harry had disappeared into the stacks to get another book just when Viktor decided to approach her.

“Oh, hi Viktor,” Harry heard his sister say. “Good game today.”

“Thank you, Hermione,” Viktor replied. It had taken him a while to get it right, but he was finally pronouncing her name correctly. “I vas hoping I could talk vith you.”

“Okay…what did you want to know?”

“I vanted to ask you to go to Yule Ball vith me.”

Harry stopped and peered through a gap in the books back at their table. As the “little” brother, it wasn’t exactly his job to “protect” Hermione from boys, and Viktor seemed like a perfectly polite and respectable man, but he was still three years older than she was, not to mention a celebrity.

“Oh, Viktor, I’m really flattered,” she said, “but I already have a date.”

“You do?!” Harry exclaimed. He stumbled back around the shelves and rushed to the table.

“Harry! This is a private conversation.” She glared at him.

“You didn’t tell me you had a date, Mione.”

“I don’t have to answer to you, Harry. I was going to tell you tonight, but if you _must_ know, Neville asked me this morning.”

“Ah. I see,” Viktor said before Harry could react. “I thought you two might be close, but I vasn’t sure. I vanted to ask you because it is so hard to find good girls here.”

“You mean you haven’t been mobbed by girls yet?” Harry said in surprise.

“I vas at first,” he said, “but unlike you, I can hide in our ship.”

“That bad, huh?”

“ _Da._ Too many girls only care about fame. How did you find date, Harry?”

“I was lucky. I know a girl who’s as far from a fame-seeker as you can get,” he said. “Don’t spread it around, but I’m going with Luna—little blond girl? Ravenclaw?”

“ _Da._ I know her. She seems…strange. But if she does not care about fame, you are lucky, Harry. It is not easy. I vill have to keep looking. I don’t suppose she has sister?” he added half-seriously.

“Sorry, Viktor, she’s one of a kind. And most of my other friends are Quidditch fiends.”

“Hmm…” Hermione thought. “Actually, I think I know one girl with a clear head on her shoulders who doesn’t have a date yet. I could introduce you.”

“That vould be very good, Hermione. Thank you.”

“And in the meantime, I can track down Neville,” Harry said with a grin.

“Harry, if you threaten him, I will hex you.”

“Come on, Mione. I’m your _little_ brother. It’s not my job to threaten your boyfriend…it’s my job to tease you mercilessly about it.”

* * *

Ginny Weasley wasn’t sure what she was going to do about the Yule Ball. Her dream date, Harry Potter, already had his mystery date—although she’d mostly given up on him a long time ago. The next boy she thought of, Neville Longbottom (he’d helped save her from Tom and the basilisk, after all), was going with Hermione. Most of the other boys she knew well were Quidditch players, who were generally several years older than she was, or were her brothers.

No boy had asked her yet, and while Ginny was perfectly open to asking a boy for herself, no one obvious presented himself. Maybe someone like Dean? It could work—although he was muggle-raised, and according to the older girls, muggle-raised boys couldn’t dance proper, old-fashioned dances to save their lives. How much did that matter to her, though?

What Ginny didn’t expect, but perhaps should have, was for an uncharacteristically nervous year-mate to come looking for her one day after Quidditch practice.

“Hey…Ginny…” Colin said, clasping his hands nervously.

“Hi Colin,” she said brightly and waved to him.

“Could I, uh, talk to you for a minute?”

“Huh? Oh, sure.” She threw her broom over her shoulder and veered off from her track back to the castle to meet him by the greenhouses. Colin wasn’t his usual hyper self—or was less of it, anyway. He looked uncomfortable and seemed to struggle to meet her eyes. “So, what is it?” she asked.

“Well, um…I was wondering…” He stammered out. _“Wudyugobalwfme?”_

“Sorry, what?”

“Oh, sorry. I was wondering…” Colin took a deep breath. “Would you go to the Yule Ball with me?”

“Oh!” Ginny was so surprised that the only answer she could manage was, “Well, I, uh…How’s your waltz?” Then, she immediately chided herself: _Idiot. Is that all you care about?_

“Not bad,” Colin said. “I learnt after first year. I wanted to learn how to dance like a real wizard.”

Ginny laughed. That was so Colin. “I was kidding, Colin,” she saved herself, “but that’s brilliant. Of course I’ll go to the ball with you.”

“Oh, good,” he said, sounding really relieved. “That’s great, Ginny. I…I was worried no one would want to go with me…You know, with the werewolf thing. I mean, Cedric’s so lucky to have Cho, but me…I feel like girls are still nervous around me.”

“Only because they don’t understand. You’re a really sweet boy. You just have a…furry little problem.”

Colin doubled over laughing. When he saw Ginny raised an eyebrow at him, he said, “That’s what Professor Lupin always calls it.” Ginny laughed with him, and they went into the castle together. “Thank you so much, Ginny,” he repeated. “I’m glad you’re never scared around me.

“Maybe that’s because I’ve faced down a lot worse than werewolves.” She chuckled weakly. “I didn’t even know you were interested. I would’ve asked you days ago if I’d thought of it.”

Colin stumbled over his own feet. “Really? I’ve been…I’ve been wanting to ask you for a while now,” the words spilt out. “You’re smart, and fun, and a great Quidditch player and, um… _Ithnkurelprety_.”

Ginny’s eyes widened. She still couldn’t make that out, but she did catch the word “pretty” on the end and the fact that he turned bright red. She didn’t really think of herself as pretty yet—not at her age. “Oh, Colin, that’s so sweet,” she said, and then, on an impulse, “So do you want to go to Hogsmeade with me on Saturday?”

“Hogsmeade?” he squeaked.

“Of course. I’ll need flowers, you know,” she joked.

Colin grimaced: “Er…I guess so, but I can only make a half day of it. There’s a full moon that night.”

“Ooh. Bad luck. At least it’s not the day of the ball. Alright, then, first thing Saturday morning.”

“I’ll l-l-look forward to it.”

* * *

The upcoming Yule Ball was by far the most exciting thing happening, but life still went on at Hogwarts. Classes were as hectic as ever, with one big change this year. Under Professor Lupin’s tutelage, History of Magic had gone from the most boring class ever devised to a surprising number of people’s favourite. Having actually competent ghosts tell actual firsthand accounts of history had a lot to do with it. It made sense, when you thought about it. Many people found history boring, but storytelling never got old. Even Draco Malfoy found himself far more interested than he’d ever expected, especially with the werewolf teaching and the scandalous pro-muggle bias of many of the ghosts.

Brother Martin, better known as the Fat Friar, was an interesting case. He had been executed for witchcraft in 1485 by the same muggle clergy whose teachings he’d devoted his life to God under. But he was a Hufflepuff and a devout believer (despite being a ghost calling some of those beliefs into question) and as such, he made it a habit to be friendly with everyone, wizard and muggle alike.

Draco had even taunted the ghost the first day he lectured in class: “How can you be a monk if you’re a ghost? Do monks even believe in ghosts?” And the Friar had handled it with aplomb.

“Oh, I confess that I was a poor monk in life, Master Malfoy,” he’d said, “indulging in earthly pleasures of food and drink…and pulling rabbits out of the communion cup wasn’t a very good idea, either. This existence is my Purgatory: doomed to wander the earth, unable to partake of its pleasures, until the ghosts are released from their chains at Judgement Day.”

Draco had rolled his eyes. The Malfoys hadn’t held with religious mumbo-jumbo of any stripe for over two hundred years. Only what magic had _proved_ about the nature of the soul would they accept as “gospel.” But he had to give some grudging respect for the Friar’s conviction.

“The House of Lancaster, which overthrew the House of Plantagenet in 1399, was not directly associated with witch hunts,” the Friar said in today’s lecture, “but given the rising tide of anti-magic sentiment in Europe at the time, it seems an appropriate time to pinpoint a shift in wizard-muggle relations. The late medieval phase of persecutions began in 1320, when Pope John XXII authorised the Inquisition to prosecute ‘sorcerers.’ This was a direct reversal of Alexander IV’s canon of 1258.”

“So the Church actually _wasn_ _’t_ after witches the whole time?” asked Lavender Brown.

“No, Miss Brown. Before that, we’d done an admirable job of convincing the Church that we didn’t exist. And even when the witch-hunts began, it was far more about muggles becoming paranoid with each other than about tracking down actual witches and wizards. After all, in the Middle Ages, the Church believed that witches were consorts of the devil who acquired their dark powers from demonic forces. Of course, there is ample support for this in the Bible for those who want to see it. People possessed by demons are described as having superhuman strength, or alternatively, having incurable illnesses that resemble real magic. And of course, in the Book of Tobit, Sarah suffers from what most wizards would describe as an Anti-Marriage Curse placed by the demon Asmodeus—”

The werewolf coughed softly before the Friar could launch into a full-blown sermon. He had a tendency to tell long, rambling stories and wax theological whenever anyone mentioned the Church.

“Anyway, as I was saying, the royally-sanctioned witch hunts in England did not begin until…er, when was that again?”

“1542,” Lupin said.

“Yes, thank you, Professor. But the Lancasters were far more circumspect in their dealings with wizards than the Plantagenets for fear of attracting the ire of the Pope. It is around this time that wizards ceased to be a major force in the Royal Court, and therefore in Britain, although many families continued to deal in the muggle world for its monetary benefits.”

“But did that really change things so much, Brother Martin?” Draco asked, using the ghost’s proper name to get on his good side. “The Bloody Baron told us that even in the days of the Founders, wizards usually themselves from muggles.”

“Yes, Master Malfoy, most wizards did hide themselves from long before the Inquisition began hunting us. Now, the older ghosts would be more able to explain it, but as I understand it, there was a divide in magical society. The rich and powerful wizards—those in the service of kings and princes—could afford to act openly, while most—those who lived among the common people—could not. Muggles have always been superstitious about magic, even when the Church denied its existence. A wizard who lived in the time of the Founders would do well to hide—I can admit that—because he might have been in danger from his neighbours, not from the parish priest.”

Now _that_ was a different perspective, Draco thought—one he hadn’t got from the Baron or the Black Knight, who, after all, were both noblemen in life. He wondered if that was why the werewolf had picked the Friar over Nearly-Headless Nick, and not just to appear less biased. So there had always been tension in the wizarding world between those who wanted to deal with muggles and those who wanted to separate themselves. Then he got a slightly sick feeling when he realised that according to all he had heard this year, the House of Malfoy had actually been on the _pro-_ muggle side of that debate—and on the opposite side from its nominal ally, the House of Slytherin.

What must internal politics in Slytherin House at Hogwarts have been like in those days? Malfoy and Greengrass on one side, Slytherin and Gaunt on the other: it must have been a war zone at times. And yet…

_Stupid werewolf and his stupid historical scholarship._

Malfoy and Greengrass were still successful families, and Slytherin and Gaunt had been lost to history. The families who were most insular were long gone and those who were willing to deal with muggles survived and prospered. Even if the Dark Lord _was_ the Heir of Slytherin, as rumour held, it couldn’t have been through the male line, and he had never taken a consort. Draco stopped and shuddered. That was a dangerous line of thought if Father even got wind of it—both the political thought and the speculation into the Dark Lord’s private life.

Still, Draco had looked at the old books—much older than _A History of Magic_. Some had been collecting dust in the Hogwarts library for centuries. He even asked Professor Snape for a pass to the Restricted Section to look at the rare books collection. (It wasn’t _all_ Dark Magic in there.) Those books were closer to the time they described, but he kept in mind that, as his parents had warned, they might be more biased. But of course, the reason he had started on this endeavour was the hint that the modern sources were biased in a completely different way.

For some reason this year, found himself questioning a lot of things more, and it wasn’t just in History class. Father’s sudden and sometimes counterproductive passion for magical creatures. Professor Snape’s unusually acerbic attitude (well, that was probably down to Lupin and Moody being here). Potter’s bizarre and allegedly unwilling entry into the Tournament. Without consciously realising it, he had found himself questioning why these things happened instead of accepting the partial explanations he had always been fed before. And he himself—if he was perfectly honest with himself, he’d been coasting on his family name his whole life to get ahead, but being a Malfoy and fabulously wealthy would still only get him so far if he was stupid.

In any case, the older histories, those written before 1750, were completely different from the modern ones, in tone if not always in substance. They spoke much more about wizard interaction with muggles, and many of them positively. In was even more pronounced in the illuminated tomes written before 1600 in the rare books collection. Things had changed so much in Britain when that witch-hunting tyrant, James I, had come to power. That man had hated wizards so much that he himself, a muggle king, had taken the time to write a book about hunting them down. Going back to the House of Tudor, and even earlier (Draco had had to educate himself far more than he cared to on the muggle Royal Families), relations were much better.

And what was more, he saw prominent pureblood names peppered throughout these tales of muggle-wizard interaction, some still well-known today, and some extinct. It was morbidly fascinating to see names that were once ranked with the best appearing more and more rarely down the centuries until he finally lost them somewhere in the 1700s. But through it all, one name kept appearing more than any other. Malfoy. Malfoy. Malfoy. Armand Malfoy had helped William of Normandy conquer Britain. Nicholas Malfoy had taken over the Wizard’s Council in all but name by augmenting his power with dark rituals conducted under the cover of the Black Death—or so that was what that one book said. Brutus Malfoy had rebuilt the family’s fortunes after they were forced to withdraw from most of their muggle investments under the Statute of Secrecy and worked his way back to the top in record time. And, to Draco’s chagrin, the first Lucius Malfoy had inadvertently caused the rise of James I by placing an Anti-Marriage Curse on the first Queen Elizabeth.

It was all there in black and white. Damn near every generation of the Malfoys had been shrewd businessmen, powerful warlocks, and the power behind the power in Britain in an unbroken chain for the past nine hundred years—and before the Statute of Secrecy, that was in both the magical world _and_ the muggle world. Draco had heard Father boast about their heritage many times, but never like _that_. Perhaps Father was…

He still didn’t have the nerve to voice the logical conclusion, even to himself. It was still too alien to his lifelong experience. It worried him that he was even coming near it and thinking about questions he never would have asked himself before this year. Naturally, he still thought muggles were useless pests, and mudbloods weren’t much better…but so had Brutus Malfoy, and it didn’t stop him from making money off them. It was all so confusing.

He really needed to talk to Mother.

* * *

Hogsmeade on the Saturday before the Yule Ball was crowded with shoppers and filled with excitement. A disproportionate amount of the traffic consisted of groups of girls shopping for accessories, makeup, and, in some cases, dress robes. There was much more giggling and squealing going on than usual, and Harry found himself wishing he could just skip all this drama.

Harry went down to Hogsmeade with just Hermione so as to keep the identity of his date under wraps. Luna went down with Ginny, who was rather put out that she wouldn’t tell her who she was going with. In fact, Ginny wasn’t completely convinced Luna even _had_ a date (Luna wasn’t that popular with the boys, sadly), and Luna didn’t correct her. She wouldn’t want to lie to her best friend if she asked right out.

Even so, Luna begged off at mid-morning to find Harry and Hermione. They had arranged to meet Harry’s parents at the Three Broomsticks. It was a little unconventional, the girl meeting the boy’s parents before a date, but Harry had wanted to do something nice for her and bring her some jewelry for the ball, so there they were.

“Hello, Luna,” Emma Granger said when she met Harry’s family in a private room. “It’s good to see you again.”

Luna hadn’t had much contact with Harry’s adoptive parents—mostly just some professional communication for their articles in the Quibbler—but they seemed like very nice people. “Hello, Mr. and Mrs. Granger,” she replied. “It’s nice to see you as well. It’s very thoughtful of you to help me prepare for the ball.”

Emma smiled and said, “Give a mother a chance to indulge in seeing her children off on a date, and—”

“Mum!” Harry and Hermione said at the same time, both turning red.

“Well, I’m glad Harry found a nice girl to ask,” she concluded. “To hear him tell it, it wasn’t easy with his fame.”

“ _Anyway_ ,” Harry changed the subject, “we were just discussing the clue to the second task while we were waiting.”

“Oh? That sounds interesting. I haven’t heard anything about the clue yet,” Luna said.

“I have it here,” Harry said, and he spread it open on the table. Now that he had discovered the first step, Harry had found that the “fan” would now collapse down to baton form directly from and open directly to the complete disk. It was almost two feet wide fully opened and covered with strange carvings. “We figured out the first step, but this is a lot harder.”

“The disk looks more like a giant astrolabe than anything else,” Hermione said. “Except like you said, the carvings don’t line up with each other. So unless it’s some kind of weird non-Euclidean geometry—”

“Mione!” Harry yelled. “You’re not helping me with the summoning Cthulhu bit!”

“Harry, you’re not going to have to fight Cthulhu,” she said exasperatedly. “Nothing in Lovecraft is based on real magic.”

“Except the umgubular slashkilters,” Luna pointed out. The Grangers stared at her worriedly. “And the heliopaths. And—”

“Luna!” Harry exclaimed.

Luna giggled. “You’re very easy to tease, Harry. I’m sure even the Rotfang Conspiracy wouldn’t be foolish enough to awaken a sealed horror, if it even exists.”

Harry and Hermione stared at her in bewilderment. Luna Lovegood was saying something _didn_ _’t_ exist? “The Rotfang Conspiracy?” Hermione asked to clarify.

“No, Cthulhu. Lovecraft was very confused about many things.”

“Okaaayyy…” Harry said, recovering first. “So, do you have any idea about the clue? The only thing we could identify was a line that says, “ _All will be revealed when the stars are right_.’”

“Hmm…” She looked over the odd silver disk. The markings were intriguing, “No, nothing comes to mind. Sorry.”

“It’s alright. So I wanted to offer you the chance to wear some of the jewelry from my vault to the ball,” Harry told her, blushing a little. “Hermione’s already got some, so it makes sense. It’s not made from vegetables, but…”

“That’s very sweet, Harry. I _would_ like to take a look.”

“Alright, then,” Emma said. She took several pieces of jewelry from a bag—necklaces, earrings, bracelets, and a tiara. “Luna, Harry told me you’ll be wearing Ravenclaw colours to the ball—which makes me glad we told Harry to get silver-accented dress robes. They’ll go with most colours. Now, I picked out a few things that I thought would match yours. They’re silver, of course, instead of bronze…actually, I think this one is platinum.” She held up a bracelet.

“These look very nice,” Luna said, and Harry was secretly glad she had some normal tastes in addition to her strange fashion sense. She picked up a necklace and examined it closely. Slowly, her eyes widened. “Are these real sapphires, Harry?” she asked.

“Hm? Eh, probably. They were my birth parents,” and I don’t think my dad would’ve skimped on something like that.” He honestly hadn’t thought about it.

“No, this is too much, Harry. These must be _really_ valuable.”

“It’s fine, Luna.” He insisted. “I’m sure not gonna wear them myself. And they’ll get better use being shown off by a pretty girl than sitting in a vault.”

Luna blushed, and Harry realised he’d just said that in front of his mother and blushed even harder. _Yeah, real smooth, Harry_ , he thought.

But Luna seemed happy. “You really do know how to spoil a girl,” she said. “I suppose I can…” Luna slowly went through the jewelry and chose a fairly ornate necklace, a bracelet, and a pair of earrings, all in matching silver with deep blue sapphires. Harry agreed they would look good on her. The silver would match his robes and her eyes. “I think this will do,” she concluded. “Thank you very much.”

“Did you want the tiara, Luna?” Emma asked.

“No thank you, Mrs. Granger. That really would be too much.”

“Hmm…” Hermione said, appraising her and tapping her chin. “It seems a shame not to do _something_ to accentuate that lovely hair of yours.”

Luna lowered her gaze: “You don’t need to tease me, Hermione. I know my hair isn’t very good.”

“Nonsense. Loads of girls would kill to have natural platinum blond hair as long as yours. It’s a bit stringy, but a little bit of Sleekeazy’s will smooth it right out. That’s what I’m doing with mine. Did you know Harry’s family invented it?”

“Why, no, I didn’t. I still think the tiara would be too big a statement, though. I wouldn’t want to be overdressed.”

Hermione laughed. It was a formal ball. It would be awfully hard to be overdressed. But still, she remembered Harry’s concern about not attracting unwanted attention and sought a compromise. “How about…how about a few periwinkle flowers?” she suggested. “You’ve already got a sort of ‘child of nature’ look about you. I think they’d look good on you.”

Emma considered it and agreed heartily: “Yes, that could work.”

Harry also pictured the look and found that he liked the idea.

“I…I think I’d like that,” Luna said softly. “Mum always made daisy chains to put on my head when I was little. Of course, those wouldn’t match the colours.”

Hermione smiled broadly: “Come on, Luna, I’ll take you to the florist. Harry needs to buy you a corsage, anyway, but you might want to do that separately if you’re still keeping it a secret.”

“Thank you, Hermione. And thanks again, Harry. I’m glad you thought of this.”

Harry smiled and waved as the two girls left. An hour later, Luna had a simple circlet of periwinkle flowers, and Harry had bought a matching corsage. Despite his initial reluctance, he was really starting to look forward to the ball.


	100. The Yule Ball

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Day by day, however, JK Rowling is gaining ground upon us.
> 
> Ginny’s reaction to Harry and Luna getting together is adapted from Arpad Hrunta’s most excellent Protection From Nargles. In fact, I take quite a bit of my background for Luna from that story, but I think this is the only direct quote.
> 
> Everything Fred and Hermione do are real swing dance moves. Yes, even the Angel Aerial, the Around the World Backflip, and the Rolling Pin Dip.
> 
> JK Rowling has doubled down on her frankly silly statement that there are only eleven major schools of magic in the world. The British Isles have never housed more than 2.5% of the world’s population (in 1850-1900), so even if Hogwarts is on the small side, this is far too low. If the demographics hold up, Hogwarts should be the smallest school, not Mahoutokoro, and the largest, Uagadou, ought to have somewhere between 5,000 and 8,000 students, which verges on the absurd. Therefore, there are and will remain 60 schools of magic in the Animagus-Verse.

The twenty-third of December came, and most of the girls spent what Harry considered to be an inordinate amount of time getting ready for the Yule Ball. Harry, Neville, and the other Gryffindor boys were down in the Common Room all in their dress robes waiting for the girls to appear. Since Neville was going with Hermione, Ron with Parvati, and Seamus with Lavender, Harry thought it would be reasonable to wait for them instead of loitering in the Entrance Hall.

“So, Harry, how to you feel about Neville dating your sister?” Ron asked with a wink and a nudge. Neville glared at him.

“Oh, I’m fine with it,” Harry said. “Neville knows Hermione can take care of herself. He’s seen her duel. The only person who beat her was…well, me.”

That thought did make Neville a little nervous, especially when Harry shot him a mischievous grin, and the other guys sniggered at his expense. But the thought was forgotten when the girls arrived.

When Hermione descended the stairs, Harry almost didn’t recognise her. It was the hair that did it. Aside from a couple of ill-fated experiments years ago, he had never seen his sister with well-behaved hair. Tonight, it was smoothed down and done up in a way that her roommates must have had help with, since Hermione was no fashion maven. She came down wearing Lily Potter’s emerald-green dress robes, plus jewelry and makeup that she never bothered with normally, and even Harry could admit she looked beautiful. But he barely had time to notice all of that before he was distracted by something far more shocking.

“Hermione! Your teeth!” he exclaimed.

Hermione smiled broadly, revealing two rows of perfectly straight teeth. The buck teeth that he’d seen his whole life and that he always told her looked cute on her no matter how much it annoyed her were gone.

“I wanted to surprise you,” she grinned. “After we split up in Hogsmeade, I convinced Mum and Dad to let me get them adjusted. I’ve been wanting to for a while, and the ball seemed like the best time.”

“You didn’t really need to, Mione,” Harry said.

“That’s not your business, is it?” she retorted. “You know I never liked my teeth.”

“Well, I think y-you look g-great, Hermione,” Neville said, struggling to find his voice, but he recovered and kissed her hand before taking her by the arm.

“Why, thank you, Neville,” Hermione said. “Shall we?”

“Way to set a standard, Nev,” Seamus half-complained as he took Lavender’s arm, and the girls giggled.

“C’mon, guys,” Ron said. “I want to see who this mystery date of Harry’s is.”

“I hope it’s a Slytherin,” Lavender said.

Everyone turned and stared at her. “What? Why?” Harry said.

“Because then you could play the star-crossed lovers. It would be so romantic!”

“Plus she’s got five sickles riding on it,” Parvati said.

“You bet on who my date is?!”

“Well, you’re famous, aren’t you?” Hermione said. “I bet a sickle on Natalie McDonald, myself.”

“Hermione! You _know_ who my date is!”

Hermione just laughed: “And who says girls can’t play pranks?”

By the time they made it to the Entrance Hall, most of the group was laughing at Harry’s expense, but he was in a good mood and let it go. The Slytherins passed through while they were waiting in their extra-formal, extra-old-fashioned robes. Harry didn’t particularly think they looked becoming. Draco Malfoy, for example, looked like a vicar. His date, Pansy Parkinson, looked like a sheep walking on its hind legs. Crabbe and Goyle looked like a couple of mafia goons, but that was normal for them.

Professor McGonagall called the champions over to her to wait for everyone else to be seated before the formal procession, and Harry got his first look at the other champions’ dates. Cedric was there with Cho, of course. Hermione’s advice had paid off for Viktor, who was standing with a very elegant-looking Daphne Greengrass on his arm. Fleur, it seemed, hadn’t put as much effort into finding a date if the glazed-over look on Roger Davies’s face was any indication. He was probably the highest-status date she could find—Quidditch captain and second in his class after Cedric—but that didn’t help him resist her allure.

“Go on, Mr. Weasley,” McGonagall said, shooing the rest of the group into the Great Hall.

“But I want to see Harry’s date,” he said.

“Come on, you’ll see her soon,” Parvati said and pulled him along.

“Mr. Potter, where _is_ your partner,” McGonagall demanded.

“She should be here any minute,” he said nervously. Luna could be flighty sometimes, but he couldn’t imagine her standing him up, intentionally or otherwise.

“Hello, Harry,” a cheerful voice called from the stairs. Harry turned and smiled as his date strode towards him.

Luna’s dress robes actually looked fairly normal, by her standards, although they still might have fit in better at a Renaissance fair than a formal dance. They looked like a bright, royal blue dress in a medieval muggle style, with sleeves flared out very wide at the ends and laces down the front, although they ended at ankle length so she wouldn’t trip over them. They had glittering bronze trim all around and bronze flowers worked into them. And Harry’s mum had been right: the silver jewelry did match her eyes.

Luna had clearly taken Hermione’s advice about her hair, too. The circlet of periwinkle flowers was braided into her hair to keep it from falling into her eyes, but she let the rest of it fall free down her back in smooth, shiny waves to show it off.

“You look stunning this evening, Miss Lovegood,” Harry said, kissing her hand.

“Why, thank you, Lord Potter,” Luna replied with a giggle and a curtsy. “You look very handsome yourself.”

The Hogwarts students stared at them in obvious amazement—probably both because Harry was going with Luna and because Luna had cleaned up so well. She was the smallest and youngest of the four girls (true, Cho was only an inch taller, but Luna just looked tiny), but in Harry’s completely biased opinion, she was the best-looking of all of them. Even Professor McGonagall looked a little surprised.

 _So much for not attracting attention,_ Harry thought. _Oh, well._

“Very well, then, Mr—er _Lord_ Potter,” McGonagall said. Harry could admit the title felt appropriate tonight. “All of you line up, please.” And she led them into the Great Hall.

The Hall was a beautiful sight. The teachers had really gone all-out with decorating. It looked like a winter palace from a fairy tale, filled with frost, icicles, and garlands of ivy from floor to ceiling while still being comfortably warm. And just like an old-time ball, everyone stood and applauded as the procession walked in. Harry didn’t notice any stares or comments yet about Luna, but he was sure there were some.

The champions and their dates joined the six judges at the largest of the round tables that dotted the Hall, and after greeting them, Dumbledore officially opened the feast by taking his seat. Harry found himself manoeuvred to sit between Luna and David Monroe, who smiled broadly at him. Unlike the usual feasts at Hogwarts, the food didn’t appear at once. Instead, people were to order individual entrees off a menu, which would, apparently, be delivered up by the house elves at once.

Soon, the Champions were deep in conversation, comparing the Ball with the feasts they had at Durmstrang and Beauxbatons. Unsurprisingly, Viktor was impressed with Hogwarts’s display, while Fleur was underwhelmed. However, with so many Quidditch players at the table, it was only natural that the conversation soon turned to the Quidditch Tournament. Due to the busy schedule, they’d only been able to squeeze in five matches of the planned fifteen so far, so it was hard to tell how things stood. Furthermore, each of the Hogwarts houses had played twice, while each of the visiting teams had only played once. However, it looked like it would probably be down to Durmstrang, Gryffindor, and Slytherin, with Durmstrang being the favourite not just because of Viktor, but also because of a strong squad overall. Durmstrang was a very large school and thus had a large student body to draw from. Beauxbatons also had the advantage of fielding an all-school team, but they were cursed with a so-so Seeker who had barely beat out Cho in their first match and thus couldn’t compete with the leaders.

“Now, now, Bagman, you can’t be offering bets when four of the teams’ Seekers are at the table,” David Monroe chided when his fellow judge got a little too animated about the whole thing. Harry thought he heard Monroe mutter something rather coarse about it under his breath, but he kept it to himself.

“Poor form, don’t you think?” Karkaroff sniped. “You’re supposed to be the Head of Magical Games and Sports, after all.”

“Just trying to have some fun with it,” Bagman insisted. “You should try lightening up sometime, Igor.”

Karkaroff looked like he’d much rather curse Bagman than join in his fun.

“So, Harry,” Cho asked. “Did you ever play any sports before you came to Hogwarts? I imagine growing up in the muggle world didn’t give you many chances to play Quidditch.”

“Oh, sure, Hermione and I played football back home,” Harry said, “and we took karate lessons for years. Those were the only ones we got serious about, but we learnt the basics of all of the major ones in gym class, and we’d play things like badminton or rounders on the playground once in a while.”

“I know of football,” Viktor said, “but I do not know this karate.”

“It’s a kind of muggle duelling invented in Japan,” Cho explained. “There are a lot of different forms in the Far East. I have some second and third cousins in China who are masters of one of them called Kung Fu.”

“And zis badmeenton?” Fleur asked. “And—‘ow do you say? Rounders?”

It took Harry a few minutes to explain both games enough for the others to understand them, and when he was done, they looked a little perplexed.

“Huh. I didn’t know muggles had that many sports,” Cedric said.

“Oh, that’s nothing,” Harry replied. “It varies from school to school, but you’ll have cricket, tennis, basketball, hockey, boxing, fencing, rowing, swimming, athletics—”

 _“Mon Dieu!”_ Fleur exclaimed. “‘Ow can you ‘ave so many?”

“He’s _got_ to be exaggerating. Right, Potter?” Daphne said.

“Oh, no, I believe Lord Potter is quite serious,” Dumbledore said, smiling at Harry. “Muggles _have_ devised a great many ways to entertain themselves.”

“But how can you do that?” asked Cedric. “You must have named—what, thirteen sports?”

“Numbers, Cedric,” Harry said. “Probably almost half of muggles play at least one of those sports in school, and not all of them are team sports. Plus muggle schools are close enough together that they can play each other all the time, so there’s usually only one team of each per school. You see, in the magical world, it’s so rare that we play other schools, since they’re all overseas, we really can’t support a lot of sports teams compared with muggles.”

“Hmm…I can see how numbers vould vork,” Viktor agreed after some thought. “But it is still surprising.”

“And I thought wizards were sports-mad,” Roger said. “I’ve never even played anything but Quidditch. Well, I guess you can count duelling.”

“I have only done Quidditch, duelling, and broom racing,” Viktor said

“I played Swivenhodge when I was a kid, but it kind of loses its appeal if you’re over age ten,” Cedric said. “ _Half_ of all muggles? I can’t even imagine. Heck, I can’t even imagine learning that many sports at once.”

“It’s not that hard,” Harry said defensively.

“That’s why Harry is so physically fit, you know,” a high, cheerful voice said. Everyone stopped and stared at Luna, who turned and looked up at Harry with a completely sincere smile.

Harry smiled back and squeezed her around the shoulders affectionately. “That’s more down to hard work and daily exercise, but thanks, Luna,” he said.

“Oh, I think there’s more to Lord Potter’s athletic prowess than that,” David Monroe said. “I didn’t get a chance to personally congratulate you for your performance in the first task. That showed a real natural talent. To do as well as you did at your age is truly impressive.”

“Well, thank you,” Harry replied, hoping this conversation wouldn’t go too far down that road.

No luck: “May I ask how you did it?”

“Sorry, I’m keeping that trick under wraps. I wouldn’t want to lose my advantage if I need it again, would I?”

Monroe laughed. “A wise sentiment, Lord Potter. I take it you’re working out your plan for the second task?”

Harry said nothing. He tried to scan the faces of the other champions, looking for any clue to their thoughts. He honestly had no idea how they might be doing at solving the clue, but just the first step had taken a N.E.W.T.-level spell to get through. He might be well behind and really didn’t want to advertise the fact.

Monroe picked up on his reticence and frowned: “Or are you still working on the clue?”

Harry still said nothing and was growing decidedly uncomfortably with this line of conversation. He could feel the eyes on him.

“I think it would be quite awkward for the champions to discuss their strategies in front of each other,” Luna spoke up.

The other champions and Monroe jerked back and let out rather nervous laughs, while Harry and Dumbledore both let out much more sincere ones. Harry really appreciated Luna’s brilliant way of saying exactly what she was thinking at that moment. It could be uncomfortable at times, but it could cut through a lot of messes like this. He sighed with relief and leaned over and whispered in her ear, “Thank you.”

Cho seemed to agree with Luna because she took up a new topic: “Well, here’s a bit of Tournament news no one’s mentioned. How many people going to the Diagonal Theatre’s Christmas play next week?”

About half the table nodded that they were, although foreign delegation seemed unfamiliar with it. Harry didn’t indicate either way, although the Grangers had gone the last three years.

“What about you, Harry?” Cho asked.

“I honestly don’t even know what they’re showing,” he said. “I haven’t had time to pay attention.”

“Really? Mandy Brocklehurst’s been talking about it for weeks. It’s a new original production, like _The Wizard and the Hopping Pot_.”

“It is?” Harry was suddenly much more interested. The past two years, the Theatre had run old plays, but their one original production he had seen had been their best work, and was instrumental to the passage of the Muggle Protection Act. “What’s it called?”

“ _La Trag_ _édie du Tournoi d’An I_.”

“Oh, a French play?” Fleur perked up.

“No, English,” Roger said. “The title is because it’s set in France.”

“Yes, it’s about the _last_ Triwizard Tournament.”

“Zee 1792 Tournament?” Madame Maxime said. “That would be vairy eenteresting—eef eet ees done well, of course.”

Harry blinked a few times, still trying to parse the title. Hermione had looked up past Tournaments and found that the most recent attempt that had actually gone forward had been held at Beauxbatons in 1792— _oh_ …which was in the middle of the French Revolution. And if he remembered right, 1792 was Year I on the Revolutionary Calendar. His interest was definitely piqued. He’d never thought much about how the magical world was affected by revolutions like that. “I’ll be interested to see that,” he said. “Mum and Dad have probably bought tickets by now anyway, but I’ll be there either way.”

When the meal ended, Dumbledore stood and rearranged the Great Hall into a dance floor and stage, and a chamber orchestra filed out—likely the same one that that played at the Diagonal Theatre, given the size of Wizarding Britain. It was an impressive feat of magic; of course, Dumbledore made it all look easy. Harry and Hermione were never quite sure whether he did things like that on his own or triggered the castle to help him somehow, like how the elves sent food up from the kitchen, but either way, they were ready to dance.

The champions stood to take their places. Harry offered Luna his hand and said, “Well, then, shall we dance?” Luna smiled and joined him on the floor. He could feel the eyes on him again, but he ignored it as the orchestra struck up a waltz. He had practised the steps leading up to the ball to refresh his memory, but never with a partner. Yet they got off to a good start, and Luna gracefully turned with him around the dance floor.

Actually, he soon realised, Luna was pretty good at this. She glided around the floor where he led her, stepping where she needed to go so they wouldn’t trip over each other’s feet, and she was so light on her feet that it felt effortless on Harry’s end, and he soon found himself grinning.

“Why, Miss Lovegood, I thought you said you weren’t much of a dancer,” he said.

Luna smiled coyly back: “I thought you said you weren’t much of a dancer, either, Lord Potter.”

“Oh, I can dance. I had to take lessons. Old family stuff. But I never enjoyed it much…not until now. You’re really good, though.”

“Thank you, Harry. I made sure to practice on my own before the ball. I’ve only really danced with Mum and Dad when Mum was still alive. The only wizard boy where I live who isn’t at least three years older than me is Ronald, and he was never interested.”

Harry looked over to where Ron was standing with Parvati, looking bored. He hoped Ron wouldn’t give her too poor a time. “I see what you mean,” he said.

“Mm hmm. But I like this,” Luna said, causing Harry to blush a little. “Maybe I should try dancing more often.”

Harry didn’t trust himself to answer, but he kept dancing, and when the song ended, the rest of the Hall applauded before they began to take to the floor themselves. The orchestra struck up another tune that was more upbeat and surprisingly swingy. Harry was about to ask Luna if she knew the steps when a certain redheaded witch interrupted them and decided to make a scene.

_“Luna Amalthea Lovegood! I thought we were friends!”_

Quite a few people stopped dancing and stared, and Harry readied himself just in case Ginny Weasley had suddenly gone mad. Colin Creevey hurried to catch up with her, looking utterly mortified.

Luna, however, looked unconcerned: _“Hello, Ginny. Of course we’re friends. Why would you think otherwise?”_

“ _Harry Freakin_ _’ Potter_ is your mystery date? How could you keep _that_ a secret?” And suddenly, Ginny broke into a girlish grin. “Most girls would’ve told the whole school by now.”

“I didn’t want to spoil the surprise, of course,” Luna told her. “Also, Harry suggested we not attract undue attention.”

At that Ginny turned as red as her hair as she realised attracting attention was precisely what she was doing. “Er, sorry, Harry,” she said, not meeting his eyes. “You’ll have to tell me all about it later, Luna. Come on, Colin, let’s dance.”

Colin now looked quite dazed, and he mouthed something to Harry as Ginny pulled him away that looked suspiciously like “Girls.” Harry nodded sympathetically.

“Ginny’s a very expressive person, isn’t she?” Luna said.

“Er…that’s one way of putting it,” Harry agreed.

“Oh, I can tell she’s happy for me. She just gets overexcited sometimes.”

“I think she might be too much for Colin.”

“Maybe. It’ll be interesting to see how they work out.”

“Uh huh. So…Amalthea?” Harry asked as they started dancing again.

Luna nodded: “The foster mother of Zeus in—”

“Crete. Yes, I know.”

“Mum and Dad picked my name together, of course. Dad wanted a lofty-sounding name to encourage me to have an elevated frame of mind.” Harry suppressed a snort, which she thankfully didn’t seem to notice. “So he picked Luna. But Mum wanted a nurturing sort of name, like her own. Oh, I know Pandora is a Greek tragedy, but the name means “all gifts.” She told me once she considered Demeter, but Amalthea is less ambiguous about being nurturing.”

“I think it’s a pretty name.”

Luna blushed noticeably: “Thank you, Harry.”

After the second song, Neville and Hermione joined Harry and Luna at the edge of the dance floor for a brief rest. The orchestra took up something older than a waltz that probably only Neville knew. Predictably, Malfoy and Parkinson took centre stage, but they didn’t pay them any mind.

“I was worried there for a minute,” Hermione said. Harry didn’t need to look to know she was talking about Ginny, but the redhead now looked perfectly content chatting with Colin. “Anyway, you two looked lovely out there,” Hermione continued.

“Harry’s a good dancer,” Luna agreed.

“Surprisingly so,” she agreed. “Just don’t fill up your whole dance card, little brother. I can already see a lot of girls have their eye on you.”

Harry scanned the Hall, being careful not to linger on any one spot. He did see a lot of girls’ eyes turned his way. He only had a few he was really interested in dancing with, but it would still be a challenge to give appropriate attention to Luna whilst being reasonably polite to the others.

In contrast to the ancient minuet or whatever it was, the orchestra’s next number was an all-out swing number faster than the previous one. Not that many people knew this dance either, but soon, Fred Weasley and Angelina Johnson were whirling around the dance floor with such abandon that people had to back out of their way.

Hermione’s eyes were fixed on the couple. “I didn’t know wizards knew swing,” she said excitedly.

“You know that dance?” Neville said nervously.

“Yes. I so rarely get to dance it, though—not with anyone that good…” She waited till near the middle of the song and said, “Excuse me for a minute, Neville.”

“Oh boy, this is gonna be good,” Harry said as she approached the couple.

“Why’s that?” Neville asked.

“You know how Hermione’s an overachiever at everything?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, she took some special classes when she was ten. I didn’t learn any more dancing than I had to, but she went through a phase where she couldn’t get enough of it—especially swing—it’s kinda weird “cause it’s American, but it’s been pretty popular in muggle Britain at times.”

“Excuse me,” Hermione said, tapping Angelina on the shoulder, “may I cut in?”

Angelina looked surprised, but she graciously bowed out for a turn. She looked like she was enjoying the dance, but she also looked like she could use a break.

“You want to dance with me?” Fred said, utterly perplexed.

“Mm hmm.”

He stared at her in consideration and said, “Alright, Granger, I’ll go easy on you.”

Hermione cocked an eyebrow at him and said, “Don’t you dare!”

Fred took the challenge. He got a wicked grin on his face and spun Hermione around fast, but she kept up easily. He threw her out into a spin and caught her, did a complicated move where he passed her behind his back, dipped her nearly to the floor, and generally started being as wild as he and Angelina were. A crowd started to gather to watch them.

Neville’s jaw dropped: “Do muggles really dance like that?”

“Only a few of them,” Harry said.

Hermione kept up with everything Fred did, even when he lifted her in the air and tossed her over his shoulder. Harry had no idea where he had learnt stuff like that, but it was impressive. For his final move, Fred picked her up bridal style and did something Harry had only seen once before where he flipped her over his arm, swung her behind his back by her knees, and caught her, but then dropped her so that she rolled over to hang by one arm and one leg as the song ended.

The crowd roared with cheers. Harry suspected that few wizards have ever seen dancing like that before. Hermione rushed back over to Harry and Neville flushed and with a big grin on her face, with Fred and George close behind.

“Oh my goodness, that was brilliant!” she said breathlessly. “Thank you, Fred. I almost never get to dance like that.”

“My pleasure, Miss Granger.” Even Fred sounded out of breath. “I never would’ve pegged you for a swing dancing prodigy.”

“I didn’t know dancing like that was even possible,” Neville said uncomfortably. Harry could tell he was feeling inadequate after that display.

But Hermione kept smiling just as broadly and patted him on the shoulder. “I can teach you if you want, Neville,” she said. “I’m sure you can get it with some practice. It’s good exercise, anyway.”

“Gee, thanks,” Neville said, clearly unsure whether to be pleased or even more nervous.

“Well, here’s something I never thought I’d see,” George said. “Hermione Granger and my twin brother dancing together.”

“And being brilliant at it,” Angelina said. “You’ll have to teach me, Fred. That was amazing.”

“No problem, baby,” Fred smiled at her and kissed her on the cheek. “Oh, and by the way, Harry, that _thing_ you asked about is ready.”

“Excellent,” Harry said with a grin.

Hermione turned on him at once: “Harry James Potter, what did you do?”

“Just a bit of fun. I just had them arrange an extra waltz while the band is setting up.”

Hermione continued to eye him suspiciously, but she let it go.

At this point, seeing that none of the group was dancing, other people started moving in, at least some to try to find new partners. Cedric and Fleur wandered over while Roger was dancing with Cho, as did Viktor and Daphne. Unfortunately, so did Malfoy and Parkinson. Malfoy just had to get his digs in, didn’t he? He looked Harry and Luna up and down and said, “Lovegood, Potter? Really?”

“Yes, Malfoy,” Harry said.

Malfoy burst out laughing.

Harry fumed: “A gentleman should respect a lady, Malfoy. Are we going to have a problem here?” He knew if he’d done that to Parkinson, Malfoy would probably call him out, no matter how ridiculous her dress looked.

“No, Potter, I just want to take in this picture,” Malfoy said, still laughing. “This is just too perfect, isn’t it, Pansy?”

Parkinson gave a simpering giggle: “Potter and Loony. I couldn’t have thought of anything better myself.”

“Her name is Luna, Miss Parkinson,” Harry said.

Fortunately—or unfortunately—before the scene could escalate further, a small girl with a lot of curly hair rushed up to them and said, “Just ignore them. May I have this dance, Harry,” whilst batting her eyelashes.

“Romilda?” he said as he thought, _Isn_ _’t she in second year?_ He couldn’t come up with anything better to say than, “How did you get in here?”

“Oh, I came with Cormac, but that’s not important.” She nodded at Cormac McLaggen who seemed to have his eye mainly on Fleur at the moment. “So do you want to dance?”

“Oh, um, sorry, Romilda, but I was just about to have a dance with…Fleur.” Fleur raised an eyebrow at him. “Please?” he mouthed.

“Oh, _oui_ , of course,” she said patronisingly and offered him her arm, and they started dancing a stately waltz.

“ _Merci, Fleur_ ,” he whispered. It took all of his self-control to keep focusing on her face and not to go dizzy holding the quarter-veela so close, but it was still an improvement over Romilda Vane in his book.

Fleur continued the conversation in French so they would be less likely to be overheard: _“It’s fine,”_ she said quietly. _“That boy was starting to give me one of_ those _looks, anyway. Who are they?_ _”_

_“The little stalker is Romilda Vane. She’s been following me around since last year. The big one is Cormac McLaggen. He’s just kind of an arse.”_

They looked over at the couple, and she and Harry saw that in spite of her loud resistance, Romilda actually looked like she was enjoying herself, dancing inappropriately close to McLaggen.

_“Ah, yes. I know the type. They are two sides of one coin, are they not?”_

_“Yeah, they are. I’ve been trying to make it clear I’m not interested, but she isn’t getting the hint.”_

_“For some people, it doesn’t help,”_ Fleur agreed. _“If you want my advice, I don’t think you’ll be able to keep avoiding her all night.”_

 _“You don’t?”_ Harry said with a frown. Of course, he could see she was right. Romilda was too tenacious for that. _“What do you think I should do?”_

_“Offer her a dance, but make it clear that it means no more than with any of the other girls. Don’t say it out loud—just by your attitude. Even if that doesn’t work, it will make the rest of the dance more pleasant for you. And make sure to pay the most attention to your date, even if she is a little odd.”_

_“Luna’s brilliant, Fleur. But thanks. I’ll try it.”_

_“You are a good dancer, Harry. Not many boys can keep a clear head around me.”_

_“Merci.”_

_“You know I’m still going to crush you in the second task, don’t you?”_ she said with a grin.

_“Oh, yes, I’m counting on it.”_

So Fleur wasn’t still angry _per se_ about the first task, but she was still determined to take him down, so that was fair. He danced a couple more times with Luna, with Ginny, Cho, Daphne, and Luna again, but then he found himself cornered and accepted a dance with Romilda Vane.

Unfortunately, this turned out to be the orchestra’s last song, and it was a very slow waltz. Romilda took the opportunity to press herself close to his chest the whole time, and he did his best to push her back and hold her in a normal waltz position. She was wearing a set of dress robes that looked even more expensive than the last set he’d seen her in, and she was wearing her perfume that, no matter what she said, he still thought smelled like catnip. He couldn’t imagine how she would get the impression he was enjoying it.

When the song ended, he nodded to her politely and pried her fingers off his arm. “Oh, Harry—” was all he let her get out before he made himself scarce and sought out Luna again. He needed to be in position for what would happen next.

“Hello, Harry. Are you in a hurry?” Luna asked as the orchestra began to file out.

“It’s just time for my little surprise, Luna. I lined up a _special_ dance I was hoping you’d join me in. I think you’ll like it.”

“What’s special about it?”

“Do you know any Tchaikovsky? The _Path_ _étique_ Symphony?”

“No, I’m afraid not.”

“Oh. Well, in that case, just follow my lead.”

At that moment, Fred and George, who had vanished a few minutes earlier, rolled out an old phonograph they had found in storage in front of the stage. Harry had provided the record, discreetly ordered from a muggle shop by Remus.

“And now, ladies and gentlemen—” Fred called out.

“—a special request from the audience,” George finished, and they started the phonograph.

Harry grinned as the music started. They began with a snatch from the end of the previous movement to make it sound like it was normal music. But then, he whispered to his partner, “Six-seven-eight-nine-ten,” and started moving.

Luna’s eyes widened more than usual in understanding, and she caught on quickly.

As for the other couples who tried to dance the song, they weren’t so lucky.

It was a waltz. It sounded just like a waltz—a very pretty waltz, in fact—until you tried to dance it.

Half the Yule Ball were suddenly tripping over their own feet.

Harry, however, had practised dancing a waltz in quintuple metre rather than triple metre, and he had no problem with it. Most of the dancers didn’t know what hit them when the quintuple meter began, for that was how Tchaikovsky had written the waltz movement of his Sixth Symphony.

Most people flailed around for a little while, trying to find the downbeat before giving up. It would be pretty clear who had supplied the “request from the audience.” The only couples who could even come close to dancing it well were Harry and Luna, Fred and Angelina, George and Alicia, and Dumbledore (Was there anything that man couldn’t do?), who was dancing a surprisingly smooth five-step with Professor Vector. Hermione probably could have managed it, but she didn’t push Neville. Anyway, she looked amused when Malfoy nearly fell flat on his face.

“This is a nice song, Harry,” Luna said. “Although it looks light most people need more practice with it.” She sounded obtuse, but there was a twinkle in her eye that told Harry she knew exactly what he was up to. Classic Luna.

“Harry, I can’t believe you pranked the entire ball,” Hermione said when they rejoined them.

“You can’t? You, my sister, are sorely lacking in imagination,” Harry replied with a grin.

“You know what I meant!”

“They can force me to participate, but they can’t stop me from having fun with it.”

Hermione sighed: “You are incorrigible, Harry.”

“And proud of it.”

The Weird Sisters looked very…80s. Perhaps wizard music trends ran a few years behind. They played drums, guitar, and bass, but also cello, lute, and bagpipes. To Harry’s and Hermione’s surprise, all of those instruments actually worked well together. However, their first song, a heavy metal piece called “Do the Hippogriff” was entirely too loud. Most of the girls screamed and flocked to the stage like the Beatles were playing or something, but Harry decided to back off.

“I don’t like this kind of music much,” Harry half-yelled at Luna. “Do you?”

“No, loud music attracts wrackspurts,” she yelled back.

After two and a half years of this, Harry was starting to get a feel for Luna’s code. “Attracts wrackspurts” meant it was too distracting for her tastes…at least he thought that’s what it meant. “They’ll probably play some more slow songs later, when people are tired,” he reasoned. “You want to take a walk in the rose garden?”

“Yes, that sounds nice.”

Harry, Luna, Hermione, and Neville all headed to the back of the Great Hall. It looked like quite a few other couples were getting the same idea as they also proceeded to the Entrance Hall.

“Excuse me, Mr. Potter.”

The group froze as they heard Professor McGonagall calling to Harry, having dropped his title. “Yes, Professor?” he asked, turning to face her.

“Do you think your actions just now were appropriate for a formal event?”

“With all due respect, ma’am, this Tournament lost the right to my respect when it forced me to be an unwilling participant.” Harry said. “And besides, Professor Dumbledore seemed to like it.”

McGonagall gave him a sour look, but she held back any sharp criticism. “That’s not exactly a ringing endorsement, Mr. Potter,” she said. “But be that as it may, I trust there won’t be any further disruptions tonight?”

“I didn’t plan anything else,” Harry said truthfully.

“Good. In that case, do enjoy yourselves. It’s not often that we have a ball here.”

“Actually, I’ve been meaning to ask about that, Professor,” Hermione spoke up. “I understand it’s a Tetrawizard Tournament tradition, but it would be nice if we had dances more often. I mean, most muggle schools have _at least_ one dance every year. Often two or three.”

“Two or three? Between that and the sports, it’s a wonder muggles manage to get anything done!” McGonagall said. “The Headmaster told me your explanation of muggle sports, Mr. Potter. I wasn’t sure whether to believe it.”

“What’s this about?” Hermione asked him.

“I was explaining to the other Quidditch players about all the sports we have in the muggle world. Sometime, I think it would be nice if we had more sports available here, too, like football or cricket or—”

“Whoa, easy there, tiger,” Hermione cut him off. “This isn’t a muggle school, remember? If you want to even try with that, I think we’d need to see if we could drum up enough support for football before we took it any further.”

“I would advise you to be a good deal less ambitious, Mr. Potter,” McGonagall said. “This school is already busy enough as it is.”

“Honestly, it’s really not, ma’am,” Hermione protested to her obvious surprise. “Muggle schools do a lot more than Hogwarts does. It’s just a matter of oversight—and of students having to pick and choose which events to attend. And many of the events are student-organised. In a muggle school, the prefects would do a lot of planning for the dances.”

“Is that so? Hmm…” McGonagall thought for a moment. “I don’t know about sports so much,” she concluded, “but it is good to have an event like this one once in a while. There _have_ been stretches in the past when Hogwarts held an annual Christmas, Halloween, or Valentine’s Ball, but Headmaster Dippet was anything but an art lover, and Professor Dumbledore, for all his eccentricities, doesn’t seem to think about such things. Perhaps it is a tradition worth reviving.”

“That would be nice, Professor,” Harry agreed, to Hermione’s surprise. “Now, if you’ll excuse us…”

They continued on their way and split off in different directions, but before they could get to the rose garden, Harry and Luna were again interrupted.

“Psst. Harry?”

Harry used his feline night vision to look into the shadows where he saw Cedric standing alone. _What is it_ this _time?_ he thought. “Cedric? What is it?”

He stepped forward so he could be seen more clearly. “I was hoping I could talk to you privately.”

Harry sighed and looked back at his date apologetically. “I’ll just be a minute, Luna.” He marched over to Cedric’s corner and said, “Make it quick. I’m on a date.”

“I know. So am I. I wanted to ask how far you really had got with the clue to the second task.”

“Oh. That. I figured out how to get the disk right away, but I haven’t made any progress from there.”

He nodded: “I thought you might not have. No offence. If you want my advice, maybe you need to get some air.”

“What?”

“Just find someplace high up and in the open air to clear your head. Like the Astronomy Tower. Take the disk with you.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m just saying, the Astronomy Tower is a good place to go and mull things over.”

“Come on, Cedric, I told you exactly what the first task was.”

“Oh, alright, then. It’s not just an astrolabe. It’s a collapsible armillary sphere. You need to take it to the top of the Astronomy Tower and expose it to starlight to unlock it. Then, just remember the code phrase.”

“Right. I’ll do that the next time I’m within a hundred miles of the Astronomy Tower,” Harry said. Honestly, he _was_ going home tomorrow.

“Sorry,” he replied sheepishly. “It took me a while to figure it out myself.”

“Well, thanks anyway. And Merry Christmas.”

Harry quickly returned to his date, and they finally made it to the courtyard. The cliff leading down to the boathouse had been turned into a blooming, terraced rose garden despite the winter cold. It was lit in a soft, flickering like by a number of lanterns hung all through it, and it had a dark, eerie kind of beauty to it.

“What was that about, Harry?” Luna asked.

“Just a clue to the second task. I’ll worry about it after holidays.”

“Ah. Thank you so much for asking me to come with you tonight, Harry,” she told him. “I never thought I’d have this much fun at a ball.”

“Yeah, me either,” Harry agreed. “Thank you for coming with me.”

They walked through the gardens for a while, arm in arm, up and down the terraces, admiring the scenery. They saw a number of other amorous couples along the way, and they had to be careful to avoid Snape, who was breaking them up. It was only when Harry felt the chill on his face that he realised how cold it was.

“Are you cold out here, Luna?” he asked, though he hardly had to. He could see the goose pimples on her arms.

“It is getting chilly, isn’t it?”

“Here, this is why guys wear extra layers, I think.” He quickly took off his outer cloak and offered it to her.

“Why, thank you, Harry,” she said, putting it on. She was so much shorter than he that it brushed the ground, but it would keep her warm. “You’re quite the gentleman. These gardens are very beautiful, aren’t they? I hope they keep them.”

“Yeah, they’re nice.”

They continued on, sometimes talking about trivial things and sometimes in pleasant silence. When they had strolled through the whole garden all the way down and back up, they decided to go back inside. It was only then that they looked up and saw the strategically-place mistletoe at the entrance to the courtyard.

Harry stood still, waiting to see how Luna would react. She was younger than he, and it was her first ever date. Plus she was shyer than Cho, so he really wasn’t sure how she would feel about kissing.

“Be careful, Harry. It may be infested with nargles,” Luna said.

Harry suppressed a frown. Was she trying to steer him away? Or was she giving him an out? He certainly wouldn’t mind kissing her. He had kissed Cho on each of his dates with her and interestingly found himself rather more interested in kissing Luna. He decided to make his opinion a little clearer: “Well, do you know any good ways to repel nargles?”

Luna cocked her head to one side thoughtfully. “I didn’t bring my charmed necklace,” she said, “and you don’t have one anyway…but it can help to hide your face,” she added with a small smile.

That didn’t sound any more encouraging—nor less confusing. “What do you mean?” Harry asked.

“Well, if you had a tree, where would you hide it?” she said, still smiling.

“…What?”

She took a step towards him: “In a forest, silly.” She stood on her toes to bring her face closer to his.

Harry finally got the message and smiled as well. He leaned forward and kissed her gently. They stayed there a long time. Well, actually, it probably only lasted a couple of seconds, but his sense of time seemed distorted. He still didn’t hear angels singing. (Did anyone ever really in the real world?) But there was definitely something there that there hadn’t been with Cho. He and Luna…clicked better, he supposed. They understood each other better. And while Cho was nice enough and very pretty, he had to admit that he had more fun with Luna around.

This was turning out better than he expected.

* * *

Hermione and Neville also took a walk around the rose garden, but in the opposite direction. They crossed paths with Harry and Luna a couple of times, but the couples gave each other their space. Hermione and Neville ran into Snape once, but he merely gave them a suspicious glare and told them to move along. They returned to the entrance sooner than Harry and Luna did, and Hermione tried to stop them under the mistletoe without being too obvious about it. However, Neville looked decidedly uncomfortable when they drew near the door and didn’t seem to notice what she was doing.

“I—er—thank you for coming with me tonight, Hermione. I really appreciate it,” he said.

“Of course it’s been a wonderful evening,” she replied.

“Yeah, it has,” Neville said with an awkward smile. And then, before she could properly place themselves under the mistletoe, Neville leaned in and kissed her—on the cheek.

And then he blushed furiously. She couldn’t even tell whether he’d done that accidentally or on purpose. Neville’s confidence had grown over the past three and a half years as she and Harry had helped him with his spellcasting and potions brewing and pushed him to become physically fit, but it still came in waves at times, and a little thing could still trip him up.

Hermione was disappointed, of course. She almost threw caution to the wind and went for the kiss herself, but something held her back. Neville was a perfect gentleman and had already shown her a wonderful time tonight, and she knew him well enough to tell that it wasn’t about anything she’d done. If he was really that shy about it, she didn’t want to ruin their night. She would see him a couple of times over the holidays, and she could— _would_ —talk to him about it properly in a less high-pressure setting. For now, she allowed him to escort her back to the dance floor.

By now, the Weird Sisters had transitioned to more dance-able songs, although there was only a little organised dancing going on. She saw Colin Creevey trying to explain to Ginny about the informal, unchoreographed dancing that muggle teenagers did, which led to her alternately giggling and awkwardly trying to mimic him.

“She looks like she’s having a good time,” Hermione commented.

“Yeah, she is,” Ron spoke from behind her, making her jump.

“Oh! Hi, Ron. I didn’t see you there.”

“Sorry. Of course, Mum’s gonna go spare when she finds out Ginny came with a werewolf.”

“She wouldn’t!” Hermione gasped. “She won’t be that bad, will she?”

“Well, it’s not like she’s really against werewolves, if that’s what you mean. It’s just that she’s really protective. Mind you, I wouldn’t be too happy with it either if I hadn’t seen Professor Lupin and the others be nice and friendly all year. It’s hard to get over what you’ve been taught.”

“Story of all our lives,” Hermione muttered.

“You don’t think your mum will try to break them up, do you?” Parvati asked worriedly by Ron’s side. “They look so cute together.”

“Nah, probably not. She’ll yell about it some, but Ginny can stand up to her.”

“Well, if you’re sure…”

Ron and Parvati also looked like they were having a good time, which Hermione uncharitably found herself a little surprised at. Ron wasn’t exactly a romantic while Parvati decidedly was. But she was happy for them. Harry and Luna came back after the next song, with Harry grinning broadly and even Luna smiling quite a bit more than usual. Clearly, something had happened on their walk. Hermione watched from a distance as her brother started dancing again and spun Luna around in a swing style (though nowhere near Fred’s level).

“Nice night, isn’t it, Hermione?” an exaggerated smooth voice said.

Hermione suppressed a groan and turned to see Cormac McLaggen lounging nearby, with little Romilda Vane sitting by his side, glaring at the couple on the dance floor. “I’d say the ball is a success, yes,” Hermione answered cagily.

“Well, you’re certainly looking good,” McLaggen told her with a grin that bordered on a leer.

“Thank you, McLaggen,” she replied unenthusiastically. “I meant most people are enjoying themselves.” She turned to watch her brother again and smiled. “Harry looks like he’s having the time of his life out there.”

“Hmpf!” Romilda squeaked.

“Hey, it’s not so bad, Romi,” McLaggen said. “You’ve still got me.”

Romilda rolled her eyes and smiled patronisingly at him.

“You know what you need, Romi? Another butterbeer. Everything’s better with butterbeer, am I right? I’ll get you some. Hermione, you want anything?”

“Oi! Her date’s right here, McLaggen!” Neville spoke up.

“Suit yourself,” he said.

“Just a small glass of punch for me, Neville,” Hermione said softly, and Neville also walked off.

“I just don’t get it,” Romilda muttered, still glaring at Harry—or more accurately, Harry’s date.

And Hermione had had just about enough of this girl. “How does Cormac feel about you crushing on another boy, _Romi_?” she said waspishly.

“Oh, Cormac and I just came as friends.”

“Friends?” She couldn’t believe that. Did they even know each other?

“Sure. He’s been really sweet tonight, and he’s a good dancer, but we’re just friends.”

 _Sweet? McLaggen?_ Was this girl in denial?

“I don’t get it!” Romilda repeated, stamping her foot. “It’s Loony Lovegood! She’s barmy!”

“She’s not barmy, Romilda. And her name is Luna,” Hermione snapped. “And they’re clearly having a great time together.”

“But what does he see in her?”

Hermione smiled again and said, “Harry has a knack for seeing the inner beauty in people when no one else can.” She turned that smile on Romilda and added, “He gets that from his mother.” She took another couple and added, “Plus, she’s unconventional, and Harry’s always had a taste for the unconventional.”

“Unconventional?” Romilda said incredulously.

“Maybe you should just try to have a good time with Cormac.”

Romilda harrumphed and ignored her, even though she had seemed to be enjoying herself when someone managed to turn her attention away from Harry.

Hermione and Neville got back to Harry and Luna near the end of the dance and caught up on their respective conversations. Hermione was definitely interested in Cedric’s clue and annoyed that the couple played coy about whether they’d kissed or not (even though it saved her and Neville from having to answer the same question).

“So Romilda’s still after me?” Harry asked when Hermione recounted the girl’s antics.

“Yes, there’s not much deterring that girl.”

“But she _does_ seem to be having a good time with her date,” Luna pointed out.

“Hmpf. They deserve each other,” Hermione said firmly.

“Yeah…except I’m not sure which of them I’m more worried for,” Harry said.

“Perhaps they’ll be a good fit,” Luna suggested.

Suddenly, their conversation was interrupted by Kirley Duke announcing the last dance, and their other concerns were quickly banished. They finished the ball strong and left feeling more contented than Harry especially had felt since before Halloween.

“Do you want me to walk you to your dorm?” Harry asked Luna as they split off in the Entrance Hall.

“That’s alright, Harry. I know the way,” she said with a smile.

“Er…that’s not exactly what I meant—”

Luna giggled: “You’re very easy, you know, Harry. Of course you can walk me to my dorm. It’s nearly on the way, isn’t it?”

The group climbed to the seventh floor together, but Harry split off to take Luna to Ravenclaw Tower. He wasn’t sure if Luna would go for the goodnight kiss, but it turned out she went for a goodnight hug instead. But it was a very warm hug—and very Luna.

“Goodnight, Harry,” she said. “I had a wonderful evening.”

“Goodnight, Luna. So did I. I’ll see you at New Year’s.”


	101. The Tragic Tournament

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Too far a retreat from reality is JK Rowling.
> 
> I hereby release the story of La Tragédie du Tournoi d’An I to the community. If anyone wants to create their own version, please feel free to do so, and PM me so I can read it.

“I do not think Karkaroff is involved in any plot to restore the Dark Lord,” Snape told Dumbledore and Moody in the wee hours after the ball ended. “He has also noticed his Mark growing darker, and he is terrified of the prospect. He intends to flee if the Dark Lord does return.”

“You are certain of this, Severus?” Dumbledore asked.

“I’m hardly infallible, Albus, especially with wandless Legilimency. But there is no reason for Karkaroff to be involved. He has nothing to gain and everything to lose from the Dark Lord’s return. We knew this already. I doubt that even aiding his return would make up for breaking the masque of secrecy and selling out his fellow Death Eaters. I’m more concerned with these rumours that some of the Inner Circle have already been approached to re-form the group.”

“Yes, that is clear enough,” Dumbledore admitted. “Unfortunately, the only other serious suspects here remain David Monroe and Ludo Bagman.”

“Hmm. Did you learn any more about your conversation tonight?” Snape asked.

“A little. Bagman may be acting strange, but his behaviour seems to be related to his unfortunate gambling habits. Monroe _did_ seem unusually interested in Harry’s performance in the Tournament, but this _is_ David Monroe we are talking about. He no more supports Voldemort than I do.”

“He could be impersonated,” Moody pointed out.

“The wards registered him as David Monroe, Alastor. It would be more plausible if he was simply concerned for Harry’s well-being as the youngest champion.”

“Or Imperiused, maybe?”

“Always a possibility, yes. I will continue my study of the relevant memories in the new year.”

“And someone ought to tell the boy about this,” Moody added. “He needs to know what the enemy’s up to.”

“It would mean little to him that he does not already know. Harry already knows that Voldemort is implementing a plan to return thanks to the recent prophecy.”

“Amazing as it may seem, I agree with Moody on this, Albus,” Snape said dryly, prompting Moody to give him a suspicious look. “Too many of your mistakes have come from not keeping Potter apprised of the situation.”

Dumbledore had to admit he had a point. He hoped that at his age, he could admit his own failings. That was indeed a mistake he had made a few too many times for his liking. And he also had to keep in mind that young Harry and his family had explicitly rejected any attempt to shield them from the trouble. “Of course, I will keep that in mind, Severus,” he said.

* * *

Harry and Hermione were still in a good mood on Christmas Day. They had had their usual family Christmas morning celebration with Grandma and Grandpa Granger and Sirius and Remus where they regaled them with tales of the Yule Ball and showed off photos. On the evening of Christmas Day, everyone except Grandma and Grandpa, who weren’t officially supposed to know about magic, went on to their last Christmas tradition, the premier of the Diagonal Theatre’s Christmas play. It was one of the biggest social events of the year and was definitely the biggest event of magical Britain’s small entertainment industry—with the possible exception of the national Quidditch finals.

But this year, for the first time, the Grangers had been too distracted to really know anything about this year’s play. It seemed that the Theatre had been bitten by the same Tetrawizard Tournament bug that was gripping the rest of the nation, for they had written a new original play: _La Trag_ _édie du Tournoi d’An I._ The title, it turned out, was anachronistic: the Revolutionary Calendar wasn’t in widespread use until Year II. But the theme of the play was clear. Three years after the Storming of the Bastille, Beauxbatons Academy of Magic was set to host the Triwizard Tournament. Despite uncertainties about the stability of the new Legislative Assembly running the country, the plans went forward, and the preparations were put in place.

Then, three weeks before the start of the school year, as the play’s introduction revealed, an earthquake: the king was overthrown and the monarchy suspended. Even though a century had passed since the Statute of Secrecy, the magical world was not immune to the chaos. Most pureblood wizards were royalists on general principle, while the frustrated muggle-borns favoured the revolutionaries. The school year still began in a civil manner, but the debate in the halls was heated.

Three weeks after the term started, the new constitution officially abolished the monarchy. The play anachronistically depicted a group of revolutionary wizards Portkeying into Baton Vert and announcing the beginning of the French Republic and the beginning of the new Year I. The majority of wizards objected to this, but things were rapidly growing dangerous. Muggle royalists and clergy were being executed, and the revolutionary wizards (Harry thought they looked rather thuggish) were threatening anyone who didn’t fall into line.

The Hogwarts and Durmstrang contingents were understandably nervous when they arrived, and they certainly had their disagreements with the French wizards. The Brits and Germans (for most of Durmstrang was German) were both more royalist than the French, who were turning more and more republican out of political necessity. Unfortunately, this put them at odds with the two judges sent by the now-solidly revolutionary French Ministry. But despite the conflict, the Triwizard Tournament was a centuries-old and highly respected tradition, and nothing short of complete catastrophe could change that. The champions were selected and the Tournament began.

Trouble started at once. The Beauxbatons champion, Pepin Darnay, was a royalist who, despite the backing of his teachers, found himself on the wrong side politically with two of the judges and embraced by the Hogwarts and Durmstrang Heads in a bizarre case of strange bedfellows. The Hogwarts and Durmstrang champions were no fans of the French monarchy, but they were a lot more worried by the blood being spilt by the revolution and its opposition to the old ways of the wizarding world. (The Grangers thought the anachronism was showing through again, since the worst of the violence in both the magical and muggle worlds was associated with the Terror two years later.)

The revolutionaries were angry that one of their own was not selected. The two judges from the French Ministry wanted a new selection, but the decision of the Goblet of Fire was final. However, they eventually decided to call for a volunteer from among the revolutionary students to compete against the others without the sanction of the Goblet. (“Thank God Karkaroff didn’t think of that,” Harry whispered to Hermione.) They wanted their own champion, and they found her: a half-blood named Judith Defarge, whose muggle-born mother had been persecuted by the ruling purebloods. (Obviously, the writer had read _A Tale of Two Cities._ ) The visiting schools strongly protested, but they were bound by the Goblet’s contract and couldn’t back out now.

In contrast to the usual international competition, the Tournament soon became a competition between the three official champions and the revolutionary upstart, Defarge. Tensions rose as the school divided itself along these lines, and infighting amongst the judges and the student bodies became commonplace. All of the champions received minor injuries from hexes as the first task approached.

The first task had the four champions each battling a dragon, and the magical special effects were so convincing that they drew screams from the audience. (At least, the Grangers _hoped_ they were special effects.) It was a great action scene, although in terms of plot, aside from the factions in the school cheering when the champions they disliked were badly injured, it didn’t change very much.

The first act ended with the Yule Ball, but this did not go as well as the one at Hogwarts had. The ball was an old tradition, and thus it was an occasion for the rich purebloods to show off their ostentatious wealth and fancy clothes. The resentful revolutionaries, egged on by the judges from Paris, kept trying to disrupt the event until the whole thing dissolved into shouting and hexing and had to be ended early. The angered Headmaster of Beauxbatons separated the two groups and threw the unruly visitors out of the castle, but the first act ended with an ominous pronouncement from the French Head of International Cooperation that enemies of the revolution would soon get what was coming to them.

The curtain rose on the second act in January with the announcement that the king had been guillotined, and so had the old, royalist Minister for Magic. The mood in the castle became sombre as the royalists saw that the revolutionaries had real power to kill those of whom they disapproved. When the news was announced, Judith Defarge lorded it over the cowed purebloods of the school and effectively ruled the roost so that even the visiting students were afraid of her. However, Pepin Darnay worked up the courage to confront her shortly before the second task, shouting her down and telling her that no matter how much she hated the muggle king and his pureblood wizard cronies, killing them all wasn’t the answer. But the witch didn’t listen and immediately began plotting her revenge.

The second task was a highly dubious one in which each of the champions was required to rescue a hostage—a cherished friend or family member—from the bottom of a nearby lake. But Judith tried to sabotage Pepin and prevent him from rescuing his younger sister from the lake. This led to another impressive feat of magical special effects as the actors staged a vicious underwater duel. Judith won it by fighting dirty—using the hostages as human shields and successfully incapacitating Pepin while absconding with her own hostage. It was never clear whether the hostages were in real danger, but in the end, they came out of it unharmed when the Hogwarts and Durmstrang champions teamed up to rescue the other three hostages and Pepin together.

When he woke up on the shore, Pepin violently attacked Judith and accused her of trying to kill his sister, an innocent child, out of spite. They had to be pulled apart, and the judges’ blatantly biased scoring of the task nearly caused them to draw wands themselves. Ultimately, they compromised and declared the champions to be in a four-way tie. Samuel Everard, the Headmaster of Hogwarts declared that it was a mark of a true compromise that nobody liked it. After the second task, the British and German contingents came together and expressed their disapproval of the whole Tournament continuing at all at this point.

By the third task, Beauxbatons was in chaos. Duels were breaking out in the halls, and students and teachers alike had been arrested for disloyalty to the Republic. But even so, the Headmaster had managed to maintain control. The two revolutionaries from Paris had tried to arrest Pepin Darnay himself and prevent him from completing the Tournament, but the Headmaster had stopped them. In retaliation, they hatched a scheme with Judith Defarge to make her the winner and bring down what they saw as the royalist bastion of Beauxbatons once and for all.

The third task was a large hedge maze that the champions were to navigate and capture a cockatrice that was roaming through it. Contrary to muggle accounts, the gaze of a cockatrice would not kill, but it would stun its victims unconscious. Since the victim was typically eaten afterwards, it was hard for muggles to tell the difference. Also, unlike the basilisk (and the muggle accounts again), its reflection held no danger at all, hence the maze. But Judith was secretly given a potion made from mandrakes and weasel eyes that conferred temporary immunity to the cockatrice’s gaze, as well as a dark artifact made from a weasel’s skull that would help her locate the beast (the weasel being the cockatrice’s natural enemy). She was to capture the cocktrice, but not blindfold it, as she was supposed to, and then set it loose to incapacitate and eat the Headmaster and anyone else who stood in their way.

The plan almost worked. Judith captured the cockatrice quickly and led it the exit of the maze. It was only because the other three champions were on guard after the second task that the revolutionaries were foiled. The three official champions had arranged a system of signals in case there was any trouble. The Durmstrang Champion saw what Judith was doing and alerted the others. Unfortunately, when they converged on the exit, they spooked the cockatrice, and it broke free of the hobble on its feet and went on a rampage.

Half the crowd was knocked out instantly, including all three school Heads. The rest, those who happened to be looking away and a handful of revolutionaries who were expecting it, were overwhelmed before they knew what hit them. Three of the champions gave chase, while Judith stood back and watched the chaos that was unfolding. The cockatrice tried to eat the judges, but the champions forced it back before it could reach them, and Pepin shouted out for everyone to join them and help fight. Many tried to scatter, but as the cockatrice stomped through the stands, they soon had no choice. Even Judith’s pride rapidly turned to horror as she saw her fellow students being trampled, royalists and revolutionaries alike.

“You see what you’ve caused?!” Pepin shouted at her as the defenders fell. “It’s just going to kill everybody! You have to stop it!”

At that, Judith Defarge finally saw the error of her ways. She was an excellent duellist, but more importantly, since she had taken the potion, she was the only one who could fight the beast head on. In one final spectacle of magical special effects, the cockatrice stomped straight downstage, as if it were about to attack the audience, when Judith stepped in front of it. It one swift, brutal battle, the cockatrice fell down dead, but Judith was mortally wounded in the process. She died in Pepin’s arms.

Being a tragedy, the play ended on an ambiguous note. The students had achieved the catharsis of overcoming their disagreements to come together against a common enemy, but at the same time, all of the judges and many of the students had been badly injured, and worse, the Beauxbatons Headmaster was so badly wounded that he would have to retire. His last act was to join with the other Heads in ending the Triwizard Tournament in perpetuity. With him gone next year, the school would be left more vulnerable to the revolutionaries as the war got worse in the rest of the country. The students likely would be under their heel by autumn. Even so, the students agreed to try to be more civil in their disputes and face it together.

The play was a big hit. The audience loved it, and the Grangers thought it was well written. It managed to avoid the biggest pitfalls of portraying France in an overly negative light and of unfairly emphasising the partially muggle-born roots of the revolutionaries (the revolutionaries were disproportionately muggle-born, but muggle-borns by themselves weren’t nearly enough to sustain them).

After the play, the Grangers milled around the reception, meeting friends, acquaintances, and political allies while Harry kept trying to give Rita Skeeter the slip. Seriously, the woman always seemed to be scuttling around right behind him.

Hermione quickly separated from her family when she found Neville. Neville’s Gran gave her a thoughtful, appraising look, but she let the two go off on their own without saying anything.

“So how did you like the play, Neville?” Hermione asked as they strolled around the room.

“It was amazing!” he said. “I felt like I was really there! When that cockatrice charged the stage—”

“Yeah, they really pulled out the stops with the magical effects. I thought it was fascinating how they showed the interplay between the magical and muggle worlds, even after the Statute of Secrecy.”

“Uh huh. Really makes you think about how we’re not that separate from muggles after all—Well, _you_ know that.”

“Yes, but it’s nice to see it.”

They kept walking in silence for a minute, moving towards the far corner of the hall.

“I hope the rest of the Tournament doesn’t go like that, though,” Neville said.

“Yeah, me too.” She shivered. “At least there’s no danger of a muggle revolution anytime soon.” She tried to smile, and Neville tried to return it. His smile widened a little as he switched topics.

“So I went to visit my parents today. They’re both talking, now.”

“They are?”

“Mm hmm. Their memory still isn’t too good, but that…that…speech pathologist person? She’s really helped them. I mean, Dad still uses the wrong words a lot, and Mum stutters, but—”

“I’m really happy for you, Neville,” she cut him off.

“It’s amazing to be able to tell them about my time at Hogwarts and have them understand it. Well…part of it…” he reminisced with tears in his eyes. “They were really happy when I told them how good a time I had at the Yule Ball.”

Hermione blushed deeply: “They were?”

“Yeah…” Neville fell silent. He leaned closer to her… “You and your family should come visit them before we go back to school.”

Hermione squeaked at the sudden change of topic. “Um…I guess so…?” she answered awkwardly.

“Well, they want to meet my friends, don’t they? Plus, they were good friends with Harry’s birth parents.”

“Right. Right.” Hermione took a deep breath to collect herself. “We’ll be there.”

“Great. You’re the best, Hermione,” Neville said quickly, and then, before he could reconsider, he kissed her on the cheek and just as quickly rejoined the mingling.

Hermione sighed. _Sometime_ this holiday, she’d get a proper conversation about that in with that boy.

The main person Harry wanted to meet tonight was Mandy Brocklehurst. Since her family _de facto_ owned the Theatre, and her great-grandfather had been a great help to them in their political causes, he certainly wanted to compliment them on their work.

“Hi, Har—er, Lord Potter!” she called, waving him over.

Harry let the formality go—though it worried him occasionally that he was starting to get used to it—and kissed her hand. “Good evening, Miss Brocklehurst,” he said.

Mandy giggled. “So what did you think of the play?” she asked.

“I liked it. It was well-written. It was really interesting seeing how the muggle revolution affected things. And if I’m really lucky, it’ll make people think about how screwed up this year’s Tournament is.”

Mandy’s face fell: “I’m sorry, we didn’t really think about…It’s just that it’s an interesting historical story, and…”

“It’s alright, Mandy,” he assured her. “I don’t mind seeing plays about it or anything. Honestly, I probably would’ve enjoyed this Tournament myself if I hadn’t got stuck competing.” Which wasn’t necessarily a good thing, what with the other champions risking their necks for the people’s enjoyment.

Mandy’s great-grandfather, Lord Ethelred Brocklehurst, walked up to them with his cane and greeted Harry formally. “So, Lord Potter,” he asked, “now that you’ve seen a few of our productions, do you have a preference among them? We always try to get a good measure of what the people are looking for.”

“Well, it’s going to be hard to beat _The Wizard and the Hopping Pot_ ,” he answered. It was amazing how a children’s story had made such a great play. “This one definitely had the best special effects, though. And I like historical plays like this. It’s nice to learn about things in history I normally wouldn’t.” Well, technically, this one fell into the category of “loosely based on a true story,” but whatever.

“Yes, I’ve always thought so,” Lord Brocklehurst agreed. “I must say the new history professor at Hogwarts has given us a lot of new ideas.”

“He has?”

“Indeed. We’ve been getting more requests for new historical plays than we have in decades. It seems that with someone finally teaching history _properly_ , the people want more.”

Mandy leaned closer to Harry and told him conspiratorially, “A bunch of us in Ravenclaw think it would be neat to have a play that tells the _real_ story of Armand Malfoy, but we’re not sure Lord Malfoy would let us get away with it.”

Harry laughed: “Yeah, you’re probably right. But can you imagine the look on his face if you did?”

They both laughed. Even old Lord Brocklehurst chuckled a little.

Draco Malfoy noticed the group laughing from across the room, but, not knowing what they were laughing about, dismissed it. What Mandy Brocklehurst didn’t know, though, was that Draco had heard of that idea of the Ravenclaws through the grapevine. But he’d kept it to himself. One more thing to think about.

* * *

Bathilda Bagshot opened her door and blinked into the sunlight, squinting up at Harry Potter and his family.

“Hello, Ms. Bagshot,” Emma said, loudly enough so she could hear. They always visited to take tea with the old woman at least once a year, usually over Christmas holidays. Her house looked the same as it always did—a rather poorly-maintained throwback to the nineteenth century. Not surprising, really. No one was quite sure how old she was, but she had to be pushing a hundred and fifty by now, and she didn’t own a house elf as far as they knew, although she did have some thoughtful neighbours who checked on her regularly, just as the Potters had done all those years ago.

“Hello, there, Mrs. Granger,” she said cheerfully. “It’s good to see you all.”

“We hope you don’t mind, Ms. Bagshot; we’ve brought a friend with us. I think you’ve met before. This is Remus Lupin.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you again, Professor Bagshot,” Remus said, offering his hand.

Bathilda clasped his hand as firmly as she could and pulled him close so she could peer at him carefully. The Grangers weren’t sure how she could see at all with as thick as her cataracts were getting, nor why she hadn’t had them healed. Maybe even magic couldn’t help you at that age. “Remus Lupin…Remus Lupin…” she muttered, trailing off into the mists of memory. “Oh, yes, one of those boys who was always running around with James. Always running, you four. Yes, it’s good to see you again. Please come in.”

She hobbled inside and started the tea, shakily lighting the stove with matches. It had been years since they saw her use a wand, and they weren’t sure she was able anymore. It worried them, her living alone like this. The matches alone—they could tell she had difficulty sometimes, and most wizards weren’t used to them. But they pushed aside those thoughts. They’d notify the neighbours if they saw something really wrong.

“Remus just started teaching History this year at Hogwarts,” Emma told her.

“Ah, a history teacher. Fine subject. Fine subject…” she said.

Remus sighed. The Grangers had been right when they warned him it was hard to get any useful information out of her with the way her mind was. “Yes, I’m enjoying it a lot,” he said. “History instruction was so disjointed at Hogwarts until I took over from Professor Binns this year—”

“Oh, I remember Professor Binns,” she said with a smile, losing the thread of the conversation. “He was a wonderful teacher. He’s the one who made me so interested in history. Whatever became of him?”

“He died forty years ago,” Remus said flatly, vaguely astonished at her words. “And he’s still been teaching ever since until we made him retire to haunt the library.”

“Oh, such a shame. He was such an animated young man when I had him as a teacher.”

They all goggled at her. Hermione and Harry weren’t sure whether to be more gobsmacked that she was that old or that Binns was that old. And now, she started wandering off, reminiscing about her school days. It took Remus a fair bit of gentle prodding to get her back on the subject of history and still more to ask her the question he’d wanted to ask her all term—the one that had haunted (no pun intended) his class from the start: “Madam Bagshot, why didn’t you ever bother to interview any ghosts when you wrote your books?”

“Interview ghosts?” She blinked in confusion. “Interview ghosts? Well, I spoke to them as much as any young Hufflepuff—”

“We’re you in Ravenclaw, ma’am?” Hermione interrupted. “That’s what you wrote in _Hogwarts, A History_.”

“Ravenclaw? Oh, yes. Yes I was. I forgot.”

 _Well, this is going swimmingly,_ Remus thought.

“I always enjoyed sifting through old scrolls,” she continued, “searching for those little nuggets of information that no one else thought to look for and no one had expected to find written down.”

“Yes, but why not talk to the ghosts?” he pressed.

“Well, so few wizards become ghosts that it doesn’t contribute very much, does it…And after that incident with Helena Ravenclaw, I’m afraid I quite lost my nerve about talking to them.”

“Helena Ravenclaw?”

“Yes, Rowena’s daughter. Though most people called her the Grey Lady.”

Remus yelped and fell out of his chair. “The Grey Lady is Ravenclaw’s daughter?” he gasped. “Good Lord, no wonder she didn’t want to tell me her real name.” He could only guess what the secretive ghost had done when Bathilda had tried to press her about her past.

“Professor Bagshot,” Harry spoke up, “Remus has had a lot of the castle ghosts, er, helping him lecture this year, and they teach a lot of things differently. They say that a lot of those old scrolls have a completely different point of view if they were written after the Statute of Secrecy rather than before, and they don’t give a fair look at the real history of the magical world. If nothing else, talking to ghosts could have helped you make sure you weren’t getting things wrong or using biased sources.”

Bathilda Bagshot stared at Harry like a deer in headlamps.

“Your scholarship _is_ very good within the realm you worked in, Professor,” Remus said apologetically.

Her mouth opened slightly, and her lower jaw started quivering—more of a tic than an emotional response.

“The main issue is that you wrote all your books from a fundamentally modern perspective,” he continued, “the comparatively anti-muggle perspective of the post-Secrecy era—without looking at how people viewed their own times before the 1700s.”

The ancient witch furrowed her brow unhappily, but still didn’t speak.

Hermione waved her hand in front of her face. “Are you alright, Professor?” she asked. How awful would it be if she’d just had a stroke or something?

Bathilda coughed and stuttered, “P-pl-please excuse me, Miss Granger. I’ve just never thought of things this way before. And I think if you put it that way, Remus,  I can see why you would want a more contemporary, cultural view of historiography. Of course, if you’re interviewing ghosts, you would almost have to take that view of history. Now, I would say there’s a place for both views—that there’s a place for taking the long view and seeing how history affects us today as well. But by Merlin, you make me wish I _had_ written a book about interviewing ghosts. Oh, if I were fifty years younger. But I suppose one of you will have to write the next great tome.”

The others stared at her as shocked as she had looked a minute ago. That was the most lucid the Grangers had ever seen her in the eight years they’d known her. She seemed more animated, and her eyes seemed brighter as she was brought back to her old field of study.

“Well…” Hermione said. “Harry’s done a surprisingly good job writing his own memoirs.”

Harry didn’t particularly appreciate anyone trying to ask him to measure up to such a giant of scholarship. “Well, Remus is doing a really good job of improving the class,” he said.

Remus didn’t appreciate that any more than Harry did. “Well, Hermione is easily doing the best in the class,” to her annoyance.

Bathilda chuckled. “Well, you have plenty of time to sort that out amongst yourselves. And I thank you for the most interesting conversation I’ve had in years. Now, tell me a little more about these ghosts…”

* * *

The New Year’s party at Grimmauld Place was a busy affair, and not just for fun. There was quite a bit of business to be done between people with connections whom they didn’t see each other very often. Horace Slughorn, for example (though they were pretty sure they’d got all the useful information about Voldemort they could out of him), was a good person to keep in touch with. Between his innate knowledge and his own connections, he was a good ally to have if you needed one.

But Albus Dumbledore had other connections he needed to make tonight, most notably with Bill Weasley, with whom he met with Edward Grayson in a bedroom that Sirius had converted into a small, private meeting room.

“Pleased to meet you, Ambassador,” Bill greeted the Australian. “I’ve read a lot about your work. I have to stay on top of things in world magic for my job. If I may say so, some of the things you did in East Africa I’d never even heard of before.”

“It’s always good to hear from a well-read man, Mr. Weasley,” Grayson replied. “I hear you’re a pretty respected cursebreaker, yourself.”

“I try, sir.”

“William comes highly recommended by the Gringotts goblins,” Dumbledore said, and he paused to cast some privacy spells around the room. “He has spent several years working on their most difficult cases in Egypt, and as such, he has on several occasions come into contact with horcruxes.”

Bill grew more serious: “Ah, so _that_ _’s_ what this is about. Harry told me enough to figure out what that diary Ginny had was. And he said you’d found more of them? And You-Know-Who is still out there somewhere.”

“I am afraid so, William,” Dumbledore said. “I trust I can rely on your secrecy?”

“Of course.”

“We have confirmed the destruction of three of Voldemort’s horcruxes. I spoke with Professor Slughorn, who was Voldemort’s Head of House when he was a student, and we believe that there are three or four horcruxes remaining.”

“Good God,” Bill whispered. “I’ve never even heard of more than one—well, no more than rumours, anyway. Nothing confirmed. You know that people with horcruxes can come back, right? You-Know-Who could…could come back.”

“It’s worse than that, kid,” Grayson said. “We think he’s already got a plan in motion.”

Bill paled even further, his freckles standing out unnaturally against his skin. “How long do we have?” he asked shakily.

“A few months at most. It could be any time if he gets desperate.”

Bill shivered: “Professor Dumbledore, I’ll keep your secret, but you can’t this from the people. They need to be ready.”

“I am preparing, of course,” Dumbledore said. “I informed Amelia Bones so that she will not be blindsided, although there is little she can do at this point. I am also quietly reassembling the Order of the Phoenix—the organisation your uncles joined in the last war. If we cannot find the remaining horcruxes, the key will be to respond quickly.”

“I can probably swing a reassignment back to England after the next summer solstice,” Bill said, thinking quickly. “I could help then—if it’s not too late.”

“I think we’ll need the help well past then,” Grayson said. “We still have no leads on the last two horcruxes.”

“Wait, you found another one?” Bill said, quickly doing the maths.

Dumbledore nodded: “That is the most immediate reason why I wanted to speak with you. Have you ever heard any rumour of a way to destroy a horcux without destroying the physical vessel?”

“Destroy it without destroying the—no, of course not. When we find a horcrux, we always send for a goblin expert to come in and destroy it with a cursed blade. I’m not sure if even Master Sharpshard knows what actually got into the blade to do that, but that’s all we have.”

“Most likely basilisk venom,” Dumbledore answered. “And you have not seen any references to such a method in tombs or archives?”

“No, I’ve never seen anything like that…This isn’t theoretical is it, Professor?” Bill asked when he made the connection. “You should just destroy it. Immediately. We _always_ write off horcruxes when we find them. They’re too dangerous to be left intact, no matter how valuable the item is.”

“I understand the dangers. Nevertheless, the peculiar characteristics of this item make it highly undesirable to destroy it.”

That set Bill’s cursebreaker’s senses tingling, though he couldn’t imagine what had happened. “You’re holding something back, Professor,” he said. It wasn’t a question. “What did You-Know-Who do? Use the ritual on the castle? No, there’s no way even he could pull that off. Some critical part of the rune stone network, or something?”

“I have every confidence in your trustworthiness, William, but this is not my secret to tell,” Dumbledore told him. Well, it sort of was, but it was only fair that Harry be told first, if he could help it. “Suffice it to say that we found a horcrux in something valuable enough that we do not want to destroy it, even to get rid of Voldemort for good, unless we absolutely have no other choice.”

“Well, I can’t help you there; sorry. I can ask around, but it’ll make the goblins suspicious.”

“That won’t be necessary just yet.”

“Have you heard of anyone ever botching the ritual?” Grayson asked. “Not getting the soul fragment to bind right?”

Now, that set Bill’s cursebreaker senses tingling _much_ more. “Not getting it to _bind_ right? I’ve never…Look, you two probably know more about soul magic than I do. I already know more than I care to, and that’s just what I need for my job. I only have to worry about the end product. With a ritual that dark, I would’ve assumed that it would either go as intended, or the soul fragment would be lost, probably killing the caster in the process. That’s all I’ve got.”

Dumbledore was disappointed, though partly relieved that Bill _didn_ _’t_ know any more about horcruxes and—he suspected—didn’t make the connection to Harry. “We still appreciate the help, of course,” he said. “Thank you for your time.”

Bill went on his way, and Dumbledore and Grayson went back to socialising. They had one more meeting, but tonight might not be the best time, so he had decided to ask the host for a meeting at a later date.

“Have you learnt about our great-great-grandfather?” Sullivan Fawley asked Hermione Granger as Dumbledore approached the Granger Family. “Binns never seemed to get around to it.”

“I…it’s a little embarrassing, but I never got around to it either,” Hermione admitted. “I should really learn more about our family history. Was he well-known? You always see the same family names popping up so often that you never really know.”

“It’s alright,” Sullivan said. “It’s not something we trumpet about either. Our great-great-grandfather was Hector Fawley. He was the Minister for Magic during Grindelwald’s rise.”

“We’re related to a former Minister for Magic?” Hermione asked her cousin.

“Yes, but it’s not something we like to talk about.”

“You should not be ashamed of your family, Mr. Fawley,” Dumbledore cut in.

Sullivan jumped: “Oh! Good evening, Professor.”

“Good evening, Professor,” Hermione echoed. “Sullivan was just explaining our shared family history. I didn’t realise we were related to someone so important.”

“Well, that’s debatable,” Sullivan muttered.

“Again, I say, you should not be ashamed of your family,” Dumbledore repeated. “I daresay history has not been kind to Hector because he dismissed the warning signs during the lead-up to Grindelwald’s War. However, he was considered a very popular and personable Minister for the decade preceding. One does not hold onto that position for fourteen years without being competent. I remember him as a very good peacetime Minister who sadly could not adapt to wartime.”

“Huh,” Harry said from beside his sister. “Sort of like how Churchill considered Chamberlain a valuable part of his team, but he’s only really remembered today for “Peace in our time.’”

“But Churchill _did_ come out against Chamberlain after the war,” Hermione pointed out.

“Well, obviously. But Remus said there have been disagreements about the lead-up to World War II in recent scholarship.” Remus had been boning up on his own historical scholarship all year and had become very interested in the largely-unremarked interplay between the magical and muggle forces at the time.

“Either way, it _is_ not too different,” Dumbledore said. “Unfortunately, that hurt dear Hector very badly when he stole Mr. Chamberlain’s line.” He chuckled a bit. “I knew a rather irascible American warlock at the time with a penchant for quoting Thomas Paine who took issue with Hector’s statement. The resulting duel was rather…one-sided.”

Sullivan and Hermione both looked a little embarrassed about this part of their family history being aired out, although Harry was sure Hermione would be reading up all she could on it later.

They soon found that Dumbledore actually wanted to talk to them to set up a meeting about Harry in the near future. He apparently had a number of things to talk about, including regarding Voldemort, that he wanted the whole family to be present for. He was pleased to hear that since the party was running so late, the Grangers had decided to stay the night at Grimmauld Place, so they would be able to meet there tomorrow afternoon.

With that settled, Hermione set out to find the boy she’d wanted to talk to all night. She found him with his Gran, who was trying to introduce him to some third cousins he’d never heard of, and she immediately rescued him. The hard part, though, was trying to find some privacy at the crowded party. She knew Neville would feel more comfortable with fewer eyes on them and, truth be told, she felt the same. They passed Harry, who was chatting animatedly with Luna. He winked at Hermione when Neville couldn’t see, and she made a mental note to get him back later. She soon found that the first floor hallway outside the drawing room was mostly unoccupied, and even then only by people passing through. There, away from the noise, she could finally have a frank discussion with Neville.

“So, Neville, did you have a good time at the Yule Ball?” she asked him.

“The Yule Ball? Of course I did. I said I did,” he said worriedly. “Why, was there something wrong with it?”

“No. No, it was a lovely date,” she said, turning a soft pink. She bit her lip before she continued, “I was just wondering…Well, I’m sorry to be blunt, Neville, but when we stood under the mistletoe…”

Neville blushed much harder than Hermione: “Er…yeah…I mean…I kissed you on the cheek.”

“I know. I was just wondering why you didn’t…do more…”

That shade of red couldn’t be healthy. For that matter, Hermione could feel her cheeks growing hotter, too. “Oh, well, I do…like you, if that’s what you mean,” he stammered out. “I just…you know, felt kind of awkward about kissing on the first date.”

Hermione smiled warmly. So _that_ _’s_ what this was. Well, it didn’t really surprise her. “And the Christmas play?” she asked.

“Well, that wasn’t really even a date, was it? And everybody was watching.”

She nodded. “And…what about here?” she asked innocently.

“Huh?”

She pointed upwards and revealed that they were now standing under one of Sirius’s strategically-placed sprigs of mistletoe.

Neville let out a short squeak before he tamped it down. “Oh! Um…did you want to…” he started.

Hermione took his face gently in her hands and said, “Neville, you don’t have to feel awkward about kissing me. I know we’ve only had one official date, but we’ve been friends for three and a half years, and that counts for a lot. And I like you, so—you don’t have to if you’re not ready, but you don’t have to hold back on my account.”

Neville looked a little stunned by the position he was in, but slowly, a smile spread across his face. He mirrored Hermione’s position, pulled her to him, and kissed her on the lips. It was light, tentative, but very sweet, in Hermione’s opinion, and her life felt a good deal more in balance.

* * *

After the guests had left, as Harry was preparing for bed, he heard off-key singing coming from down the hall.

_“I could have danced all night. I could have danced all night, and still have begged for more…”_

“Hermione?” he called. She didn’t respond other than to keep singing, but it was definitely her. He could tell. His sister didn’t sing much, and with good reason in his opinion (although Sirius was worse). He could guess what had happened after she had pulled Neville somewhere private. Of course, he wasn’t one to talk. He had manoeuvred Luna under the mistletoe and got another kiss from her tonight. He was happy for Hermione—except for her singing. “Well, it sounds like _someone_ had a good time,” he said loudly.

“Shut up, Harry!” She said cheerfully and kept singing: _“I only know when he began to dance with me, I could have danced, danced, daaaaaaanced all night.”_


	102. A Talk with the Longbottoms

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Harry Potter is people!

Albus Dumbledore and Edward Grayson met with Harry and his family in the attic of Grimmauld Place. Dumbledore had with him a highly marked-up copy of Harry’s second book, _Harry Potter and the Heir of Slytherin_ , which was now ready for publication.

“I was once again pleased with your work, Harry,” Dumbledore said. “You have spun a very entertaining mystery story from your experiences in second year.”

“Aye. You’re a good writer, Mr. Potter, especially for your age,” Grayson said.

“I had a lot of help from Remus,” Harry said.

“Well, congrats to you, too, Remus. And thanks for letting me read the unabridged versions. You’ve done some amazing feats, Mr. Potter, fighting Voldemort like that. You’re also bloomin’ lucky to be alive several times over. I hope you’ve grown at least a bit less crazy now.”

“So do I,” said Harry and half of his family at once.

“It is the unfortunate life of one touched by destiny,” Dumbledore said. “I made my changes to the manuscript to protect our secrets, as with the last one. I unfortunately had to conceal the origin of the diary. It would do no good to have you subject to a libel suit, or worse, a challenge to a duel from Lord Malfoy. Since house elves are sometimes known to each other’s families, I suggest you also describe Dobby under a false name so that no one can trace Lucius through him. I naturally removed all references to your animagus ability once again, and thus had to gloss over a lot of your investigation into the Heir, as well as omitting the prophecy and your Occlumency lessons. I redacted your political conversations and conflict with the Board just a bit. And finally, I removed the truth that the diary was a horcrux and stuck with Tom’s cover story that he was a memory in a cursed diary.

“There was one thing I thought we should discuss together, however, and that was whether to reveal Voldemort’s true parentage, as well as what to do about publishing in general.” In fact, the shade of Riddle hadn’t revealed his true parentage to Harry and Neville in the chamber of Secrets, but he had revealed his real name and that he was the true Heir of Slytherin. From there, someone like Rita Skeeter, had she had the inclination, could have pieced together the rest, just as Dumbledore had. Given the present circumstances, Harry had decided to add it in at the last minute.

“Is there a problem with that?” Emma asked.

“You know that Voldemort is moving again. Professor Snape reports that he is gaining strength, and I have heard increasing rumours that he is already recalling his old followers, one by one. Professor Snape can help little in this matter because Voldemort surely believes he has fully sold out to me by now. But he is already returning, and I fear our chances are dwindling to stop him before he is back at full strength.”

The Grangers stared in horror. “I had no idea it was that bad,” Emma said.

“I had hoped it wasn’t, but all of my investigations have hit dead ends. We are nearly out of options. Rest assured that I am rebuilding my own structures to fight him. However, to reveal his parentage at this time would be a highly provocative act.”

“It would also undermine his rhetoric, though, wouldn’t it?” Harry said.

“Among those who believed your words, yes. But those who were already inclined to follow him will also be inclined to believe it a lie.”

“Would it at least get people to stop calling him You-Know-Who?” Hermione asked.

“A few, perhaps, though I have been trying to make the wizards of Britain realise he is only human for years without success.”

“We could at least stick to him, couldn’t we?” Harry suggested.

“Harry!” Emma gasped.

“What? He already wants to kill me. It’s not like I can make him any madder.”

“You shouldn’t think like that, Harry,” Dan warned him. “We need to be serious about staying safe.”

“We need to be serious about beating Voldemort, Dad,” he protested.

“Yes, we do, be we need to be smart about it. Your last book _did_ say Quirrell was working for Voldemort. We haven’t been shy about saying he’s still out there and making moves against you. But we need to decide if the benefits of _this_ book outweigh the risks.”

Hermione was also considering the implications, and a thought struck her: “Well, Dad, a lot of the Heir of Slytherin business is already public record. If we can find someone who’s willing to publish it, maybe it won’t make much difference, even if Voldemort’s already back.”

“I don’t know if Mr. Drucker would publish it after Voldemort comes back,” Emma said.

“If we can at least have the ads go out before he comes back—” Harry started.

Emma shook her head: “We can’t just do that without telling him.”

“Well, then…how long do you think we have, Professor?” Harry asked.

“Not long, I’m afraid,” Dumbledore said. “Remember, Voldemort wanted you in the Tetrawizard Tournament, Harry. And he must have known that killing you through it would be unlikely. Therefore, it must be related to some larger plan. I’m afraid I still don’t understand what that plan is, but I think it most likely that it will come to fruition at the third task in June, which is also the last day of Hogwarts’s term, another important symbolic date.”

The Grangers shuddered. Somehow, that made it much more real to them. To think that they only had six months of peace left before that deranged murderer came after them again…

Through all of this, Sirius and Remus had been silent, but at this point, Sirius spoke up: “You know, Albus, if this goes down the way we expect, this book would be a valuable…you know, propaganda piece, for lack of a better term. If there’s a war coming, it could be important for the war effort. Couldn’t the Ministry provide for Drucker’s security in that case?”

Dumbledore stroked his beard and thought for a minute. “It’s possible, but it would be difficult,” he concluded. “If the Ministry is slow to mobilise, which is very possible, we might not be able to get Aurors to him right away. The only other option would be to use Order resources, which presents its own set of problems. But I will look into it.”

“Okay, so we can tentatively say publishing the book is okay, if Mr. Drucker agrees,” Dan said. “That still leaves us with the original question of whether we should announce to the world that Voldemort is a half-blood.”

“I vote yes,” Remus said. “It won’t convince his hardcore followers, but the casual supporters who saw him as a way to elevate themselves through their blood status will think twice. Besides, Harry’s right. He’ll try to kill everyone in this room either way, except maybe Edward.”

“I vote yes,” Harry said. “Anything to cut him down to size.”

“Yes, we know how _you_ feel,” Hermione quipped.

“I’m with Remus,” Sirius agreed. “The pureblood elites who weren’t Death Eaters, but looked the other way about them might think twice, too, if they see that in print. And there aren’t any publicly-admitted supporters of Voldemort running free, so it’s not like it’ll be any more dangerous walking down the street.”

Emma slumped and rubbed her head with both hands. “How did we ever get into this position?” she wondered aloud.

“We knew what we were signing up for from the beginning, dear,” Dan said softly, rubbing her back with one hand.

“I know, Dan, and I wouldn’t trade it for anything, but sometimes, I wonder if we ever _really_ understood at all…Oh, I don’t know. I can see where Remus and Sirius are coming from. There’s something to be said for hitting hard and fast.”

“Yes, I can see that. We’ll still have to talk to Mr. Drucker, of course…Hermione, what do you think?”

“Honestly, I think there will some nasty unintended consequences, but if all of you agree, I’ll stand with you.”

“Thanks, sis,” Harry said.

“Don’t thank me yet,” she muttered.

“Alright, then, Dumbledore,” Dan spoke for the family. “We’ll go with including Voldemort’s heritage.”

“Very well. I will spread the word to prepare for that,” the old wizard agreed.

Suddenly, Sirius jumped to his feet and started pacing the room. He was ready to spring into action. “Okay, if we’re gonna do this, we need to do this right,” he said. “We want to have this published before the third task. Albus, can you turn that manuscript into a clean copy with your edits quickly?”

“I can.”

“Good. We’ll send that to Timothy Drucker today so he has time to read it by the book signing on Thursday. Harry has him eating out of his hand, so no problem there. We’ll tell him about the security situation on Thursday and see if he’s willing to do it. We’ll keep the bombshell a secret until we publish.” He rubbed his hands together eagerly. “It’s not every day you get to prank Voldemort, is it?”

The Grangers suddenly felt a little less certain about this idea. Harry, however, wasn’t about to let it slow him down. He wasn’t sure about publishing, anymore, but he intended to have _Harry Potter and the Year of the Wolf_ done by the end of the school year, and he’d started keeping a journal of this year to help him organise his thoughts, since it didn’t seem like trouble would be leaving him alone. Maybe he could do some more good before this was over.

“Well, now that that’s taken care of,” Dumbledore said, “I had another serious matter to discuss with you.”

“Hey, that’s my—mmpf!” Remus clapped a hand over Sirius’s mouth.

“As I was saying, first, I want to ask you, Harry, have you had any more visions since last summer?”

Harry shook his head. “No clear ones. There’s been a couple times I felt like something was coming through, but I always blocked it with Occlumency.”

“That is good. You should continue to do so. As Voldemort becomes stronger, it may become more difficult to block him out.”

“Professor, I’ve been thinking about Harry’s vision last summer,” Hermione cut in.

“You have?” Dumbledore said in surprise.

“Yes, sir. I thought maybe it could help if we could figure out what Voldemort was up to. Like, he seemed to be acting with some kind of body. Even though Harry didn’t actually _see_ him, he had to have done to use the Killing Curse, right? So I started looking into it.”

Grayson turned and grinned at Dumbledore. “Everyone says she’s the bright one,” he said.

Dumbledore nodded: “Indeed. And did you find anything interesting?”

“A few things. I think this was the most interesting.” She held up an ancient, yellowed tome. “There’s only so much material on manipulating life forces—mostly in alchemy. I know you’re a noted alchemist in your own right, Professor. I looked into what was in the unrestricted section of the library, and last week, I took out the Paracelsus from Harry’s vault for a closer look. Now, I admit my sixteenth century German is a bit rusty—” Harry rolled his eyes at this point. “—but I did find this. The homunculus. It’s a ritual that can create a rudimentary, but living body. I thought that might be what he did if he could get a proper one.”

Dumbledore nodded thoughtfully. “Yes, I am familiar with the homunculus, Hermione. I had not given great thought to how Voldemort had got into his present state, but your logic is valid. However, he could not have used the homunculus ritual that Paracelsus developed. That ritual requires three hundred and twenty days to complete.”

“Someone as smart as Voldemort could’ve modified it with dark magic, though,” Grayson said. “Or had someone else do it for him. You said there were rumours he was on a world tour, Albus. Who knows what the Vodun or Aztec ritual-makers could do for the right price?”

“Most definitely. And those same ritual-makers give him a number of options for the resurrection ritual he seeks. Unfortunately, there is little we can do about it. And unless I am much mistaken, the details are of little importance. In any case, my original point was my concern that Harry’s visions might grow worse as Voldemort gains strength. Even with Occlumency, there is always some small risk of a connection forming.”

“We know, but what else can we do?” asked Emma. “Harry says the connection is always sort of there. Isn’t that right?”

“Yeah, Mum,” Harry said. “I’ve been getting headaches more often, and I can’t see how it could’ve ever really gone away. It’s been happening since first year.”

Dumbledore looked very serious, now. “I am well aware of that, Harry, which is why I’ve been searching for a permanent solution to your problem. I mentioned to Professor Grayson that you had a muggle brain scan done last year—and that you found something interesting in it.”

“Yeah, I did.”

“What did you see, exactly, Mr. Potter?” Grayson asked.

Harry rubbed at his scar absently. “Well, the doctor said my scar isn’t just in my skin; it’s all the way into my brain. Apparently, it looks like someone took a jigsaw to my skull on the x-ray, and my brain just looks like it ‘grew’ that way—with a lightning-bolt shaped groove in it.”

Grayson looked back at Dumbledore, and they nodded to each other. Then, Dumbledore spoke again. “Harry, I believe your scar is a result of Voldemort’s Killing Curse penetrating partially into your head before it was blocked by your mother’s protection,” he spun his fabrication. It wasn’t, strictly speaking, false, but it wasn’t exactly true, either. “Normally, the Killing Curse is conducted throughout the victim’s nervous system and destroys it instantly. But in your case, it made it only a short way before the protective magic burned it out.”

“Yes…” Grayson said, giving a sidelong glance at Dumbledore, as if he were disagreeing with something. “We normally say the Killing Curse leaves no marks on the victim, but a few years back some Russian muggle-born wizards used something called a transmission electron microscope on the brain of someone who’d died by the Killing Curse, and they found that every single synapse was damaged so that it couldn’t transmit signals. Technically, the cells are still alive for a few minutes, but the victim is still brain-dead, and without working synapses, it’s impossible to revive them.”

The Grangers, Sirius, and Remus were all surprised that such a dark curse had been studied in such depth. It didn’t sound quite right compared with what they knew from Harry’s MRI, but then again, even Dumbledore sounded like he was guessing at this point.

“So how would that leave me connected to Voldemort like this?” Harry asked worriedly.

“Alas, with your scar, we are in completely unknown territory,” Dumbledore answered. “But all dark magic leaves residue, and with residue from the Killing Curse embedded in your scar, it must be especially pernicious. That residue remains connected with Voldemort’s magic in ways even I don’t fully understand. I can only speculate that that is the link that allows a connection between your minds to form.”

Harry suddenly grew worried. “That’s why I can speak Parseltongue, isn’t it? I’m drawing off his magic or something? Is that why our wands are brothers, too? Is it doing something else to me—?”

“Harry,” Dumbledore cut him off before he could turn frantic. “I wish I could assure you about your fears, but I’m afraid I don’t understand much more than you do. Even knowing what I do about this link, I honestly don’t know how it allows you to speak Parseltongue.” That was true. He could make a few guesses, of course, but there was something fundamentally odd about Harry being able to speak Parseltongue when the horcrux didn’t seem to otherwise affect him. “What I can say is that you are a far better person than Voldemort ever will be. To be sure, there are similarities. You are both half-bloods, both orphans, both victims of abuse, and both extremely gifted at wandless magic. But I have told you before and I repeat now that you have something in abundance that Voldemort has never had nor wanted: love. And that makes all the difference.

“And as for your wands, I believe that your brother wands are a product of the prophecy, not your personal link. I am not as well versed in wandlore as Mr. Ollivander, but I do know quite a bit about your own wand. Holly may be known for impetuosity and short-temper, but it is fundamentally a wand of protection, while Voldemort’s wand, yew, while not dark _per se_ , is better suited to offensive spells and curses. Thus, in a very important way, your wands are opposites rather than twins.”

Harry sighed with relief and mumbled his thanks to Dumbledore.

“Yes, that’s definitely reassuring, Dumbledore,” Emma said, “but you said something about a permanent solution.”

“Ah, yes. The best thing for Harry would be if we can find a way to sever his link with Voldemort. I have been searching for a way to do it safely for some time. It’s very difficult, as you can imagine, as there are so many variables to take into account. But I’ve asked Professor Grayson, and he believes that some aspects of his Australian healing magic may be able to help.”

“It can?” Harry said.

“That’s what I’m hoping, Mr. Potter,” Grayson said. “Healing chants are one of the oldest and strongest forms of magic in the world, and few cultures have ever developed it further than my people. I wanted to meet with you today to do some initial diagnostics to understand the nature of your scar. I probably won’t be able to fix it today, but I hope I can get some ideas to start formulating a plan, if you’re willing.”

Harry looked to his family, and they all quickly agreed. Anything for him to be shot of a connection to Voldemort was good in their book. Grayson instructed Harry to lie down on the duelling platform and knelt over him. He began chanting rhythmically, fast and repetitive. No one in the room recognised any of the magic. Even Dumbledore barely understood it. Everyone except Dan and Emma felt the magic swirling around the room, and even they soon noticed the small whirlwind and the rainbow of light that was forming around Grayson and Harry. But Harry was still lying in seeming comfort. It was only as the magic reached a fever pitch that Harry began to twitch as if in pain and clapped a hand to his forehead.

Grayson immediately cut off the magic and stood up, looking out of breath. “Crikey,” he muttered. He looked around the room as Harry sat up. “Well, the good news is, I’m pretty sure it’s possible to remove it in principle,” Grayson concluded. “The dark magic doesn’t seem to be tied to his life force directly, so it should be possible to separate them magically.” He gave Dumbledore, Sirius, and Remus a significant look. “The bad news is that I don’t think it’s strictly tied to his scar. It might’ve been when it first happened, but as his brain grew, the sharp lines got smeared out. I don’t mean the dark magic will affect him any worse, mind, but most of the simple ways to excise the dark magic won’t work that way. We’ll have to look into it some more.”

Dumbledore got the message loud and clear. There was still some hope for Harry, but it would take still more research, and unfortunately, his initial, mad idea of physically cutting out the damaged brain tissue wouldn’t work. Well, he probably should have expected that. He only hoped he could find a way to save the boy’s life before it was too late.

* * *

Several days later, Timothy Drucker sat in his easy chair, sipping a glass of wine as he read the final chapters of Lord Potter’s new book. It had its pros and cons over the first one, but it was definitely a good read. He felt the need to get something stronger to drink when he read the harrowing account of Potter’s and Neville Longbottom’s defeat of the basilisk. But nothing had prepared him for the big reveal at the end.

“Holy crap! You-Know-Who was a half-blood?!” he yelled, dropping his wine.

Yes, he would _definitely_ need that Firewhisky.

* * *

Since they would need to be out and about that day anyway, the Grangers decided to visit the Longbottoms in St. Mungo’s on Thursday morning, before Harry’s book signing. Frank and Alice Longbottom looked worlds better than when the Grangers had last seen them a year ago. Physically, they were about the same: aged, worn, and white-haired, and Frank being held on his feet with crutches and elaborate magical leg braces. But there was light in those eyes that might as well have been dead before, and Alice rose to her feet smoothly and with confidence when she recognised her son.

“N-N-Neville,” she said with a smile, and he ran to her like a boy half his age. She hugged him tightly, paying no mind to the fact that he was taller than she was. “It’s so g-good to sss-see you.”

The speech therapist had helped her speak intelligibly again, but there was still some nerve damage that no amount of therapy or medication would cure. But for Neville, it was enough. He could finally have a real relationship with his mother after all these years.

“It’s good to see you, too, Mum,” Neville said. “You too, Dad.” He hugged his father, too, though he had to help him stay on his feet. “How have you been? How was your New Year?”

“New Year?” Alice said.

Neville smiled indulgently. “Yes, Mum. The New Year. It was this past Sunday.” Her memory hadn’t fully recovered, either.

“Oh, yes. It was lovely, wasn’t it, Frank?” she said.

“It was very hearty, my doe—no, it was very…lovely, my dear,” Frank managed. He hadn’t fully recovered, either. His own problems still manifested as a slight aphasia—more specifically, a chronic misuse of words.

“That’s good,” Neville said. “I wanted you to meet my friends.” He motioned for Hermione to stand beside him. “This is Hermione. She’s the girl I told you about. The one I took to the Yule Ball.”

Alice smiled at once and took Hermione by the hand. “Ah, it’s wond-d-derful to m-meet you, Hermione,” she said. “We’re hap-p-py to see N-Neville has m-made such good f-f-friends.”

“Pleased to meet you, Mrs. Longbottom,” she replied. “Your son’s been a great friend to us. And I really enjoyed the Yule Ball with him.”

“Neville has told you a lot about us,” Frank said, then he stopped and thought. “Told us a lot about you…I think. You sound like a very hot girl.”

“Excuse me?” Hermione said.

“No—a very bright girl. You do good letters—good logic—good logos…”

“Good sp-sp-spells, Frank,” Alice said.

“Yes!” he exclaimed.

“Oh, right. Well, I try.” Hermione tried to crack a smile. “Neville’s a pretty good wizard himself, too.”

“You are very…sour—no, salty—no, spicy—”

“Mr. Longbottom—” Hermione tried.

“I think…sweet? Maybe savoury…?”

Neville sighed. “I’m pretty sure you mean sweet, Dad.”

“Yes!” Frank smiled and leaned towards Neville. “Have you licked her yet?” he asked.

“WHAT?!”

“DAD!”

“FRANK!”

Frank looked confused at the scandalised looks from his own mother, the girl’s father, and especially the young couple themselves. He screwed up his face in thought and tried again: “No, I mean…have you…kissed her yet?”

Neville and Hermione somehow, if it were possible, turned even redder.

“Aha! You have!” Frank grinned as Alice and Emma both smiled and Neville and Hermione both shot Dan and Harry a nervous look. “Neville’s a good wand, Hermione,” he told her. “He can climb good. Make sure he gives you treats—no, treats you right—right? Right…Right? Right.”

“Right!” Alice cut him off. She gently placed an arm around him and nudged him to sit down before he could get overexcited. “Who is your other f-f-friend, N-Neville?”

“Mum, Dad, this is the other friend I told about, remember? He’s Hermione’s adopted brother…He’s Harry Potter.”

Alice and Frank both gasped. Alice approached Harry shakily and shook his hand. She stared at his forehead like everyone else, but Harry didn’t begrudge her that. It hadn’t been long after James’s and Lily’s deaths that the Lestranges and Barty Crouch Jr had attacked the Longbottoms, but even they had learnt of the legend of the Boy-Who-Lived. “Harry P-P-Potter,” she said in awe, and he tried not to flinch. He still remembered how Quirrell had always stuttered over his name in first year. “F-Frank and I knew your p-p-parents-s-sss,” she said. “They were very-ry g-good peop-p-ple. We were very s-sad when we heard they were…were…were g-gone. Everyone was c-c-celebrating bec-cause V…V…V…”

A look of frustration crossed Alice’s face, and Harry could tell it was her condition that was stopping her from saying the name, not fear. “Voldermort?” he offered.

“Yes. _He_ was gone. B-but we had l-l-lost so many people. And then…and th-th-then…”

“It’s alright, Mrs. Longbottom.”

“N-Neville says h-h-he’s…he’s not d-dead,” she said.

Harry and Hermione both looked at Neville curiously. He shrugged his shoulders and said, “They deserve to know the truth after all they’ve done.”

“We’ll, don’t worry, Mrs. Longbottom,” Harry tried to assure her. “Dumbledore and…and a bunch of people are working on getting rid of him for good.”

Alice smiled weakly. Harry left out his own role in the affair. Something told him she understood a bit more than she could express in words, after all.

“So we see their treatment’s gone well,” Dan said to Healer Strout at the back of the ward.

“Yes, better than I ever could’ve expected,” the Healer admitted. She had been sceptical a year ago, but she couldn’t argue with the results. “I’ve even started looking into whether muggle techniques could help some of the other patients…Unfortunately, I think we’ve hit the limit of what we can do for these two.”

“Oh?”

“Well, they haven’t really improved any more the past two months. I suspect we’ve repaired everything that can be repaired.”

“We considered taking them to the manor for the holidays,” Augusta said, “but we felt like we wanted to be a little surer of what their current needs were. Merlin knows I’d like to be able to bring them home full time. Neville even more so. They’ve never really been happy here. But I don’t know if we’d be able to, even if we bought a house elf.”

“Muggles have a lot of literature on in-home care for the disabled,” Dan offered. “We could get some for you.”

Augusta was surprised yet again. A year ago, she hadn’t believed that muggle medicine could help her son and daughter-in-law recover from their curse. She was much more open-minded now, but it was still surprising. Did the muggles really have an answer for everything? No, she thought. It wasn’t as if they had their own magic. It was just that there were so very many of them that they’d thought about a lot of problems that wizards had never got around to. In any case, she accepted his help graciously.

After the visit, Harry had to move on to Flourish and Blotts for his book signing. This was not something he was looking forward to. It almost made him wish he’d not written the book…Well, not really, but he certainly wished he’d negotiated better when he signed the contract. That would change with the next book, not least because he was worried a public book signing would be a target for Voldemort by the time he had a chance to do one.

It was weird to think that his writing wasn’t just for fun anymore. It could soon be a strategic move against his oldest enemy.

The book signing itself sounded horribly dull, though. He would have to sit out there for four hours, probably sign several hundred books, and make small talk with everyone who showed up, most of whom would probably gawk at his scar. It met his expectations thoroughly.

Sirius and Tonks had been tasked with providing security for the event in an unobtrusive manner. Fortunately, the DMLE knew how to handle book signings well enough. For each book, Harry would sign it with his own quill and ink, and before he touched it, either Sirius or Tonks would discreetly cast a Revealing Charm to make sure it wasn’t a disguised contract or Portkey, was simply cursed, or held any other mischief. With Voldemort on the move, they weren’t about to take any chances.

After a thoroughly uneventful four hours, Harry and his family packed up and retired to Timothy Drucker’s office back at Whizz Hard Books. Unsurprisingly, Harry’s publisher was overjoyed to see the second instalment in the series, but the shock of last night still hadn’t worn off.

“I still can’t believe You-Know-Who was a half-blood,” he said in awe. “Are you quite sure?”

“Headmaster Dumbledore confirmed it, Mr. Drucker,” Harry said.

“Well, this is brilliant. Crazy and dangerous, but brilliant. _Harry Potter and the Heir of Slytherin_ is just what we needed, Mr. Potter. A lot more people know about the Heir of Slytherin business than your first year. I can’t tell you how many owls I’ve received asking about it, and with that reveal at the end, it’ll sell even better than the last one. When were you thinking about publishing?”

“June,” Harry said at once. “Before the end of the Tournament.”

Drucker’s eyebrows rose. “That soon?” he asked. “Looking to capitalise on the Tournament publicity again?”

Harry grimaced: “Not what I was thinking. And we both know that timing wasn’t intentional.”

“Well, if it’s not that, I should let you know it’s more common in the publishing industry to wait a year between books. And even if you don’t want to, I think it’ll sell better in July.”

“No, Mr. Drucker. It has to be June.”

Drucker was doubly surprised. When he had last met Harry Potter, the boy had acted quite humble. He wasn’t given to odd demands like some other famous authors. This seemed out of character, and he suspected something deeper was going on. “Why June, Mr. Potter?” he asked.

However, it was Remus, as Harry’s co-author, who answered: “Mr. Drucker, you haven’t been one to shy away from political controversy in the past, even when it was dangerous. You published _Hairy Snout, Human Heart_ at a time when werewolf relations were bad and getting worse. That’s why I recommended you to Harry, in fact. And I see you’re clearly eager about this book.”

“Ah, well…I’m glad you thought so highly of me, Mr. Lupin,” he replied a bit uneasily. It was true, he’d taken a strong stand in the war, but he had a bad feeling about this. “Am I to take it there’s a similar problem here? I’m not afraid of the rumoured Death Eaters who are still loose any more than I was afraid of Fenrir Greyback, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“It’s worse than that, I’m afraid,” Remus said. “And we want you to consider whether you’re willing to fully commit to taking this on before you sign.”

And that was a conversation Drucker had never expected to be on this end of. “What is it?” he asked.

“You know how Dumbledore’s always said Voldemort isn’t dead?”

Drucker flinched at the name, but he nodded.

“Well, he’s right,” Remus said. “Those weren’t just rabble-rousers at the World Cup. Voldemort’s on the move again. Dumbledore’s already working against him, but he doesn’t think he can stop him in time. It’s going to be…well, honestly, it could be any time, in which case you’ll be free to cancel the contract, no questions asked. But we _think_ that he’s going to make his move on the twenty-fourth of June: the third task of the Tetrawizard Tournament.”

After a brief, colourful response, Drucker struggled to collect himself. Merlin’s beard, he was getting too old for this. This would mean getting him in a lot deeper than he expected.

“Of course, the Ministry would be able to spare some security for your business, Mr. Drucker,” Sirius piped up. “You’d be doing us a great service to publish this book.” He grinned. He didn’t get to use this angle much as a Hitwizard.

“So…you want me to publish these scandalous revelations about You-Know-Who just days before you think he’s going to make his big return?” Freedom of the press or not, Timothy Drucker was scared stiff by the very thought. If he went along with a plan like this, it would test his mettle to the limit.

“That’s the general idea,” Remus told him, “and in case you’re wondering, Dumbledore approves, too.”

He leaned back and sighed heavily. “This is a lot bigger than _Hairy Snout, Human Heart_ ,” he said. “This is the biggest gamble of my career if you’re right.”

“Take your time to think about it,” Emma said, and he was relieved to finally hear some kind words. “We only really need a decision by Easter.”

“Right. Right. I’ll…keep in touch.”

Potter and his family went on their way, leaving Drucker feeling more than a little shell-shocked. He would do it. He was pretty sure about that. He would hold to his ideals, and freedom of the press was high on that list. But he would need some time and a few shots of Firewhiskey to convince himself.

* * *

“It’s not that the albino peacocks are especially magical or symbolic in themselves,” La Pantera told Lucius Malfoy. “It’s the fact that they’ve been bred that way by wizards for generations that makes them so. Magic is based on intent, as you well know, and it attaches to things that hold special significance to wizards. That’s what makes them… _useful_ to me.”

Lucius still got a shiver down his spine every time she said that word. “Very well, milady,” he said. “I will bring you the birds presently.” At least she wasn’t asking for some obscure giant magical sea snail or something like that again. “My Lord, if there is no other business?” he addressed his master.

“Not at present, Lucius. Sometime closer to my full return, I will ask you to retrieve Crabbe and Goyle. But not yet. Their discretion has always left something to be desired. You may go.”

“Yes, master.”

* * *

“The Great Pink Sea Snail? Merlin, what is he up to?”

Draco Malfoy never used to ask questions like that about his father, but his behaviour had only grown stranger over the past few months. Stranger and more secretive. Magizoology was all well and good, but Draco and his mother were both concerned by the man’s sudden change in attitude.

Well, Father was away again for the day, and that gave him the opportunity he’d been waiting for: a chance to talk to Mother.

“Mother, could I talk to you?” he asked, meeting her in the conservatory.

“Of course, Draco. What is it?” Mother said.

“I…I was wondering about Father. Do you know what’s going on with him? All this magical creature stuff?”

Mother frowned and sighed with dismay. “I wish I did, Draco,” she said. “I never thought your father would be one to suffer a mid-life crisis, but…well, that’s certainly what it looks like. I know many Malfoys have been animal breeders, but sometimes I feel like…” she stopped and gave him a curious look.

“Yes, Mother?”

“Honestly, like your father has no idea what he’s doing. Don’t repeat this to him, but he’s leapt into this with so much enthusiasm and so little proper training. It doesn’t fit his character.”

“That’s what I was thinking,” he agreed, strangely relieved that it wasn’t just him. “I just can’t imagine why he’s doing it.” He stopped for a moment, but, feeling encouraged, he started to bring up the other things that had concerned him: “That wasn’t the only thing, Mother. I mean, it was the only thing about Father, but…I’ve seen things this year. Things that didn’t add up, even when people ‘explained’ them.” Mother gave him an inquisitive look. “Like Potter being in the Tourament. I’ve been needling him about it and all, but I think he’s actually telling the truth about not wanting to be in it. But if _that_ _’s_ the case, then who entered him, and why?”

Mother nodded thoughtfully. “A very good question, Draco? And unfortunately, I don’t know any more than you do. Your father did not seem too surprised, but I have no idea what he or any of his _associates_ stands to gain from it. Even though the rumours—and do not repeat this _anywhere_ —but the rumours strongly suggest they were involved.” From the way she used the word “associates,” they both knew she meant “Death Eaters.” And the fact that Father didn’t seem to be calling the shots was very worrying. “What else have you noticed, Draco?” she asked, partly as a test of his skills, he was sure, but partly out of concern and partly out of plain interest.

“Well…Hagrid was actually given permission to breed dangerous creatures, and Potter and Granger were actually the voices of reason. And then, why is Grayson here? Just for the Tournament? Maybe, but it smells fishy. And _then_ , there’s the werewolf and his History class of ghosts from every century. Everything sounds so different from what I’m used to hearing, and yet I’m starting to think…” he trailed off and watched his mother nervously.

“Yes, Draco?” she said.

“Mother…could _I_ ask you not to repeat something to Father?”

She sat up straight and fixed him with that piercing stare that made him feel five years old again. “If you have a good reason, you certainly could,” she said carefully. “If not, we’ll have to have words.”

Draco took a deep breath and plunged in: “The ghosts have been talking all year about how the old families used to deal with muggles all the time before the Statute of Secrecy. And these were Slytherin ghosts, too. Even the Bloody Baron said it, and another one was a Greengrass. The Baron even said Armand Malfoy worked with that muggle king, William of Normandy, to take over England, and that the Malfoys were always close with the muggle rulers to help us gain money and influence. That’s why I _really_ wanted to look into family history—to see if that was all true, and…and I got a pass from Professor Snape to look at the rare books collection in the library like you said—to look at the old history books. The ghosts were right, Mother—they were biased about the specifics, but they were mostly right. Before the Statute of Secrecy, the Malfoys really _did_ work closely with muggle leaders.”

He expected Mother to make some kind of protest, even if it wasn’t dramatic. But all she said was, “Really? I would’ve have thought that…Well, you’re right in thinking that would be an impolitic thing to say, even to your father… _especially_ to your father.”

“I know. I’ve…I’ve been wishing I could talk to you for so long, Mother. But I couldn’t put those kinds of things in a letter…”

Mother could plainly see that his composure was cracking, so she rose from her seat to come to him and placed an arm around his shoulders. Normally, a proud, fourteen-year-old, pureblood boy wouldn’t be caught dead in this position. He’d be reluctant to be seen like this even by Father, but for the moment, he didn’t resist. She led him through the house to the library—the library that held so few of those old books from before the Statute of Secrecy.

“Kreacher?” she called.

 _Pop!_ The old elf that she’d traded from Sirius appeared before her. “Yes, Mistress?” he croaked.

“Inform us when the Master returns to the estate. Do not disturb us here until then.”

“As Mistress wishes,” the elf said and vanished.

“That will assure us some privacy, Draco,” she spoke to him gently. “I can tell you have something much more serious weighing on your mind, and I can guess that it has something to do with this family history you’ve been learning. If you tell me, I promise I’ll do my best to answer it fairly and keep it between the two of us.”

Draco sighed with relief and sat down. “Thank you, Mother,” he said. “You’re right; I’ve been doing a lot of thinking this year…Thinking about all the strange things that are going on at school, but also…Thinking about how best to advance the House of Malfoy.”

Mother looked surprised—and pleasantly so—to hear him put it that way, but when she didn’t reply, he kept going: “We’re not held in the same high esteem we used to be before the war, and it’s got worse since _Potter_ _’s_ become some kind of political superstar. We still have a strong hold on Fudge, but that might not be so easy after the next election, and that’s this year.”

“Yes. I’ve mentioned the election to your father, but he seems unconcerned so far.”

Draco wasn’t sure that meant Father was overconfident or if he had his sights set on something completely different. “I know I don’t have the experience Father has,” he said cautiously, “but I have to wonder if the way we’ve been doing things is really any better than Armand Malfoy. Of course, we have the Statute of Secrecy, and he didn’t, but…” He trailed off, not quite sure what he was trying to say.

“Draco, your father and I have both been so proud of you for taking a greater interest in our family history and affairs,” she assured him. “I confess I’ve been worried you were just marking time at school before this year and letting your father handle everything. What you say you’ve learnt is…surprising, to say the least, but I trust your ability to evaluate it accurately.”

“Thank you, Mother. The way things have been going this year, I’ve decided I need to think for myself more—think about how I can be the best future Lord Malfoy I can.”

“That’s very good, Draco. We hope you will still listen to trusted counsel, of course.”

“Of course I will. But the problem is, I’m not sure what to think. I’m trying to figure out how to do it but…it doesn’t seem as simple as it used to…” _Hogwarts ought to be like Durmstrang and not let mudbloods in._ He’d believed that since he was very small just because Father said so. But how would that _really_ improve the standing of the House of Malfoy. Or failing that, how would it at least help the wizarding world at large. For the most part, the only trouble the mudbloods caused was getting ideas above their station. And weakening the magical bloodlines.

 _In the Middle Ages, mudbloods were widely believed to be_ more _magially gifted than purebloods, not less,_ his mind traitorously offered. That was a revelation he wasn’t ready to share even with Mother yet. How could they have got it so wrong back then? Surely, someone must have noticed which were more gifted.

 _Granger_ —no. Stop that right there.

 _We must protect our culture and traditions. We can be open and welcoming, but we cannot allow being open-minded to destroy the essence of who we are._ Those weren’t Father’s words. They were the words of Adrian Greengrass. And more than that, he’d heard Augusta Longbottom say very similar things before. Mudbloods came into their world with their muggle ideas, always petitioning for freer trade, greater popular representation, new magical gadgets like “television,” even loosening the Statute of Secrecy, without ever thinking of the consequences of their actions. Draco was sure even Dumbledore himself was telling them to calm down when they started talking like that.

“Draco?” Mother asked.

“Huh? Sorry, Mother. I was lost in thought. I…I’m sorry to be impertinent, but I’m worried that…that I might be getting it very wrong. And if I don’t have it wrong…then maybe Father _does_ —not on Founding principles, of course, but I’m not convinced Father has the strongest political position anymore. I don’t like mudbloods any more than you or Father do, but I’m not so sure the way you were doing things back in the war will work anymore, or…or ever would have worked,” he added in a bare whisper.

That last one was the most frightening thought that had been eating at him. In history, politics was usually the arena where things got done, not following the Dark Lord of the day. But Draco had no idea how Mother would react to that. He was pretty sure she wouldn’t break her promise and tell Father, but she could still tear up his argument and forbid him from ever mentioning it again. That’s what a good Lady Malfoy ought to do in this situation.

But instead, she fixed him with a long look, seemed to consider, and said softly, “I shouldn’t be telling you this, Draco. In fact, I think you should begin studying Occlumency if I _do_ tell it to you.”

“Occlumency?” he said in surprise. “At my age?”

“You wouldn’t be the youngest. Your father heard a rumour that Potter was learning it nearly two years ago, but that’s neither here nor there. Right now, Professor Snape and Professor Dumbledore are the only Legilimens you’re likely to encounter, but you should still make an effort to conceal your thoughts. Even from Professor Snape. We’ve remained friendly with him, but we’ve never been certain of which side he’s on, as you well know. I know enough to get you started before you go back to school, and we can honestly tell your father you wish to be more involved in the family’s affairs, and we think it would be a good idea.”

“Alright, then. I’ll do it.”

“Good. Now, we both know your father’s Imperius Curse defence after the war was a sham,” she said, and Draco stared at her in shock. He’d never heard her—or anyone but a political enemy, for that matter—be that blunt about it. “You can guess exactly what your father was up to during the war. But what I never told anyone— _anyone_ —was that I had doubts about what he was doing ever since I became pregnant with you. People were dying—including families, and not just on the other side. Not to mention the Dark Lord’s infamously fickle anger. But of course, I had no way out during the war, and after the war, the point was moot…until recently.”

“Why? What happened?”

“I don’t know, exactly, but ask yourself, Draco, if your father isn’t calling the shots with these strange plans…who is?”

Draco paled in horror, and his eyes nearly popped out of his head. “No,” he whispered. It was so obvious he should have seen it ages ago…except maybe he didn’t want to.

“I can’t be certain,” she said. “You father has only given _me_ the barest of hints. But the rumours he’s alluded to suggest that the Dark Lord may well be returning.”

He was struck speechless. A year ago, this news would have filled he with glee. Finally, the House of Malfoy would regain its due dignity and crush its enemies. But now, he had doubts about the whole endeavour, and that in itself could be deadly. He was starting to have doubts about what he truly wanted. But he didn’t kid himself. If the Dark Lord returned, the decision would be out of his hands…wouldn’t it?

“What do I—”

 _Pop!_ Kreacher appeared again and said, “The Master has returned, Mistress.”

“Thank you, Kreacher. That will be all.”

When the elf vanished, Draco chose speed over subtlety and said, “What should I do, Mother?”

She shook her head: “I don’t know enough to give you any clear advice, Draco. All I can say is this. Someday, perhaps sooner or perhaps later, _you_ will be Lord Malfoy. Chart the course for the House that seems best to you. But do not burn your bridges until you are absolutely certain you have a way forward.”


	103. When the Stars Are Right

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: What’s it going to be, then, eh, JK Rowling?

After the excitement of the holidays, Harry spent most of Saturday before going back to school with Rowena. His old cat was definitely getting weaker and, though he didn’t want to admit it to himself, he couldn’t be sure he’d see her again. It was hard to leave her behind. He even offered to take her to school with him and promised her all the comforts of home, but she refused. She was content where she was and didn’t want to go on some silly, sentimental humans’ trip. Hermione noticed his “sulky” mood on the train, but she didn’t push him. She even told Malfoy to get lost for him when he came around.

Harry was in a better mood at the New Year’s Feast that night when Dumbledore announced the next two Hogsmeade visits: the first in two weeks on the twenty-first, and the ever-popular Valentine’s outing on the eighteenth of February. Harry was pleasantly surprised that they were managing to squeeze in two visits that close together in their busy schedule. He knew a certain little blond Ravenclaw he was interested in asking to those—more interested than he ever felt with Cho, if he was honest.

He was nearly as excited when Dumbledore announced that the next Quidditch game would be on Saturday—between Beauxbatons and Durmstrang, since both of them had stayed and had time to practice over the holidays.

Harry’s good mood vanished on Monday morning, however, when he saw Hermione’s roommates alternately staring at him and giggling at the latest issue of _Witch Weekly_. This wouldn’t be the first time he was featured there, but their reactions made him worry a little.

“Alright, what’s so funny?” Hermione said, swiping the magazine after they giggled one too many times. She looked at the article and groaned.

“What is it?” Harry asked.

“See for yourself.”

 

_INSIDE THE ICE PALACE: PROFILES ON THE HOGWARTS YULE BALL_

_Has Potter Been Potioned?_

_Werewolves on the Prowl_

_Two Schools, One Giant Gamble_

_By Rita Skeeter_

 

“Rita Skeeter? She wasn’t even _at_ the ball,” Harry said. “She doesn’t even write for _Witch Weekly_!”

“Well, she’s freelance, of course,” Lavender said. “A columnist that successful doesn’t just tie herself down in one place.”

“And what’s this about me being potioned?” he demanded.

“Er, it’s in the profile on you.”

“Great…” he groaned, and opened the magazine. The piece was at least balanced. There were profiles on all four of the champions and a few others at the dance. Unfortunately, the contents of those profiles were typical Rita Skeeter fare:

 

_Harry Potter no doubt caused the greatest surprise at the Yule Ball with his choice of date, third-year Ravenclaw Luna Lovegood. We may be heartened to hear that young Harry has bounced back so well from his tragic breakup with Cho Chang (now dating fellow Champion Cedric Diggory; see page 5) last spring, especially with a girl who looked as lovely as Miss Lovegood did that night, with her flowing blue and bronze dress robes and long, silky, blond hair with periwinkle flowers braided into it. But is all well in the world of Harry Potter? A closer look reveals some troubling signs._

_Who is Luna Lovegood? The daughter of_ The Quibbler _editor Xenophilius Lovegood and the late Pandora Lovegood, n_ _ée Beauchamp, who died in 1990 in a self-inflicted spellcrafting accident, Miss Lovegood is described by classmates as “eccentric,” “really dotty—I mean_ really _dotty,_ _” “quiet and strange,” and “head in the clouds.” Her roommate, Melanie Maxwell said, “She’s nutters. Completely off her rocker. Always going on about her imaginary creatures, but no one ever calls her on it because she’s friends with Potter.” (When asked to clarify, Miss Maxwell said she was referring to the supposed magical creatures that frequently grace the pages of_ The Quibbler _.)_

_Indeed, dear readers, Miss Lovegood has reportedly been friends with Harry for some time, but for her to come as his date was apparently a completely unexpected development to all but Harry_ _’s closest friends, and unnamed sources claim that her name was not even mentioned in an alleged betting pool to predict the identity of his date. Moreover, her usual appearance reportedly is not nearly as refined as it was on the night of the ball. Her normal fashion sense is universally described as “bizarre,” and her hair unkempt. “She cleaned up really well,” said her werewolf classmate, Colin Creevey (see page 8), “I almost didn’t recognise her.”_

_So how did a girl with a normally-plain appearance and little native charm ensnare Harry Potter? That was what many of the girls at the ball wanted to know, and some of them developed theories of their own. Harry_ _’s own classmate, Pansy Parkinson said, “It’s got to be love potions. Lovegood’s a weirdo, but she’s not stupid. How else could she get Potter to look at her twice?”_

_However, Miss Parkinson_ _’s own date, Draco Malfoy (see page 9), did not share her opinion. “Oh, I don’t think she needed a love potion,” he said. “Potter’s off his rocker, himself. Just look at all the crazy stuff_ he’s _done. I think they_ _’re_ perfect _for each other. She_ _’s the only girl in school as crazy as he is.”_

_So which is it? Did Luna Lovegood_ _’s unique natural wiles succeed in winning Harry, or was it something more sinister? We can only hope that the young couple’s teachers will investigate carefully so that we may all rest easier about the well-being of the Boy-Who-Lived._

 

“Love potions?!” Harry sputtered. “Off her rocker—Self-inflicted—Only girl in—How can they even print this rubbish?!”

“That’s what the press does, Harry,” Hermione tried to calm him. “And that’s _especially_ what Rita Skeeter does.”

“But now everyone’s gonna think Luna—I knew they might give her a hard time, but I never thought they’d do _that_ to her.”

“Well, it could be worse,” she said. “Malfoy actually provided the contrasting voice.”

“Gee, I feel _so_ much better, Mione. What’m I gonna tell her now?”

“Try not to let it bother you so much, Harry. It’s not your fault Skeeter wrote that. And Luna’s a big girl. She can handle herself.”

“Well, maybe I should—”

“No,” Hermione cut him off.

“But I didn’t even say—”

“No,” she repeated.

Harry glared at her. “You don’t know what I’m gonna say.”

She rolled her eyes. “You’re not that hard to figure out, little brother. You’re either angry and planning to prank someone you don’t want as an enemy, or you’re feeling guilty and talking yourself out of asking Luna to Hogsmeade next week…Or both.”

That analysis made him turn bright red, but he couldn’t say anything to refute it. That _did_ sound like something he would do, after all. So he just continued to glare at her.

“Honestly, just keep doing what you were doing, and if Luna has a problem, she’ll tell you.”

He raised his eyebrows a little. “Luna doesn’t always share when she’s feeling uncomfortable, you know,” he said.

Hermione had to concede the point there: “Okay, let me rephrase that. If she has a problem, you’ll be able to tell. The two of us know her better than anyone except maybe Ginny, and you’ve got that sixth sense of yours. So don’t worry about it. Is there anything else interesting in the article?”

Harry grumbled and looked back down at the magazine. Sadly, there _were_ other people whom Skeeter went after. He noted particularly the section about werewolves:

 

_How hard is it for a werewolf to get a date? If the Yule Ball is any indication, it might not be as hard as you think. Early signs are that, with easier access to Wolfsbane Potion and enrolment in Hogwarts, these feared creatures of the night may be developing a following. First, there was Cedric Diggory, who, after tragically being infected with Lycanthropy last spring, managed to sweep Harry Potter_ _’s ex-girlfriend, Cho Chang, off her feet. Then, Colin Creevey, who was infected in the same attack, also made waves with his date, Ginevra Weasley, a pretty and vivacious fellow Gryffindor. Miss Weasley, 13, made a move adventurous even for her house by spending the Ball on the arm of her werewolf classmate against her mother’s wishes—_

“Where did she get that?” Hermione interrupted.

“Wha—? Is it true?” Harry said, confused.

“Not exactly. Ron said his mum would complain about it, but she’d probably settle down. But I can’t believe any of the Weasleys would be thick enough to say that to a reporter.”

“Well, she got it somehow. And she’s still going on about how werewolves are dangerous beasts.”

Hermione shook her head. “Skeeter’s a nasty piece of work,” she said. “Unfortunately, I don’t think you’re going to change people’s prejudices in half a year, even with Remus teaching here. I wish we could, but it’s not that easy.”

“Hey, guys, what’s wrong with Hagrid?” Neville pointed out suddenly.

Harry looked up at the High Table and was surprised to see an uncharacteristic scowl on the huge man’s face. He actually looked a little green around the gills. “He looks like he’s gonna be sick,” Harry said.

“Forget Hagrid. Look at Madame Maxime!” Lavender pointed. Looking down the table, they saw the Beauxbatons Headmistress looking downright murderous and glaring at both Hagrid and Dumbledore. It was about then that they began to hear loud French cursing from the visiting students.

“What’s got into them?” Harry asked.

“Look at page seven,” Parvati whispered.

With a sinking feeling, Harry turned his eyes back to the magazine.

 

_Besides the champions, one couple in the Hall was quite literally impossible to overlook. I am speaking, of course, of Beauxbatons Headmistress Olympe Maxime and Hogwarts Care of Magical Creatures Professor and Groundskeeper Rubeus Hagrid. Both Maxime and Hagrid share their alarmingly large size—twice the height of a normal human—which makes them stand out in the most chaotic of crowds. While they did not attend the Ball together, they were seen sharing several dances over the course of the evening, and one might easily expect to see some attraction between them._

_But two teachers of such prodigious size at two different schools? Coincidence? Certainly not! Healers at St. Mungo_ _’s confirmed that no full-blooded human could reach such a size and still support their own weight. After careful investigation, this reporter was able to determine that both Maxime and Hagrid are, in fact, half-giant!_

_Rubeus Hagrid_ _’s mother, we can exclusively reveal, was none other than the giantess Fridwulfa, who escaped from Britain during the war against He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. Olympe Maxime’s parentage is less certain, but there can be no doubt about her half-breed heritage. With the giants being known for their brutal and bloodthirsty natures, the choice of individuals with giant blood for schoolteachers is certainly a curious one in both cases—_

Harry stopped when he saw Hagrid leaving the High Table. At the same time, Madame Maxime stood up and walked out of the Great Hall, with the Beauxbatons students getting up and following. “Oh, no, this isn’t going to end well, is it?” Harry said. After a brief consideration, he jumped up himself to follow them, and Hermione soon joined him.

They caught up to Hagrid in the clock tower, though they had to run to do it. Being that tall, he could walk fast. Madame Maxime and her students were heading towards their carriage. They’d have to worry about them later.

“Hagrid!” Harry called, but the half-giant didn’t slow. “Hagrid!” he called louder, and he stopped and turned to look.

“Harry? Hermione?” he said in surprise. “What’re you doin’?”

“We’re trying to figure out what’s going on?” Harry said. “Why’s Madame Maxime so mad? Why’d they all walk out?”

“Well, yeh saw the article, didn’t yeh? ‘Bout her an’ me?”

“Yeah. So?” Harry said.

“Well, she didn’t like havin’ her secret told for all to see. I asked her about it at the Ball, and she was even offended at _me_. And I told her I was one! Said she was ‘big-boned.’ Ha! I’ll show her big bones. Mind yeh, I’m not too chuffed about it myself, havin’ that woman tell who me Mum was—”

“Wait, that was a secret?” Harry said. “I thought everybody knew that.”

Hagrid stopped and stared at him with wide eyes. He couldn’t seem to process Harry’s words. “Harry…” he stammered, “I—I didn’t tell anyone ‘cept Dumbledore and the other teachers…How’d _you_ know… _You_ didn’t tell anyone, did yeh?”

“No, we didn’t want to pry or anything,” Harry said in genuine confusion. “Well, I think I might’ve told Natalie McDonald, but she wasn’t even at the Ball. I just thought it was obvious. We figured it out in first year.”

“Yer first year? How?”

Hermione was starting to see why Harry was so confused. “Hagrid, you’re eleven foot six,” she spoke up. “There’s never been a confirmed report of a muggle who was taller than nine-flat. Nine out of ten muggle-raised students who come into this castle will automatically think ‘giant’ when they see you and won’t particularly care.”

“So…so yeh really don’t mind?” Hagrid said hopefully.

“Of course not!” Harry said. “We’re fighting for werewolf rights, aren’t we? Why should giants and half-giants be any different?”

“Aw, yer the best!” Hagrid exclaimed, and he grabbed them both in a rib-cracking hug.

“Yeah…thanks, Hagrid,” Harry grunted before he let them go. “ _Well_ ,” he said, “now, all we have to do is try to patch over an international incident with Madame Maxime…plus I need to talk to Luna…”

“ _And_ you need to figure out the clue to the second task,” Hermione reminded him.

Harry grumbled at her.

* * *

He finally caught up with Luna that afternoon, and he could tell the article hadn’t gone unnoticed by her peers. She looked more downcast than usual; she was walking a bit faster and holding her books closer to her chest. But he was greatly encouraged when he saw her face light up when he called her name.

“Hello, Harry,” she said with a smile.

“Hi, Luna. Listen, I’m really sorry about that article this morning. Parkinson was just awful to say that about you.”

“Oh, it’s alright,” she said. “It’s not your fault, after all.”

“I know, but I still don’t want people thinking so poorly of you. They’ve been giving you a hard time about it?”

She lowered her gaze a little. “People have been teasing me,” she admitted. “Most of it wasn’t anything I haven’t heard before, but a couple of the older girls thought they needed to ‘rescue’ you from my clutches.”

“Oh, no. Did they hurt you?” Harry said.

“No…but I had to dodge a few hexes.”

He groaned. “Do you want me to do something about it?”

“I don’t think that would help very much. You won’t change anyone’s minds by being overly-defensive towards me.”

Harry didn’t give up. “Do you want Fred and George to do something?”

That made Luna giggle, at least. “I don’t know if I could stop those two,” she said, “but _I_ know I didn’t slip you any potions, and that’s enough for me…But I understand if you want to have yourself checked for them.”

Harry considered this for a moment—how it would play in the press. “I might,” he reasoned, “but, not because I don’t believe you—just so I have some hard evidence to use against the lies. Then, I could make the press issue a retraction, and if anyone keeps saying it, I could call them out.”

Luna smiled a little sadly at him. “Yes, I can see that working,” she said. “I do know a few things about the press. It’s not necessary for you to defend my honour, of course, but it’s sweet of you to do so.”

“Alright, then. And, besides that, can I at least convince you to go to Hogsmeade with me next week?”

That made Luna smile broadly. “I’d like that very much, Harry,” she said. “The potions must be working.”

Harry laughed, and he reflected that it felt good to know a girl whom he could completely trust that a line like that was a joke. (Of course, the fact that he had just said he would get tested served as a firewall.) He didn’t think he had ever reached that point with Cho. “Brilliant, Luna. I’ll see you then.”

“I’ll look forward to it.” She kissed him on the cheek and skipped away, humming to herself happily.

* * *

The Astronomy Tower was off limits except for classes. This was for several reasons, including the delicate instruments left exposed up there, the penchant for amorous upper-year students to make inappropriate use of it, and especially the lack of guardrails at the highest point of the castle. Even though the tower was warded against falls, it was better safe than sorry. Cedric had probably gone up there legitimately on his prefect patrols, but Harry didn’t have that option.

“So I’ll just have to sneak up there,” he concluded. “You wanna come, Mione?”

“I think I’ll pass if it’s all the same to you,” she replied overly-formally.

“Why not? You can’t bail on me. What if there’s a clue that you can solve and I can’t?”

“Then write it down. I don’t fancy getting caught out of bounds for this.”

“We’ll have my invisibility cloak and the Marauder’s Map,” he said. “We’ll be fine.”

Hermione groaned, knowing her brother wasn’t going to take no for an answer at this point. “Oh, alright,” she conceded, “but if we get caught, I’m sneaking off in otter form and leaving you holding the bag.”

“Gee, thanks for the support, sis.”

“You’re quite welcome,” she said primly.

They made it to the Astronomy Tower without any trouble, and fortunately, it was empty of amorous couples. It was still before curfew, of course. It got dark very early in January in Scotland, and that would be one less thing to worry about.

“Well, here we are,” Harry said when they arrived. He took the silver baton from his robes, opened it into the disk, and laid it flat on the stone floor, exposing it to the starlight. Nothing happened.

“What’s it supposed to do again?” Hermione asked.

“Turn into an armillary sphere.”

“And how do we do that?”

“Er…I’m not sure. Cedric just said, “Remember the code phrase.’”

“What code phrase?”

“I don’t know. The only phrase associated with this thing is—” His eyes widened. “—the words that are written on it.” He turned one of the magically-sliding rings of the disk so that the words aligned, and he recited them aloud: “All will be revealed when the stars are right.”

The disk sprang to life. With the distinct sound of metal on metal, the rings that made it up rotated around and around each other, all at different angles, turning the whole thing for a moment into a whirling sphere of metal. Then, it settled down into the familiar shape of the celestial globe.

“Well, that takes care of that,” Harry said. With the new alignment of the rings, the other markings on it finally came together into astronomical terms: _ECLIPTIC, TROPIC OF CANCER, ARCTIC CIRCLE, FIRST POINT OF ARIES,_ and so on. The Sun and Moon ran on little tracks on the inside of the sphere. It was beautifully made, and it all moved magically with no visible gear work. But for all this, it didn’t look any different from a typical armillary sphere.

“It’s a really amazing piece of enchantment,” Hermione said. “I wish we had time to study it. But what do we do with it? Do you see any more clues?”

Both of them looked over the sphere carefully, lighting their wands for a better view. There didn’t appear to be any distinguishing marks on it—nothing that wouldn’t be on a normal sphere, and nothing that stood out as having special significance. After a while, Harry noted that a few parts of the mechanism were hidden behind each other. He rotated the rings that controlled the time and date to move it slightly and see if he missed something.

“Harry, wait a minute,” Hermione said. “What time and date is it set for?”

Harry took a careful look at the little dates carved on the rings. “Um…ninth of January, 20h 15m…so right now…I think. It says Year 17.”

“That must be on the Metonic Cycle,” Hermione reasoned.

“Uh huh…“When the stars are right…” So…if it’s set to right now…Do we set it to the time and date of the task?”

“It’s worth a try.”

“Alright.” He turned the rings until they read, _14h 00m, 25 February, Year 17_.

Suddenly, the sphere changed. Constellations appeared, strung in a fine filigree between the rings. What was more, six of them, stretching from the zenith to the horizon on one side, glowed with a soft white light. Harry and Hermione looked on with wide eyes.

“Now, I’d say _that_ _’s_ a clue,” Harry said.

“Yeah,” his sister whispered.

He read off the constellations that were indicated: “Cepheus, Cassiopeia, Perseus, Andromeda, Pegasus, Cetus.”

“Well, that’s pretty clear,” she said. “It’s pointing to the Myth of Perseus.”

“Yeah, but what do I actually have to _do?_ Do I have to tame a winged horse? Do I have to stay a horrific monster? I already took on a basilisk.”

“I don’t know. Is there anything else?”

“Not that I can see. Let’s see if I can collapse it back down.”

It took some finagling with the rings, but he eventually managed to fold the whole contraption back down into its disk form. He was about to collapse it again into the baton, but Hermione stopped him and said, “Wait, Harry. Is there anything different?”

He looked again and was glad he did: “Oh, wow, look. The star chart is still there.” Indeed, the realignment of the rings had place the six constellations of the Perseus Family on the face of the disk. Once again, there were no obvious words, but by rotating one of the rings, he was able to make one string of words appear. “Hey, it says something here,” he said, and he read the words aloud: “As above, so below.”

Suddenly, the disk emitted an ear-splitting screech.

“Ahh! What is that?!” Hermione yelled.

“I don’t know!”

“Make it stop!”

“I’m trying!”

With difficulty, Harry closed the disk back down to the baton, and the shrieking ceased. He and Hermione looked at each other in horror for a moment before they both said the same thing.

“We’ve gotta get out of here!”

They dove back under the invisibility cloak and ran down the stairs as fast as they could, nearly tripping and falling more than once.

“Nice going, furball! The whole castle must’ve heard that,” Hermione said.

“Hey, I didn’t know that would happen!” he protested. “Couldn’t Cedric have warned me about that?”

“Well, we’ve gotta get out of here before Filch shows up. Oh, no, and the judges will know we figured out the clue! I mean, they might be able to figure out it was you just now!”

“Yeah, but they told me I’m _supposed_ to be figuring it out. And I bet that’s the only way to do it. And what was that screaming, anyway?”

“How should I know? Just run!”

It was a very near thing, getting around a very suspicious Filch, plus Mrs. Norris, who could sniff them out, but Harry and Hermione made it back to Gryffindor Tower without getting caught. They sank to the floor, winded and tired out in the Common Room, to the confusion of their house-mates, and they were left still contemplating the meaning of Harry’s next clue.

* * *

Harry and Hermione tried anything they could think of to figure out the secret of the screaming star chart over the next few days, but nothing seemed to work. The baton would now open directly to the star chart, and it would start screaming as soon as the phrase “As above, so below” was uttered in its presence. Unfortunately, they were no closer to figuring what it was all about by the day of the Hogsmeade visit. But Harry set all that aside that day to focus on his date with Luna, which promised to be much more enjoyable, anyway.

Luna was wearing an explosion of colours when Harry met her at the carriage station. He counted at least nine or ten different shades from her rainbow hat to her indigo boots. He didn’t even know boots that colour existed, and he reflected that it might not stop Luna even if they didn’t. But he thought she looked lovely, and he complimented her on her fashion sense. _Bizarre my arse_ , he thought.

“So, Luna, anywhere special you want to go today?” he asked as they rode the carriage down to the village. Harry was a pro at this by now—well, maybe not a pro, but comfortable navigating his way around Hogsmeade with a girl, at least—but he knew it was good courtesy to ask her first. Knowing her, she might want to go somewhere completely off the wall.

“Well, the older girls always have good things to say about Madam Puddifoot’s,” she said, and Harry had to fight not to groan or twitch. “Have you been there?”

“Yeah…a couple of times.”

“How did you like it?”

Harry was relieved she asked him. He knew Luna would value an honest answer. “I thought it was the most saccharine-sweet place I’ve ever seen.”

Luna thought that over: “I can see why some girls would like that.”

“I think the Three Broomsticks is better if you want a cuppa,” he said. “You know—more comfortable.”

“Alright, let’s go there, then,” Luna said brightly.

Harry grinned and offered her his arm when they stepped out of the carriage. They strolled leisurely down the street, enjoying the snowy day. It was a pleasant time—a time to lean back and not worry about all the trouble he was in. There was only a small tingle in the back of his mind that was bothering him. He dismissed it for a while; there was always something going on, if he was paranoid about it, but he did take notice when they reached the Three Broomsticks. Looking around the crowded room, nothing _really_ looked out of the ordinary, but his feline sixth sense twinged on a couple of people who straggled shortly before and after them.

“Luna, wait,” he hissed when they were about to sit down. Something wasn’t right here. He readied his fingers to draw his wand.

“Is something wrong?” she said.

Harry looked around the pub, focusing on the people who didn’t feel right. A tall man in one corner sat up a little too stiffly, staring out at the patrons. Right now, he was staring at Harry’s wand hand. A man at the bar kept looking around shiftily. Ludo Bagman was sitting nearby, talking animatedly with some goblins, but that didn’t seem related. And then, there was a woman at the other side of the room who was acting perfectly natural. She had dark brown hair, olive skin, and a too-large nose; and her clothes were plain and drab, but something about her jawline seemed familiar, and when she looked up, Harry noticed she had…violet eyes? Harry relaxed at once, grinning goofily and waving to her. She tried to ignore him, but he waved again and pointed at his eyes. Her own eyes widened and at once faded to brown. He smirked to himself and sat down. He knew it wasn’t often that someone called out Tonks’s disguises.

“What was that about?” Luna asked.

“Aurors. Dumbledore would’ve asked for them. We still haven’t caught whoever put my name in the Goblet of Fire, so…”

“Oh, of course. It’s good to stay safe.”

“Yes,” Harry said dryly. “I’m sure they’re trying to be inconspicuous, but I have a really well-developed Spidey-sense.”

“Spidey-sense?” she asked.

That led to an in-depth discussion of muggle comic books over tea and pastries that Luna found very entertaining. It was refreshing for Harry to have a wizard-raised friend who could grasp unusual (for her) ideas so easily.

“So some of the superheroes are witches and wizards?” she said.

“Sort of. They call themselves that, but their magic isn’t anything like real magic.”

“Harry, my boy!” a boisterous voice called, and Harry groaned as Ludo Bagman came over to interrupt their conversation. “Been hoping to run into you. How are you doing?”

“Fine, thanks,” he said.

“Great! You know, I wonder if I could get a private word with you?”

Harry took a deep breath to calm himself. Bagman seemed to get more obnoxious every time he saw him. “I’m on a date, Mr. Bagman. Can this wait?” he said.

Bagman looked over at Luna as if he were seeing her for the first time, which seemed impossible, Harry thought, given how brightly she was dressed. “Of course, the lovely Miss Lovegood,” he said and kissed her hand. “I hope you don’t mind, my dear. I just had some quick Tournament business with Mr. Potter.”

“Oh, alright, then,” Luna said cheerfully.

Harry thought she was being too trusting, but he didn’t object. He gave her a sympathetic look as Bagman led him to the far end of the bar. He then gave a small shrug to the Auror who was sitting nearby, who looked more annoyed that he’d been spotted than concerned about Bagman. However, Harry was more concerned when his sixth sense picked up that the three goblins were all staring at them.

“You know we’re being watched, Mr. Bagman?” he whispered.

Bagman glanced up nervously. “Ugh, goblins,” he mumbled. “Who knows what they’re thinking. It’s a nightmare dealing with them.”

Harry didn’t think that sounded too charitable. “Isn’t that Amos Diggory’s department?” he asked.

“Er, yes, well…they were actually looking for David Monroe. Thought he might be up here. Trouble is, they keep gabbing on in Gobbledegook, and I only know one word of Gobbledegook. _Bladvak_. It means ‘pickaxe’.”

“Actually, _bladvak_ is a pick-mattock. Pickaxe is _bladvakir._ It literally means ‘pick-chisel’.”

Bagman’s eyes widened. “You speak Gobbledegook?” he said.

 _Oh God, oh God, why didn_ _’t I keep my big mouth shut?_ “Just a little,” he said quickly. “Luna taught me some.”

“Ah. Well, anyway, I wanted to congratulate you again on your performance in the first task. Really superb. Great showmanship.”

“Thanks.”

“So how are you coming with our little mystery? The clues in the baton?”

“Not bad,” Harry said suspiciously. “I’ve got up to the screaming part.”

Bagman smiled: “Good show. Good show, Harry.” He lowered his voice so Harry could barely hear. “Of course, if you need a bit of help with the last bit, I could always lend you a hand. If if can help you at all…I’ve taken a liking to you…the way you pulled off the first one…well, just say the word.”

If Harry was suspicious before, he _knew_ there was something untoward going on, now. Why was Bagman trying to help him cheat? He smelled corruption—possibly involving those goblins—and he didn’t want to get tangled up in it. He had enough to worry about on his own. So he thought fast to make a quick getaway. “Mr. Bagman,” he whispered, “since you’re so keen to give me some advice, I’ll give you some of my own. The Tetrawizard Tournament was your idea, wasn’t it? I think it would reflect poorly on you _and_ the Tournament if any corruption were discovered around it…Also, there’s an Auror two tables over, and I’ll bet you three sickles he’s listening to every word we say with a Supersensory Charm.”

As Bagman and the Auror both stared at each other in shock, Harry used their distraction to escape.

“Come on, Luna!” He grabbed his date’s hand and whisked her away from the table, dropping enough sickles behind him to make for a large tip. “You said you liked bird-watching, didn’t you? Let’s head over and see what’s out there near the Shrieking Shack.”

“Okay. That sounds nice.”

They walked faster through the town this time, Harry determined to put some distance between him and any trouble he may have left behind. He looked around every so often and quickly spotted the two Aurors shadowing him at a distance, trying to look like they out for a walk on their own. Of course, if they really wanted to go unseen, they could have Disillusioned themselves, but Harry didn’t think he rated that level of secrecy. Indeed, having the Aurors be a little bit conspicuous would be better to deter any suspicious characters. Luna took notice, though.

“Harry,” she whispered, leaning against him, “are you trying to escape from the Rotfang Conspiracy?”

“No, from Bagman. He was trying to help me cheat with the clue to the next task. I don’t know why, but I don’t think it’s good. Anyway, I think I can manage without his help. I figured out some more of the clue last week.”

“You did? What was it?”

“It was a star chart pointing to the myth of Perseus. It was actually pretty simple. The trouble was, once I got that part, the disk made this horrible screaming sound. I couldn’t make head or tail of it.”

“Hmm, perhaps it’s the mating call of a heliopath,” she suggested.

“Um…is there any particular reason it _would_ be, Luna?” Harry asked.

“Not really. But it _could_ be.”

Harry laughed loudly, and he spun her to face him and kissed her. This kiss lasted longer than their previous ones—long enough for Luna to put her arms around him. It was the first time it had _really_ felt natural to Harry to kiss a girl, out of the blue, and they were both grinning afterwards. This was going even better than he’d expected.

The birds didn’t avoid the Shrieking Shack, fortunately, at least not on days when the Charms had it “inactive.” The pair huddled close and looked around at the surrounding trees for birds, with Harry letting his predatory instincts out to play. With his feline senses, he quickly spotted quite a few birds in the area, many of which looked tasty—er, interesting. They looked interesting. He pointed out a trio of them to Luna.

“Are those sparrows, Harry?” she said softly. “They don’t look quite right.”

Harry squinted to be sure of what he was seeing. “No, they’re not,” he said. “They’re snow buntings. Their winter plumage looks similar to sparrows from a distance. You know, they actually migrate here for their winter home? These three probably spend their summers in Iceland.”

Luna smiled up at him: “You’re full of surprises, Mr. Potter.”

“I aim to impress, Miss Lovegood,” he replied, and, in a rarity, it was true.

They stood there a while, Harry pointing out the different species, and the two of them listening to the bird songs. Luna tried to imitate some of them and actually got some of the birds to respond. Harry was amused to see there were several merlins in the area and wondered if they tended to collect in magical areas. As they watched, one merlin swooped down from its perch and flew low and fast near the ground, chasing after a snow bunting. Just as it started to get away, a second merlin dropped down from above and snatched it out of the air with its claws.

Harry thought it was a fine bit of hunting, but he looked nervously at Luna. A lot of girls would feel sorry for the snow bunting, he was sure, but Luna, it seemed, was familiar enough with animals to take it in stride. In fact, she smiled. “That’s nice of them, isn’t it, Harry?” she said.

Harry did a double-take. “Wh-what?”

“They help each other hunt.”

“Oh, right. Yeah, they’re probably a breeding pair…huh, except it’s nowhere near breeding season,” he said, frowning.

“Well, magical areas sometimes cause animals to act differently,” she said.

They continued watching the two merlins eat their lunch when they heard a loud crack, a yelp, and a thud, and the birds soon flew away.

Harry sighed and walked towards the source of the sound. “And now you scared them off, Tonks,” he said. He offered her a hand to help her up.

His cousin’s hair blushed red as she stood and brushed herself off. “Sorry about that,” she said. “The boss said to keep an eye on you to make sure no one tried to do you in. _So_ …” She gave them a leering grin. “Are you enjoying your date?”

“Oh, yes. Very much so,” Luna said. “Harry is quite the gentleman.”

Harry knew Tonks would have some smart remark prepared, so he jumped in and said, “Yeah, we’ve been having a nice time. Tonks, this is Luna. Luna, this is my cousin, Auror Tonks.”

“Pleased to meet you,” Tonks told her. “So you’re the lucky girl. Well, you keep this kid out of trouble, now.”

“Don’t worry. I will.”

“Oh, yeah? Good luck with that, Luna,” Harry said. “Trouble is a very tenacious foe.”

Luna laughed musically, and they walked back to the village in good spirits.

“You know, I could listen to your clue sometime, Harry, if you want,” she said.

“Okay…” he said. “If you dare.”


	104. A Pool Party

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: JK Rowling and Harry Potter. They go together like coffee and cream.
> 
> There really was an Ebola outbreak in Zaire in 1995, but the one I’m describing will be much worse than the one in real life, more similar to the 2014-2015 outbreak in West Africa. Such divergences from real history will continue to grow in the future in this story, especially as Voldemort gains power.

“Alright, here it goes,” Harry said. “As above, so below.”

The silver disk that now showed a star chart began screeching, and Harry did his best to smother it with a pillow. It was still coming through at an earsplitting volume.

It had taken a few days to arrange this meeting with Luna to examine the clue, mostly to try to avoid disturbing the school with the noise. But Harry was unconcerned. He had enjoyed his and Luna’s date in Hogsmeade more than any of his dates with Cho, and seeing Luna in the Great Hall daily brought a smile to his face when he had previously been angsty over the Tournament. Even Hermione noticed, to which she smiled at him knowingly and said it was a refreshing change.

But at the moment, Harry was mainly hoping that Luna would be able to shed some light on this clue with her strange and esoteric knowledge. He was sure it was a long shot, though. It just sounded like nails on a blackboard to him. So imagine his surprise when she said with no hesitation, “Oh, Harry, that’s Mermish!”

“What?!” he and Hermione said in shock.

“You _recognise_ that?” Hermione added.

“Oh course. Mum taught me Mermish pretty well. Merpeople are usually helpful when looking for Dabberblimps and Snabberwitches.”

Harry and Hermione both just stared at her.

“Could you start it again, please? I didn’t catch all of it.”

Harry nodded numbly and closed the baton. Opening it again, he spoke the code phrase, and Luna tried to translate.

“As above, so below,” she said, “Follow him who…did go…slay the…something of fearful name…um…something about a maiden…no, no. I’m sorry, Harry, it’s too fast. You’ll have to put it in water to understand it.”

“It’s alright, Luna—wait, in water?”

“Of course. Mermish sounds like English underwater.”

“So you’re saying instead of smothering it with a pillow, I should have drowned this thing in a bathtub?” Harry deadpanned.

Luna laughed musically, which was a little worrying given how morbid the joke was.

“Okaaaayyy…” Hermione said nervously. “But we’ll need a large enough body of water to do it. Even underwater, it’s so loud it could damage your ears at close range, and I don’t feel like jumping in the Lake in January.”

“Hmm…say, Mione, didn’t the Sorting Hat say we have a swimming pool in the castle?”

“Yes, but Fred and George said it’s in the prefect’s bathroom.”

Harry considered this a moment and grinned.

* * *

“Hey, Cedric,” Harry said. “What’s the password for the prefect’s bathroom?”

“…Why?”

“Because you owe me for not telling me about the screaming.”

“Oh…yeah, sorry about that. The password’s ‘pine fresh.’”

* * *

“I’ve never been to a pool party before,” Luna said excitedly.

“It’s not really a pool party,” Hermione cautioned. (She hadn’t bothered protesting Harry’s rulebreaking this time.) “We’re just trying to solve this clue.”

“Still, it’s very exciting. The prefects always talk about how wonderful their bathroom…” They walked through the door, and the sight took her breath away. “…is,” she whispered.

It could have been a Roman bath of the highest class: all white marble, white linen curtains, and stained glass windows with a chandelier hanging overhead. The “bathtub,” currently empty, was small by pool standards, “only” about thirty feet by twenty, but it was deep enough for a diving board. It also had about a hundred taps around the sides, which made the whole thing look distinctly odd. There was no doubt what the intended usage was, though, since there were boys’ and girls’ changing rooms on either side of the room.

 “This place is amazing,” Harry said. “How come only the prefects get a pool?”

“Put it on our list of things to complain to Dumbledore about,” Hermione said. She knelt down by the side of the pool and experimentally tried one of the taps. _Bloop!_ Water gushed out, but more noticeably, so did pink and blue bubbles the size of footballs. “Whoa!” she said, jerking back. “That’s a _weird_ bubble bath.”

“Ooh, I’ve never had a magical bubble bath, either,” Luna said. She started trying the taps in quick succession and was soon giggling like a girl half her age. Her laughter seemed even more infectious than usual. Many of the taps produced different types of bubbles, but here and there, they created other effects. One produced perfumed purple clouds, and another emitted a jet of water that bounced across the surface. Two large taps on either side of diving board were the only normal ones, apparently intended to fill the pool quickly. Soon, the whole thing was full of water and bubbles.

“We’d best get into our costumes, then,” Hermione said. Harry and Luna agreed and quickly took to the changing rooms.

Harry was, predictably, interested in seeing Luna in a swimsuit. Of course, she was dressed in a mundane one-piece in Ravenclaw blue; wizards weren’t prudes by most measures, but their clothing did tend to the conservative side. He still thought she looked great in it. If the way she was looking at him was any indication, she appreciated his physique as well. Years of karate and Quidditch had done him a lot of good.

The side opposite the diving board was open, with stairs for entry, and they descended into the hot water. Hermione wanted to get right to the clue, but Harry and Luna outvoted her by splashing her heavily, successfully getting her to lighten up for a while. It turned out that none of the bubbles were irritating to the eyes, so they had no trouble there, and Harry suspected that some of them were enchanted to scrub in lieu of soap, as he could feel a mixture of magics in them. It was only after they all had their fill of swimming, splashing, and dunking each other under the water and Harry opened up the silver baton to listen to the clue.

“So I just need to put it in the water?” he said.

“That’s right,” Luna replied. “If you listen to it under the water, it should sound perfectly understandable.”

“Okay, then,” Harry said. He took a deep breath and spoke the pass phrase: “As above, so below.” As soon as the disk started screaming, he dropped it in the water, and it sank to the bottom. From above, it sounded muffled, but when he put his head under the water, he was amazed to hear beautiful singing. Hermione and Luna soon joined him. The song was long, and they had to listen to it several times through to get all of it. Once they’d heard the whole thing, Hermione wrote it down with a quill and parchment she’d charmed waterproof:

 

_What is above still is below,_

_So follow him who far did go,_

_To slay the beast of fearful name_

_And save the maiden bound in chains._

_Come seek us where our voices sound_

_(We cannot sing above the ground),_

_And follow well the path he took_

_To find out where you have to look._

_Choose, now, your maiden, prince, or knave,_

_A princess, wench, or ally brave._

_A captive first, but aide in flight,_

_Send one who_ _’s ready for the fight._

_And choose the path of which you_ _’re fond:_

_The hard, but short to find your wand,_

_Or keep it on the long way_ _‘round_

_To find your way to higher ground._

“Well, that was surprisingly informative,” Harry said. He unfortunately was used to high-stakes games of riddles, but as riddles went, this one wasn’t so bad.

“I suppose so,” Hermione agreed. “So, it looks like the task is definitely parallelling the myth of Perseus. And ‘Come seek us where our voices sound’ must mean the Merpeople, so it sounds like it’ll start at the Lake.”

“And I have to save a maiden from a sea monster,” Harry reasoned.

“It doesn’t have to be a maiden,” she corrected. “The song said a prince, knave, princess, or wench. That means it could be anyone, but it sounds like they have to help you fight your way back.”

“And I have to _choose_ someone. That’s different. Will you do it, then?”

“Me?” Hermione said, wide-eyed.

“Well, you’re the only one who can compete with me in our year. It’s probably you or one of the Weasley Twins if I want the best combination of clever, skilled, and someone I trust to have my back—no offence, Luna.”

“It’s alright, Harry,” she said. “I think you’ll need more than third-year spells.”

“Hmm…” Hermione thought. “I guess I can’t argue with your logic…I’ll do it if Mum and Dad don’t veto it. But you might want to add Neville to your short-list. He can hold his own; he faced the basilisk with you, remember?”

“Oh, right. I should’ve thought of that. So anyway, how do we think this is gonna go?”

“Well, if we follow the myth, you would first need to get some weapons to fight Medusa. Although I assume you won’t be facing anything as dangerous as an actual gorgon.”

“Right. What were the weapons?”

“A…sword, a shield, and a helmet of invisibility, I think,” Hermione said.

“There were winged sandals, too,” Luna spoke up.

“There were?” Harry said.

“Yes, so he could fly to the Gorgons’ cave.”

“Really? I thought Perseus had to tame Pegasus to find Medusa.”

Luna gave him a very confused look: “No, Harry, Pegasus was born from Medusa’s blood when he killed her.”

“What? But I thought—”

“Wait a minute, Harry,” Hermione said. “Are we following the _actual_ myth of Perseus, or are we following the Harryhausen film?”

Harry opened his mouth to speak, but then, he smacked himself in the forehead. “Alright, Luna, you’re the mythology expert. How does the real story go?”

She told them. Perseus’s original quest was to bring back the head of Medusa. Athena sent him to the Grey Witches, who told him the route to the garden of the Hesperides, where Hera’s nymphs gave him his weapons. He then travelled to Medusa’s lair and beheaded her whilst looking at her reflection in his shield. Pegasus sprang from her neck, along with a warrior with a golden sword who didn’t really figure in the story, and he flew back home on the winged horse. On the way, though, he happened upon Andromeda purely by coincidence. She was being offered up to the Cetus as a sacrifice, so Perseus turned the sea monster to stone with Medusa’s head, and (this being a Greek myth) married the princess immediately.

“Okay, the fight on the way back doesn’t really fit, then, but I guess they needed to do something for the teamwork part,” Harry concluded. “So I’ll have to go upriver, probably find some hidden cave or something—”

“Wait, why do you say that?” Hermione said.

“What do you mean?”

“You don’t know that your teammate will be upriver,” she said. “The song just said ‘higher ground’. They could be up in the mountains or something.”

He shook his head: “Andromeda was chained to a rock by the sea, though. The most obvious place for that is in the ravine. Maybe it’ll be somewhere else on the castle or river, but somehow, I don’t think we’ll be going far from the water.”

“Hmm, fair point, I guess. The last stanza’s interesting, too. It sounds like at the beginning, you’ll have a choice between overcoming some difficult obstacle without your wand, or taking a longer route with your wand. It seems really odd. I wouldn’t have expected something like that.”

“Well, it works for me. I can do wandless magic. I wonder what the obstacle is, though.”

They all thought about it for a minute, and then Luna had an idea. “When Perseus was born,” she said, “his father set him adrift at sea in a wooden box.”

Harry and Hermione looked at each other, then looked at Luna. “You think the first step will be some kind of escape act?” Harry said. “It seems possible. And the task _is_ supposed to be about problem-solving.”

“And they can’t force you to give up your wand, so they’d have to provide an alternate route,” Hermione said. “Not that you’d need it. Good thinking, Luna.”

When they had dried off and changed back into their robes, Harry walked Luna back to her dorm hand in hand. “Well, that wasn’t so hard,” he said. “I’m glad I have a friend like you who just happens to know Mermish _and_ Greek mythology.”

She smiled at him. “I could teach you some Mermish if you like.” Suddenly, she switched over to Parseltongue and hissed, _“I am still glad you taught me Snake-Speak.”_

Harry chuckled and smiled back at her. “I’d like that if we can ever find the time,” he said. But when he looked away, a sad and wistful look crept over his face. He didn’t speak again until they were nearly at Ravenclaw Tower, where he stopped and turned to her again. “Luna, could you keep a secret for me?” he said softly.

Hermione immediately tensed up and quickly pulled him away. “Harry, what are you doing?” she whispered.

“Mione, I just want to tell Luna about the Parseltongue thing. I trust her, and I think she deserves to know.”

It took her a minute to figure out what Harry meant, but when she did, she said, “Harry, you musn’t! You remember what happened last time you told someone a secret—”

“That wasn’t my fault!” he snapped. “Dumbledore even said I was being responsible enough. It was just back luck someone heard it who could misuse it. Besides, I was gonna make extra-sure we were alone, anyway.” He motioned significantly at the portraits in the corridors. He knew full well that at Hogwarts, the walls literally had ears.

“That’s not the point. You promised you’d clear it with Mum and Dad before you told any more important secrets.”

“It’s not that big a deal—”

“It certainly is! It’s at least tied to some things we don’t want getting out, and you know it.”

“But I—” He looked over at Luna, who looked sympathetic, and then back at his sister’s glaring face. Finally, he sighed and hung his head. “I’m sorry, Luna,” he said. “I really want to tell you, but I have family business to take care of first.”

“It’s fine, Harry. I don’t want to cause any trouble,” she said, giving him one of her slow blinks.

“You won’t, I’m sure,” he said, automatically blinking back, but wishing he felt more certain. “I just need to make sure everyone’s on the same page.”

* * *

Harry tried, but he didn’t get a chance to tell Luna his secret that week. The more he thought about it, the more complicated it seemed to get. He didn’t want to defy his parents, but he grew hesitant to talk to them as he considered the complications. Of course, he didn’t want to hurt Luna, either. It was so frustrating that he couldn’t just tell her, even though it was making him nervous wondering what she would think of him.

He still spent time with Luna, though, studying with her in the library, sometimes sitting beside her or she inviting him to sit by her side for pudding, bearing the whispers and occasional jinxes over them being together. He admired her tenacity. He knew the whispers and unkind remarks hurt her, but she was determined not to let what anybody else thought control her life. He loved her laugh, too: usually a small giggle or even just a knowing smile, but when her emotions bubbled over, it turned into an uproarious squeal that lit up the whole room. She had a great sense of wit, herself, and he suspected she was a little (maybe only a little) more self-aware about her fantastic creatures than everyone thought. All of that was what made it so hard for him to keep secrets from her.

Eventually, he came up with a plan. Luna’s birthday was coming up on the thirteenth, followed by Valentine’s Day on the fourteenth, and the traditional Valentine’s weekend in Hogsmeade on the eighteenth, one week before the second task. The timing suited him. He had already decided what he would do there; he would give her small tokens on the first two days and save the big gift for Saturday. He just needed to get his family to go along with it. He thought he could convince Dumbledore though. That would work to his advantage if he could pull it off.

Harry and Hermione dutifully returned to Professor Dumbledore’s office with Remus that weekend for another round of Pensieve viewing, but the investigation into the Tournament was not going well. They had exhausted all of the available memories of the Goblet of Fire from the time it was lit to when it spat out Harry’s name, and they hadn’t seen anything unambiguously out of the ordinary. This term, they had begun observing representative memories of suspected Death Eaters who had escaped Azkaban to see if any of them could spot any patterns or mannerisms that might betray an impostor. All three had animal intuition for that, though it wasn’t fool-proof, and Pettigrew proved.

However, there was one new complication to this. After his date, Harry had mentioned Ludo Bagman’s suspicious behaviour to Sirius (who had wanted a full report, of course), and he had said Dumbledore should know.

The three of them entered Dumbledore’s office to see the old wizard standing over his desk, hands behind his back, with a solemn look on his face. Unusually, there were newspaper clippings in multiple languages spread across his desk. The ones they could read blared dire headlines like, _Hemorrhagic Fever Strikes Zaire—Dozens of Muggles and Wizards Dead,_ and _Ngeze_ _’s Nundu Leaves Deadly Legacy_.

“Ah, good afternoon, Harry, Hermione, Remus,” Dumbledore said, putting a smile on his face that was slowly beginning to look false.

“Good afternoon,” they replied. Hermione in particular looked over the desk with concern. “More trouble in East Africa, Professor?” she said worriedly.

“I’m afraid so, Hermione. I feared this outcome for some time. Nundus were disastrous in centuries past when they terrorised small stretches of forest. With the more connected muggle world of today, the plagues they spread could be catastrophic.”

“Is there anything you can do?” Hermione asked.

“Is there anything you _need_ to do?” Remus said more pragmatically. The last time Dumbledore had had to spend an extended period overseas, it hadn’t gone well.

“No,” he said, “for better or worse, there is little I can or must do for this crisis. I have confidence in the local Healers who have dealt with such outbreaks before. Please sit.” With a flick of his wand, the clippings organised themselves into one of his desk drawers. “Now, Harry,” he continued, “I made some discreet enquiries into Ludo Bagman after your report of his suspicious behaviour. The Auror who questioned him found no probable cause, but when I dug a little deeper, I found that he has accrued some rather alarming gambling debts, and it seems most likely that he is attempting to influence the outcome of the Tournament to win one of his bets.”

“That makes sense,” Remus agreed. “Bagman’s a notorious gambler. It’s exactly the kind of thing he’d do.”

“Do you think he would’ve put my name in the Goblet for a bet?” Harry asked. If that was what all this was, it would turn the whole thing on its head.

“It is a distinct possibility,” Dumbledore agreed. “Perhaps even our most likely individual lead so far, not that that is saying much. Bagman may have bought into the Boy-Who-Lived legend, or, even if your winning was an unlikely outcome, a compulsive gambler would not worry about such details. It would almost fit. However, there is a very important piece of evidence that still suggests Voldemort’s involvement.”

“What?” Harry said.

“The fact that your records were altered at Uluru in Australia. That would have required extensive planning and probably multiple people. And Bagman does not seem devious enough nor desperate enough to mastermind such an elaborate scheme. I think he was at most an unwitting dupe of Voldemort in this scheme, and he would still have needed a Death Eater contact to do it.

“Nevertheless,” he continued. “I think we should take a closer look at all of the Tournament organisers. Igor Karkaroff, as you know, is a defector Death Eater. Ludo Bagman was also once accused of working with them. I do not believe David Monroe has any dark leanings, but then I also believed Madame Maxime was above the potential for blackmail, and given her reaction to Ms. Skeeter’s article, I was forced to rethink that—although after a frank conversation, I still believe that no one had any hold over her, and she was not involved.”

“So what are we looking at today, Albus?” Remus said, trying to get to the point.

“The trials of Igor Karkaroff and Ludo Bagman, both shortly after the end of the war. We must be on a closer lookout for any irregularities from those two in particular. Let us begin.”

Karkaroff’s first trial was straightforward. He was caught red-handed by Moody and sentenced to Azkaban. The second trial had him brought back from Azkaban, as he had decided to sell out in exchange for clemency. He looked more frightened the second time. He showed a definite tremor, and he was dressed in prison rags. Remus shook a little, remembering how Sirius had been trapped there for so many years.

Presiding at the trials was Barty Crouch Senior, the man who had first been disgraced after Sirius was freed, then murdered by robbers in his home. At the trials, he was a fierce and hardline judge, though not above making a deal. Karkaroff was clearly desperate to get out and grew increasingly frantic when he learnt that all the names he named were already captured or dead. Only Augustus Rookwood from the Department of Mysteries was news to Crouch, although that was still enough to release him.

Bagman, then at the height of his career, was accused of passing information to Rookwood, but he claimed he had no idea he was a Death Eater, and his fans still supported him loudly enough that the Wizengamot let him off easily. Given how well Rookwood had disguised himself, Dumbledore suspected Bagman really had been “a bit of an idiot” and had not known, but they still had no certainties.

“So Bagman is definitely suspicious,” Dumbledore concluded. “I have been unable to conclusively rule out a connection with the Death Eaters, and there is still the matter of Bertha Jorkins, who for his department and has not been seen since last summer. I think it likely she _did_ get mixed up with the Death Eaters, given the circumstances. I will speak to Amelia Bones to see if we can pry deeper into Bagman’s life, but alas, my instincts tell me we are barking up the wrong tree.”

Harry, Hermione, and Remus all agreed. Their instincts were far from certain, Bagman just didn’t throw off the “Death Eater” vibe the way Lucius Malfoy did.

“But I would urge you to be careful around him,” Dumbledore added. “Even if he is not a Death Eater, gambling debts to goblins are something best avoided.”

They all nodded to that, too. He didn’t need to tell them twice.

“Now, are there any other concerns you have before we close?” Dumbledore asked.

“Actually, Professor,” Harry spoke up, “We’ve been having a disagreement that we would like your advice on…”

* * *

Four weeks, two back-to-back Ravenclaw Quidditch matches, and one of Grayson’s wandless magic seminars after their previous date, Harry and Luna once again found themselves together in Hogsmeade. Harry’s plan had gone well so far. On Monday, he had given her an emu feather quill for her birthday and had the elves bake her a small cake. On Tuesday, he had given her a card and a box of muggle chocolates and officially asked her out to Hogsmeade. Today, they were taking a lovely stroll down Main Street. Their first stop had been the florist, where Harry bought Luna three roses. Normally, it was dangerous to leave Valentine’s roses to the last minute, but Harry didn’t have that problem because it wasn’t the traditional red, pink, or white that he bought. The three colours he chose were true blue (the impossible and unattainable and a magical cultivar), striped mundi (variety and merriment), and lavender (enchantment). Luna stuck the three flowers in her hair and smiled broadly when he gave them to her.

Once again, three Aurors were noticeably shadowing them all morning. And that started to give Harry an idea.

“Luna, I think I may be changing my mind about Madam Puddifoot’s,” he said.

Luna tilted her head curiously and spoke to him with perhaps the most serious and _normal_ voice he’d ever heard from her—none of her usual dreamy, ethereal quality. “Why?” she asked. “You said it was the most saccharine-sweet place you’d ever seen, and I hear it’s ever worse on Valentine’s Day.”

Harry couldn’t help but stare. Her sudden change was like flipping a switch—and he didn’t even know Luna _had_ a switch.

“Harry, are you okay?”

“What? Oh, yes. I mean, yes, the place is awful on Valentine’s Day, but I thought it would make for a fun bit of people watching…mainly, I want to see what Tonks will do.” He looked to where he had spotted Tonks and winked at her. To her credit, her disguise was impeccable if you didn’t know her. If one knew her mannerisms and her natural clumsiness, though, she was easy to spot. After all, she _had_ aced Deception and Concealment in training, but she’d nearly flunked Stealth and Tracking.

Meanwhile, Luna had resumed her usual dreamy tone like nothing out of the ordinary had happened. “Hm, I suppose that would be interesting,” she said. “Shall we go, then?”

They went off to Madam Puddifoot’s at once, and Tonks, looking a little worried for possible pranks, followed.

Just like last year, Madam Puddifoot’s was trussed up in eye-watering pink, lace, and heart-shaped confetti getting into everything. Harry couldn’t understand how Valentine’s Day was so popular here when you couldn’t drink your tea without getting bits of paper in it. Then again, most of the patrons on Valentine’s Day weren’t putting a whole lot of effort into drinking tea.

Harry and Luna sat down and ordered their drinks without incident, but at that moment, Harry’s little plan backfired when Tonks walked in. She had morphed herself to look younger, with long, golden hair. She had reproduced her violet eyes, and she put on an affected giggle reminiscent of Lavender Brown, and at once, she draped herself across Harry and loudly exclaimed, “Oh, Harry, darling! You already got us a table!”

Of course, everyone stared at them. Fortunately, Luna knew what was going on and didn’t look offended, but even so, Harry felt he had no choice but to respond in kind. “Nice to see you, too, Cousin,” he said. “Luna, this is my cousin. Her name is Nympha…what was the rest of it again—ow!”

Tonks scowled and whacked Harry in the back of the head hard, then slipped into the table next to him and Luna. “The name’s Tonks. _Or else_ ,” she said. “Come on in, Shack.” Her partner appeared: tall, dark, and looking uncomfortably out-of-place in the small tea shop. It wasn’t often one saw Aurors in a place like that, undercover or not. “That was below the belt, Harry,” she grumbled. “You don’t want to know how many awful nicknames I got called in school. Why do you think I go by Tonks? It’s not because Nymphadora’s over-the-top and flowery.”

“Oh…” Harry said. “Sorry, I didn’t realise.”

“Funny thing. Mum and Dad never realised either till I was thirteen. And anyway, you started it, coming in here.”

“It’s Valentine’s Weekend,” Harry protested.

“So you’re saying this _wasn_ _’t_ a prank on the Aurors _who are here to protect you_?”

“Okay, okay, I admit it wasn’t the best idea. But I’m warning you, if this winds up in Rita Skeeter’s next column, I’m siccing Sirius and Remus on you.”

Tonks thought that over for a minute and said, “Fair enough.”

They sat in an awkward silence for a few minutes. Harry held Luna’s hand across the little table. Tonks wisely didn’t try anything with Auror Shacklebolt, and the two of them got a rather large amount of stares, although Harry certainly didn’t mind having the attention taken off of him.

“I like your outfit, Luna,” Tonks said eventually. Luna was dressed in her rainbow winter wear again.

“Thank you,” she said, flashing Harry a smile. “I think Harry likes it, too.”

“The winter needs a bit more colour,” Harry replied.

“Well, I’m glad you two are having a good time.”

“Yeah. So am I. So does your boyfriend know you’re here with another man?” Harry said as he began to feel adventurous again. Auror Shacklebolt rolled his eyes.

Tonks arched an eyebrow at him: “You mean Remus…Eh, I don’t know if that’s working out.”

“Really?” Harry said in surprise. “To hear him talk, you were all over him last year.”

Tonks laughed. “Well, Remus is kind of a biased source,” she said. “Really, I’m not completely sold on the schoolteacher thing. I’m looking for more adventure.”

“Um…werewolf?” Harry said.

“Getting too mainstream.”

Harry and Luna both laughed loudly, disturbing the other patrons, not that Harry much cared. “Only you, Tonks,” he said. “I hope he’ll be alright, though.”

“I think he’ll be fine. The way I see it, I did my part getting him to open up to the idea of romance, but it might be coming time to set him up with someone more his speed.”

Personally, Harry though Remus needed someone with Tonks’s bubbly personality to balance him out, but then again, he was doing better now that he had productive employment and students like Colin and Demelza looking up to him. Well, he’d just have to keep an eye on things.

“I’m sorry about that, Luna,” he said when they left the tea shop. “That kind of got away from me.”

“Oh, it wasn’t so bad, Harry,” she said. “It was kind of fun. And I enjoyed spending the day with you.”

“Yeah, I enjoyed it, too. Would you mind getting a private room at the Three Broomsticks? I have some things I want tell you about, er, privately.”

Luna seemed puzzled, but she trusted Harry enough that she quickly agreed. They strolled over to the Three Broomsticks to request a private room. Sirius had had the presence of mind to realise that Madam Rosmerta wouldn’t just give one to a couple of minors, so Harry produced a signed letter from Sirius giving him permission. She looked at them suspiciously, but she accepted the letter. Once in the room, Harry put a _Muffliato_ and an Alarm Charm on the door, and he cast _Hominem Revelio_ to make sure they were really alone. It felt like overkill, since no one was likely to come back there, but his parents had insisted he make certain he couldn’t be overheard.

“Probably don’t need the cloak and dagger,” he told Luna, hoping she wasn’t starting to worry about his intentions. “It’s just that after last year, I need to be really sure.”

“I understand. What did you want to talk about?” she said.

Harry slumped into one of the chairs. It was a refreshing change, finally being able to talk to someone frankly. He almost hadn’t realised how much tension he’d been carrying. “There were a couple of things. The first thing is—I just thought you should know. It’s about my Parseltongue ability. I mean, you’ve been such a great help to me with it…So, over Christmas holidays, we met with Professor Dumbledore, and he said my ability isn’t just because of what happened to me when I was a baby…It’s because I have some kind of magical connection to Voldemort, still.”

That was the part he really hoped she would be understanding about. If the idea really frightened her, he’d have to back off. However, Luna didn’t look anything but curious. She was a Ravenclaw, after all. “That’s interesting,” she said. “Well, not very interesting for you. I imagine it’s very unsettling. But I think that would make more sense. This way, the ability would be derived from a direct connection to You-Know-Who’s magic rather than a transfer of knowledge or blood or something similar that there would be no real reason for. Although I have no idea how such a connection could form.”

“Um…well…Dumbledore said it had something to do with the Killing Curse burning partway through my mum’s protection and into my head…I don’t really understand it. In fact, I doubt anyone but Dumbledore and Grayson do. The point is, it’s not good because every once in a while, I get a vision or something from Voldemort, and he could try to attack my mind through it. So Dumbledore and Grayson are trying to find a way to severe the connection safely.”

“Ah. I see. If they do that, then you will probably lose your ability to speak Parseltongue.”

After two and a half years, Luna could still surprise Harry with how quick she was on the uptake. “Yes, that’s it,” he said.

“It’s for the best, of course,” she replied calmly. “After all, it would be very bad if You-Know-Who figured out how to read your mind.”

“I know. And if they figure out how to do it, I wouldn’t hesitate. It’s just that…it sounds completely mad when I say it out loud, but I kinda don’t want to lose the Parseltongue bit. Probably comes from living with Hermione for so long. I don’t want to forget the stuff I know.”

“That’s understandable.” She reached across the table and placed her hand over his comfortingly. “But you know, I learnt Parseltongue from you just fine. We could practice it so you still remember all the words afterwards.”

“Exactly! Hermione said the same thing. But you know the language better than she does. It would be better with you, and I wanted you to know why I wanted to do it.”

She squeezed his hand slightly. _“That is very good of you, Hahlee. I see clearly what you want to do,”_ she said in Parseltongue. _“I will help you.”_

 _“Thank you, Loonah,”_ he replied. “It would be nice if we could make a comprehensive list of the words. I know we sort of tried to put a dictionary together before, but it was never really organised. The problem is the dictionary’s huge, and most of the words don’t translate.”

 _“Snake-Speak is simple. It doesn’t have many words,”_ she offered. “The hard part will be figuring out which words it has and which is doesn’t. We could use the Mermish- and Gobbledegook-to-English dictionaries for reference. Those only have the words the translators thought were important.”

“Yes, that could work. There are simplified versions of English too that we could look up.” Harry remembered hearing somewhere that Orwell had based his idea of Newspeak on somebody’s attempt to invent a simplified English for second language learners with just 850 words. He could probably look into that.

“It would be nice if we had a clearer way of writing the words, too,” Luna said. “We just wrote the words the way they sounded before.”

“Yeah. I’ve talked to Hermione about it a little. She thinks we should write it in IPA.”

“What’s IPA?”

“International Phonetic Alphabet. It’s a way of unambiguously writing all the sounds that can be made with the human voice.”

“Oh. Fascinating. I’ll have to ask her about it.”

“Right, but anyway, that wasn’t the only thing I wanted to tell you, Luna.”

“It wasn’t?”

“No, there was…something more important. You see, this is one of my _big_ secrets. There are a few other people who know, but I’ve only ever willingly told Sirius and Remus.”

“Oh my. You don’t have to—”

“I know, but I want to. And it wasn’t easy to convince my parents to let me, so…”

“Well, I’m glad you trust me so much, Harry. What is it?”

Harry took a deep breath. “Let me show you,” he said. “You remember I ran away from my aunt and uncle when I was five?” She nodded. “Well…this is how I did it.” He pushed himself up with his hands and changed to cat form to land on the table.

 

_“Absolutely not!” Mum and Dad had said when he asked them about his idea. “Enough people know about your ability already. We don’t need any more. If you’re going to tell all the girls you date, we might as well not bother.”_

_“I’m not telling all the girls I date,” he protested. “I never told Cho.”_

_“Yes, and you dated Cho for eight months and never even mentioned it,” Hermione pointed out. “You’ve only been dating Luna for two.”_

_“I know, but…but I already like Luna more than I ever did Cho. She’s a lot of fun to be around, she’s kind, understanding; I trust her._ Plus _, Luna was a good friend we could rely on long before we started dating. Cho wasn_ _’t.”_

 _Sirius started laughing at Harry_ _’s description: “Oh, man, you’ve got it_ bad _, pup._ _”_

_Harry sighed._ _“Not helping, Sirius. The point is, I wouldn’t consider this if I didn’t know Luna as well as I do, apart from the dating.”_

_“That’s very nice for you, son,” Dad said, “but be that as it may, that doesn’t make it a good idea to tell her. And it doesn’t hurt anything not to tell her. You’re not picking her to join you in the second task, and she’s not involved with fighting Voldemort. She has no reason to know.”_

_“I know she has no reason to, but I still want her to know. And it’s not just that I don’t want to keep it a secret—you know, in the abstract. Remember the first task? How we said I might have to reveal my ability in an emergency? Well, the same applies to the second task, doesn’t it? And if I have to reveal it, I don’t want her to find out that way. I really like Luna, and I don’t want to be the guy who keeps a secret from her and then has_ that _happen._ _”_

 _His family thought that was very thoughtful of him, but it was still a very hard sell. Sirius, ever the ladies_ _’ man, was on his side, which didn’t help his case much. What really sold Mum and Dad in the end was when Remus reported that Luna seemed like a trustworthy girl to him from having her in his classes, and, to their surprise, he was also on Harry’s side. Perhaps Tonks really_ had _done him some good. (Dumbledore himself had said it wasn_ _’t his place to interfere, but he hadn’t vetoed the idea, and that was good enough for Harry.)_

 

“Aw, Harry, you’re so cute!” Luna squealed.

Luna was obviously a cat person. She already had the slow blink down, which she used on him regularly probably without even thinking about it, and she was so happy to see him that way that there could be no doubt. He padded over to her, and she started petting him down his back and scratching him behind his ears. He purred happily, making her giggle. It was ironic, he thought distantly; this was probably the most petting Luna would be comfortable with for a while.

“You’re a beautiful cat, Harry. Your fur is better-behaved, and it really brings out your eyes,” she said.

Harry jumped off the table and changed back to human form. “Thanks, Luna. I’m glad you like it. I really wanted you to know.”

“You’ve been able to do that since you were five? How did that happen?”

“Accidental magic. We think. It could be some weird Boy-Who-Lived power, but there’s no reason for it to be.”

“You must have been an adorable kitten.”

Harry chuckled. “Well, Hermione thought so. We’ve got a couple pictures hidden away somewhere. That’s how I found my way to Hermione, too, by the way. I could smell her magic in cat form.”

Luna giggled again. “Perhaps I should call you Furry Potter, now.”

Harry groaned. “Please don’t. Hermione wore that one out when I was eight.”

“Oh, that’s too bad. But still, I’m glad you told me. It’s nice to know you trust me like this.”

“Of course I do. Hermione and I have always been able to rely on you. But I really wanted you to know just in case, because if there’s an emergency, I might need to use it for the second task next week. I wanted you to know beforehand if that happens.”

“Thank you, Harry,” she blushed. “It really means a lot that you thought of me.”

“Well, I really like you, Luna,” he said, and he braced himself and continued, “ _So_ , if you don’t mind this, and if you can look past all my other baggage like the fact that Voldemort still wants to kill me…do you still want to be my girlfriend?”

Luna got a shocked look on her face much like she did when he asked her to the Yule Ball. His question was sort of nonchalant, and she was frozen for so long that he almost thought she’d missed it, but a wide, giddy smile soon came over her face, and she said, “Yes, Harry, I’d like that very much.” She stood on her toes and kissed him.

Harry was grinning like a loon a couple minutes later when he undid the privacy charms on the door. “Madam Rosmerta?” he called. “A Valentine’s Special for two, please. And some candles.”

Luna giggled a little. “You’re spoiling me, Mr. Potter,” she said.

“Only the best, Miss Lovegood,” he said with a smirk. It was more of a late lunch than a dinner, but it was Valentine’s Weekend, and they were going to have it by candlelight. He lit the three candles all at once, wandlessly, with a single snap of his fingers.

“Can you teach me how to do that?” Luna asked.

“Anytime, Luna,” he told her. “Anytime.”

* * *

“Looks like _someone_ had a nice date,” Hermione said when they got back to the castle.

“It was excellent, thank you very much,” Harry said smugly. “Luna officially agreed to be my girlfriend.”

“I suspected as much. I’m really happy for you. But…there’s just one thing I want you to know.”

“What’s that?”

Hermione flashed a wicked smile. “Luna’s a really sweet girl, and you know she’s had trouble in her life. She doesn’t have many friends. Most of her family is gone. She doesn’t really have anyone besides her father, and let’s be honest: he’s not all there. So I’m letting you know right now, furball…if you hurt her, _I_ will make you regret it.”


	105. The Second Task

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: It had been the Golden Age, but gold was also the colour of JK Rowling.
> 
> Phew! That’s the second task done. You know, looking back, I think this was one of the most fun chapters I've ever written.

_“Hostages?! Are you_ trying _to get yourself sent to Azkaban, Bagman?_ _”_

* * *

_“No, I can’t do anything to him just for suggesting it, Professor McGonagall, but I’ll make sure to question him thoroughly on anything else I can.”_

* * *

_“So, Mr. Bagman, tell me about these gambling debts of yours.”_

_“Er…I think that’s a private matter, don’t you, Madam Bones?”_

_“Not if there’s a conflict of interest with your job. I must say, I’ve never met such cooperative goblins before.”_

_“Oh, bloody hell.”_

* * *

“Welcome to the second task of the Tetrawizard Tournament,” Dumbledore announced to the assembled students. “Before we begin I must announce a change in the judges’ lineup. I regret to report that Ludo Bagman was forced to resign as the Head of Magical Games and Sports two days ago for attempting to fix the Tournament, other unethical gambling, and mishandling of the Bertha Jorkins case.” But not, he added silently, entering Harry in the Tournament. Bagman had told Amelia under Veritaserum that he had nothing to do with that. Back to square one.

A surprised murmur rippled through the crowd. There had been some news about Bagman being in trouble, but no one had expected him to be replaced so quickly.

“Fortunately, Mr. Bagman’s efforts have had no effect on the Tournament so far,” Dumbledore continued, “but we were hard-pressed to find a replacement judge in time for the task—ah, and I see she has just arrived. Please welcome the new Interim Head of Magical Games and Sports, former Pride of Portree Captain, and record thirty-six-time Scottish National Chaser, Catriona McCormack.”

Applause shook the stands. Catriona McCormack was a legend in the Quidditch world. Only someone positively brilliant and a little crazy would be willing and able to play for a national team thirty-six years straight. She looked easily a decade younger than her sixty-ish years as she walked up to the judges’ box and surveyed the crowd with a sharp eye. But no one was prepared when Professor McGonagall scrambled up the stairs, walked right up to McCormack, and _hugged_ her.

“Whoa! Who are you and what have you done with McGonagall?” one of the Weasley twins yelled, to which their professor shot them a harsh glare. Whispers began circulating the stands that McGonagall and McCormack were longtime friends and had been on the Gryffindor Quidditch Team together as schoolmates.

“Well, that’s a side of Professor McGonagall I’ve never seen before,” Harry said. As with the first task, he stood with his family in the judges’ box, waiting for them to begin.

“We already knew she was a big Quidditch fan,” Hermione pointed out. “It’s hard to imagine her as a student on the team, though.”

“Yeah, it was hard to imagine twenty years ago,” Sirius agreed. “More so now.”

“Will getting rid of Bagman change anything here?” Emma asked.

“I won’t have to deal with him trying to ‘help,’” Harry said. “Other than that, it shouldn’t.”

“Yes, welcome, Ms. McCormack,” Dumbledore’s amplified voice called. “Now that we are all here, Mr. Monroe will explain the second task.”

Unlike the first task, the second task was not held at the Quidditch pitch. Instead, a most unorthodox arrangement had been set up. Several hundred students, professors, the champions’ families, and press representatives were lining the battlements of the castle, overlooking the ravine. The Grangers were surprised there was enough room for everyone, and it was tight, but between the East and West Wings and all the towers and bridges, plus the judges’ box being built on scaffolding _above_ a section of the West Wing battlements, there was enough room for everyone to have a clear look down into the ravine and (with a bit of shuffling) out at the lake and back along the river. Students were lined up with Astronomy telescopes, binoculars, and Omnioculars, ready to watch the action, and four large binocular telescopes were set up in the judges’ box to follow the champions individually.

David Monroe stepped to the railing and said, “Thank you, Albus. The second task has already presented our champions with several challenges and puzzles to solve. Hopefully, they got through them all and are ready to face the task we can now reveal. The second task is based on the myth of Perseus, _but_ with a twist. Instead of rescuing a fair maiden, each of the champions shall choose…a teammate!”

Harry looked around the judges’ box, but none of the others looked surprised. They must have all worked that part out, too.

“The teammates are not subject to the O.W.L. qualification requirement, but will be considered on a case-by-case basis, though they must still have the consent of their guardians to participate. Teammates may be any student from any school, but with this restriction: they must consent to be separated from their wands.”

A gasp rippled along the battlements. While technically legal, asking a witch or wizard to give up their wand was serious business—almost unheard of.

“The teammates’ wands will be stored in a safe location for the champions to retrieve along their route. The plan of the task is this: the champions will begin at the lake. They must follow the path that Perseus took carefully to find their teammates. Clues will be placed along the route to guide them. They must first retrieve the three pieces of the key that will free their teammate from their shackles. Then, they must rescue their teammate, retrieve their wand, and face the final, terrifying challenge together to return to the castle safely. Also, in light of the first task, flying on brooms is not allowed.”

“That sounds…complicated,” Dan said worriedly.

“I know, but we know the Perseus myth backwards and forwards, now,” Harry pointed out. “We should be able to follow the clues.”

“We wanted the champions themselves to also begin without their wands,” Monroe continued, “but under the ICW Convention on Wand Use of 1692, wizards have a right to carry wands at all times if they wish, so we cannot _require_ the champions to give them up. Instead, we will offer a choice. The champions may choose to begin the task at the mouth of the ravine without their wands, which will be hidden somewhere nearby, _but_ they will each be sealed inside one of these.” He motioned to a box that looked suspiciously like a coffin. “A perfectly mundane, non-magical, wooden box. _Or_ , the champions may keep their wands, _but_ they must begin on the other side of the Lake.”

That got another round of excited whispers from the crowd. Trapped in a coffin without their wand was about the last place any witch or wizard wanted to be. One of the reasons that the custom of burying witches and wizards with their wands came about was from the old days when, even for magicals, it was possible to bury someone alive by mistake. And yet, if they could find a quick way out, it would be an immense speed advantage.

“The school heads will now confer with their own champions to learn their choices,” Monroe said. “To make it fair, during the task, each head will follow a randomly selected champion from a different school to assess their performance.”

Edward Grayson walked up to Harry’s family while the other heads conferred with their champions. “G’day, Mr. Potter, do you know what you’re going to do?”

“Yes, Ambassador,” Harry said. “I’ll hand over my wand and take the short route.”

Grayson nodded. “I expected as much. And your teammate?”

“I choose Hermione.”

“Alright. Miss Granger, you and your magical guardian will need to sign this contract to participate.” He handed over a piece of parchment. Sirius read it over first as magical guardian before signing it, followed by Hermione.

“Would’ve been nice to have that option for Harry,” Emma grumbled.

“Sorry, ma’am. I don’t make the rules,” Grayson said.

With all of the arrangements made. The champions were escorted to their starting places, each by his or her own head, or, in Harry’s case, by Grayson. He hugged his parents and Sirius and descended the stairs. He didn’t really listen as Monroe rattled off all of their choices to the crowd. It seemed plain and unadorned compared with Bagman’s showy style. As much as the Tournament in general aggravated him, he had to wonder a little bit if they’d lost something by sacking the man from commentating.

He caught a brief glimpse of Hermione and the other teammates as Catriona McCormack led them upriver somewhere. He could only hope Dumbledore had vetted her properly. Grayson he was pretty sure about. He could see the traces of Tasmanian tiger mannerisms in him if he looked closely. For the other teammates, Harry saw that Cedric had chosen his seventh-year prefect counterpart from Hufflepuff, and Fleur had chosen a competent-looking Beauxbatons girl, but to his surprise, the fourth teammate in the group was Astoria Greengrass, Viktor’s Yule Ball date’s sister. Harry guessed he must be going for the “small, light, and easy to carry” strategy rather than the brute force plan the rest of them were following.

“Don’t worry, Mr. Potter,” Grayson said. “There’s nothing _completely_ outrageous in this task, and worst comes to worst, the contract won’t penalise you if you turn and run after trying your best.”

Well _that_ was reassuring. “Only a little outrageous, then?” Harry answered.

Grayson sighed: “If you were any two other fourth-years, I’d say the final challenge will be too much for you and your sister to handle. But I think you might get lucky.”

Harry didn’t know what to make of that, except to be ready for anything. Fleur joined him by the lake shore, but Cedric and Viktor both went to the other side. Apparently, without any special abilities, neither of them had confidence in their escapology skills. That what probably less exciting than the organisers had hoped.

Two coffin-like boxes were set up at the shore. “This is where you’ll start,” Grayson said. “The boxes will be floated a short distance from shore, and at the sound of the canon, you can begin your escape. Your wand will be stored at the mouth of the ravine. I’ll take it now, please.” Harry sighed and reluctantly handed him his wand. “Very good. Are you ready, Mr. Potter?”

“Just a moment,” Harry said. He knelt by the edge on his coffin—er, “box”—and ran his hands along the wood inside and out. He couldn’t sense any magic, which wasn’t a guarantee, but he could be reasonably sure it wasn’t a trap—at least as long as no one cast some kind of magic on them after he was inside. He’d have to trust Grayson for that. “Alright, Ambassador.”

“Climb in, please.”

Harry laid down in the box, and Grayson levitated a heavy wooden lid over top of him. Harry fought to stay calm. He normally didn’t have much trouble with confined spaces, but the cramped and dark box reminded him a little too much of the cupboard under the stairs that he had been forced to sleep in all those years ago. The pounding as Grayson nailed it into place were far too like Uncle Vernon pounding on the door to wake him up. The lid, it turned out, wasn’t completely sealed; there were small gaps between the walls and the lid that let in air and presumably were meant to aid in escape, but they reminded him too much of the crack of light leaking in under his cupboard door.

“Oh, I don’t like this,” he murmured. His heart started racing. _Deep breaths. Deep breaths._ “I don’t like this at all.”

“Just a few minutes, Mr. Potter,” Grayson called. “I’m sure you won’t have any trouble getting out.”

That was easy for him to say. Harry felt his magic swirling around him in his storm of emotions. He latched onto it and controlled it to give him something to focus on. The feeling of control over his surroundings eased his anxiety some, but he still couldn’t get out of there fast enough. The lid was firmly nailed in place, and the coffin was floated out on the water. That felt weird. He felt detached from the rest of the world, unable to see or hear anything useful, even with his feline senses. All he could do was wait.

Finally, the canon sounded. It was time to go.

“Diggory begins running around the Lake,” the amplified voice of Karkaroff announced dispassionately.

“Krum is headed to the lake shore,” Dumbledore announced. “Oh my, he appears to be using partial self-transfiguration to swim across the Lake faster. Very impressive.”

While the other champions were starting their runs, Harry gathered his magic in his hands and laid them flat against the lid of the coffin. Suddenly, he felt calm course through him. Wand or no wand, he was a wizard, and no mere locked box would hold him ever again.

“ _DEPULSO_!” he yelled. With a mighty bang, the lid was ripped off the coffin and flew high into the air…

And fell back down directly at him.

“Crap!” Doing the only thing he could think of, he rolled the coffin over. The cold of the Lake knocked the wind out of him. _CRASH!_ The lid struck and cracked the wooden boards and pushed him deeper into the water, but he avoided having his back broken. He swam to the surface and heard a distant roar of applause.

He looked around and saw thin streams of smoke rising from Fleur’s coffin. She was burning her way out with her limited veela powers. He struggled to swim to shore while she fought her way out with smoldering, scratching, and kicking. He was about to search for his wand went he heard her shouting and saw her flailing in the water. He hesitated. She would probably be fine on her own…but he decided to go back for her out of an abundance of caution.

“Interesting. Potter has gone back to help Delacour to shore,” Harry heard, and he realised for the first time that Madame Maxime was the one announcing his progress. He wondered what thoughts she was thinking that she wasn’t saying out loud.

Fleur probably did need a hand, even if she didn’t want to admit it. By the time they got close enough to shore to wade out, Harry could tell she was shivering badly and, if he wasn’t mistaken, spitting mad. _“Are you alright, Fleur?”_ he asked.

Harry knew enough French to recognise her making comments questioning the ancestry of the Tournament organisers that belied her fairy princess image. _“If I get my hands on them—Ugh, I’m a fire nymph, not a common water-dweller.”_ But just the same, she was able to dry off quickly. She used her ability to project heat from her hands and ran them over her body in a way that she couldn’t quite avoid making look very sensual. Harry tried not to get distracted and applied wandless drying and warming charms to his own clothes. Meanwhile, he noticed a disturbance in the Lake. Krum was coming fast. Poor Cedric would be hopelessly far behind by the time he got there on foot.

 _“Now, where are our wands?”_ Fleur said.

 _“I don’t know.”_ Harry replied _. They have to be close, though. This is supposed to be the easy part. Hm, I wonder_ _…”_ He held out his hand and cast a wandless Summoning Charm, throwing as much power as he could into it. It was harder when it wasn’t just across the room and especially because he didn’t know where it was, but he saw a flicker from the corner of his eye, and his wand flew directly into his hand from somewhere off to his left. _“I’m guessing over there,”_ pointed and ran ahead.

 _“Show-off, ‘Arry!”_ Fleur yelled as she scrambled to get her own wand.

Harry had gained a little bit of time on Fleur, but it was still set to be a challenging scavenger hunt. He looked around and saw nothing of note—nothing to point the way. Where was the first piece of the key? It couldn’t have been where he’d summoned his wand from since not all of the champions were going there. Did he miss a clue? He looked in each cave he passed for any hint and found nothing. He thought back to the original clue. He had to follow the myth of Perseus. Perseus was guided in some unspecified way by Athena to the Graeae. And…and Athena’s symbol was the owl! “Of course!” he said. He ran faster, climbing his way out of the ravine. He wished he could change to cat form here. It would be easier to handle this rough terrain.

Fleur noticed his move. Taking the chance that he was on the right track, she hurried to follow. She was fast. It must have been the veela blood because she actually caught up with him by the time he reached the Owlery.

 _“Are you going to follow me the whole way?”_ he asked.

 _“Of course not. I’ll have to get in front of you before the end.”_ she said.

_“We’ll see about that!”_

They raced up the stairs and reached the owls’ chamber at the same time, but to their surprise, there were more than owls there. A cloaked figure stood in the middle of the chamber amid all the owls. It looked like an old woman, and an ugly one at that—all warty and misshapen, with an outsize nose, a pointed chin, and a high, bare forehead. Her fingernails looked like long, sharp claws, and she was eating a raw _something_ that he really hoped _wasn_ _’t_ an owl with pointed teeth.

She was a hag.

She grinned at them.

“Greetings, Harry Potter,” she said. “First to arrive, with your little _veela_ friend.” She practically spat the word “veela”. Harry heard Fleur hiss behind him. “It’s an honour to meet you. I am Annis Black—no relation to the wizards.” She bowed low to him and conspicuously ignored Fleur.

“Er, likewise,” Harry said awkwardly. “I’ve never met a hag before.”

“Then perhaps you should expand your horizons. We’re not just flesh-eating monsters, you know.” The half-eaten creature in her hand wasn’t helping her image.

“Enough of zis!” Fleur spat, stepping in front of Harry. “Tell me ‘ow to find zee keys, ‘ag.”

“Tsk tsk. So impatient. Your keys are just behind me.” Four golden keys hanging on the wall suddenly shimmered into view. “But to reach them, you must conquer the magic of the Old Hag.”

“I don’t think that was in the story,” Harry said.

“Not my problem, Harry Potter. Stand there! For you are spell-stopped!”

Harry was about to say that _especially_ wasn’t in the story when he realised he couldn’t move. A moment later, he realised he couldn’t breathe! His body wouldn’t respond! He couldn’t even twitch his wand. He started to panic. Quick, what did he know about hags? They only looked old and frail. They could overpower a strong man. They ate raw meat. They dealt in poisons. The Old Hag was one of the old “Night Mare” folktales about a creature that would climb into bed and sit on your chest.

Harry had heard the term “sleep paralysis” before, but he knew very little about it. It was only by luck that he hit upon the correct response to the hag’s spell by first trying to wiggle his toes and then working up to the rest of his body. Once he could shift his balance, the spell was broken. He snapped his wand arm up and yelled, _“Stupefy!”_

But Annis Black dodged and started muttering an evil-sounding spell. Before he could blink, a hurricane formed in the Owlery. The wind roared from nowhere. The owls panicked and flocked to escape, wings beating Harry and Fleur about the head as they fled. Harry was brought to his knees, and Fleur was knocked flat on her stomach as, in a flurry of hoots and screeches, the Owlery was emptied of birds.

Harry tried to stand, fighting against the wind. He tried to cast a shield, but the increased wind force on it knocked him down again. How was he _supposed_ to fight a hag? The only story of a hag he could think of was Babayaga. Remus had mentioned her in class. She was ultimately defeated by a wizard with a firebird, but he didn’t think Fawkes would show up anytime soon.

_“SCREEEEECH!”_

_Or_ maybe he was thinking of the wrong kind of firebird. Fleur charged the hag with a savage cry. She was throwing all of her quarter-veela traits into the fight and was matching her tooth for tooth and claw for claw. Neither could seem to overpower the other, but Fleur provided enough of a distraction for Harry to crawl around behind Annis and get a spell in. She collapsed to the floor.

_“AIEEEEE—”_

_“FLEUR!”_

Fleur stopped moments away from slashing Annis’s face off. She glared at Harry with fire in her eyes. _“Hags and veela are natural enemies,”_ she spat. _“They are jealous of our beauty. And we are jealous of their paralysing power. That would be very useful for veela among wizards.”_

 _“Okay, but you can’t kill her, though.”_ He walked to the far wall and examined the keys. _“Hm…they all look the same.”_ All four looked like giant, golden skeleton keys with grooves carved out as if there were other pieces to fill in the gaps. Fleur joined him and took one for herself.

That left the question of where the next station of the task was. The next stage of Perseus’ journey was the Garden of the Hesperides, but that didn’t have an obvious interpretation like the Owlery. He looked around the mess of feathers that the owls had left, but nothing obvious presented itself. He looked at the hag on the floor for a moment and pointed his wand: _“Rennervate.”_

 _“‘Arry! Why are you waking her?”_ Fleur demanded.

_“Do you want Viktor and Cedric to walk right past her?”_

_“Hm, good point.”_

_“And besides, she might know the next clue.”_

Annis Black moaned: “Ugh, I’d better get hazard pay for this. Psycho veela was _not_ part of the deal.”

Fleur hissed again, but Harry stepped between them. “Sorry about that,” he said. He carefully helped her up with one hand and showed her his key with the other. “Can you tell us where to go next?”

Annis stared at him as if staring into his soul. “You know the path, Harry Potter. The eye will lead you on.”

 _The eye_ , he thought. The path of Perseus: three hags with only one eye between them that showed the way. But there was only one hag here, and she had two eyes. It must mean something else. He looked around. Owls had big eyes, but they were all gone. Was there a one-eyed owl still lurking around somewhere? Perhaps it was something else in the Owlery. There was little adornment in the tower, except for a sculpture of an owl in flight supporting the staircase. But the sculpture had two eyes, too…but wait. He looked at the sculpture. There was something different about it. He walked closer. One of its stone eyes had been replaced with a crystal orb. He never would have noticed if he weren’t looking closely. He rushed up to it and peered inside. Nothing but a faint glow within. He turned around and determined the exact window the eye was peering through. He thought he saw a glint of gold in the distance, at the edge of the Forbidden Forest.

On a hunch, he swiped the eye from the statue and looked through it. Sure enough, the view was magnified. He smiled: “Got it. Garden of the Hesperides at one o’clock. See you later, Fleur. Pleasure to meet you, Annis.” He tossed Fleur the eye and ran back down the stairs.

* * *

Dan, Emma, Sirius, and Remus waited anxiously as the task began. Both Harry and Hermione were tied up—almost literally—in a dangerous task, and they would be on edge the whole time. They watched through Omnioculars as Harry was floated onto the Lake in a coffin. Hermione was deep in the Forbidden Forest, out of their sight.

“I hope he’s alright down there,” Emma said. “That can’t be pleasant.”

“He’ll be fine,” Sirius assured her. “Getting out of there is the easy part.”

The canon sounded, and seconds later, the lid of Harry’s coffin ripped off with a crack they could hear all the way from the battlements and flew fifty feet in the air. They gasped when it fell straight back towards him, and he flipped the coffin over. They only relaxed when he surfaced again.

Dan and Emma were surprised, but pleased when Harry went back to help Fleur out of the water. That wouldn’t help him in the task, but it was good that he was looking out for his fellow champion.

“Do you think the two of them are teaming up?” Sirius asked.

“It’s possible,” Remus said. “It would give him an advantage, but I don’t think _she_ wants to.”

Nonetheless, Fleur followed Harry closely, and they reached the Owlery together. They couldn’t really see what was going on, but David Monroe explained it: “For the first obstacle, we’ve hired Annis Black, the Hag of Deadmarsh, to duel the champions. They must overcome her hag magic to acquire the first pieces of their keys.”

“A hag?” Dan said. “How bad is that?”

“Not that bad,” Sirius said. “Harry can probably take her.”

A couple minutes later. There was a massive flurry of hooting as all of the owls fled from the Owlery, which was suddenly engulfed in a hurricane.

“Granted, the one I dated that one time was pretty nasty,” Sirius corrected.

Everyone in earshot turned and stared at him in disbelief. “You don’t want to know,” Remus said.

While the crowd watched the Owlery, Dumbledore spoke up again: “Ah, I see that Krum has reached the near shore of the Lake. We’ll see if he figures out where to go.

Karkaroff chuckled deeply as he reported, “Diggory still has a long way to go. He seems to be at a great disadvantage.” Most of the Hogwarts crowd was in a bad mood because of that.

The storm at the Owlery suddenly stopped, and silence fell. For several minutes, there was no sign of movement. In whispers, the audience speculated on what had happened. The Weasley Twins started taking some impromptu bets. Finally, they saw it. Harry was the first to emerge from the tower. The Gryffindor section of the crowd roared, and all of Harry’s friends cheered.

“Excellent,” Monroe said. “Once all four champions have passed through the Owlery, we’ll call Annis Black over here to report what happened inside.”

That was all they knew at the moment, except that by the time Fleur emerged from the Owlery, Viktor was close enough to see her.

* * *

Harry stopped short at the “Garden of the Hesperides.” The garden itself consisted of a single golden tree surrounded by a low fence. But Harry was more preoccupied with the small dragon curled around its trunk.

“Oh, bloody hell, they didn’t!”

The dragon didn’t attack him on sight—didn’t even seem to notice him, in fact. He crept forward slowly, carefully, ready to change to cat form and bolt at the slightest sign of trouble. It would be the organisers’ fault for bringing in that monster. When he reached the fence, he felt what he had suspected. The fence marked out powerful wards confining the beast to the garden.

His hesitation meant that Fleur soon caught up with him. She looked at the garden and then looked at him, standing there very tense, with sweat running down his face. Then, she laughed. _“What’s wrong, ‘Arry? Scared of a little lizard?”_ Then, to his astonishment, she leapt over the fence and charged in, wand drawn. It was only when the dragon uncurled itself and stood up that Harry saw what should have been obvious before: only two legs.

It was a wyvern.

The wyvern was smaller than a dragon, slower, less powerful, and less magic-resistant. That meant it was “only” the size of a Siberian tiger and (barely) downgraded to class four-X. He hopped over the fence.

“But it still sodding breathes fire!” he yelled as he dodged a blast of flame.

The battle was swift and fierce. It helped that there were two of them, even if that wasn’t the organisers’ or their own intent, but the wyvern was no pushover. It struck back with slashing talons, snapping jaws, and bursts of flame that nearly caught both of them on fire. In the end, it was a matter of grinding it down until Harry’s Stunners and Fleur’s sleeping spells finally put it under, leaving them a bit singed and out of breath, but still standing.

“Congratulations,” an accented voice called.

They spun to look. A woman stepped over the fence and into the garden. Harry was certain she was the most beautiful woman she had ever seen. Fleur couldn’t hold a candle to her. Her skin looked like carved marble, her hair like spun gold, her eyes like sapphires. None of those were poetic license, though Harry had no shortage of that at the moment; they actually were those colours. She also wore a revealing dress that seemed to be made entirely of bright green leaves.

 _“Eurydice!”_ Fleur exclaimed. She rushed over and kissed the woman on both cheeks. _“I did not know you were coming.”_

 _“It was a surprise for the task. It is good to see you, Fleur,”_ she replied in French.

Harry stood slack-jawed. _“Y-y-you know each other?”_ he stammered.

_“But of course. Eurydice is the finest lyrist in France. She is a wood nymph if you couldn’t tell. Her band plays at all the feasts at Beauxbatons.”_

That explained it. The wood nymph’s allure must be as strong as a full-blooded veela’s. _God, how do the boys at Beauxbatons get anything done?_ Harry thought. _I can barely take my eyes off her, and I know Occlumency._ But he wisely didn’t say that. Instead, he said, _“So we defeated the wyvern. What’s next?”_

_“Look well at the tree, ‘Arry Potter. There, you will find both your key and your path.”_

Harry and Fleur both looked, and they found that instead of golden apples, golden keys hung from the tree. Harry snapped one together with his other piece. Together, it looked like an old warded key, but the bit was still too small, and there was clearly room for a third piece. The path was less obvious, but they soon saw a map carved into the tree. Harry recognised it as it pointed to a certain location in the Forbidden Forest.

 _“Thank you Eurydice,”_ Fleur said.

_“You must hurry Fleur. I see that Krum is catching up.”_

She looked over her shoulder and spotted him. _“Any chance you can…distract him?”_ she said with a wink.

_“Sorry. They said I couldn’t interfere. I’m only here to watch.”_

_“Oh, well.”_

* * *

“Interesting,” Grayson said. “Miss Delacour has charged straight into the garden.”

“ _Oui_ ,” Madame Maxime said. “Perhaps Meester Potter did not realise it was only a wyvern. Ah, but he has joined the fight now.”

The announcements weren’t very necessary at the moment since the Grangers could see what was happening through their Omnioculars, but they were on the edges of their seats as they watched Harry and Fleur battle the beast. It took a few minutes and a few close calls before they subdued it.

Most of the crowd was following the two front-runners, but Dumbledore and Karkaroff kept them apprised of the other two champions. Viktor had successfully defeated Annis Black and was making his was to the garden when Harry and Fleur left. Cedric had figured out to go to the Owlery once he finally got around the Lake, but he still had a long way to go to catch up.

“What do you think’s in the Forest, Moony?” Sirius said.

“I have a suspicion, and if it’s right, it’ll put Harry in the lead, but I’m not certain yet. Nothing too bad, though, I think.”

“Let’s hope so. He needs a break after the last two challenges.”

* * *

Harry and Fleur raced through the woods, each trying to outrun the other. It wasn’t easy. The brush got thicker as they went further in, and the spot they were looking for wasn’t clearly marked or easy to see. But finally, Harry found it, a little ahead of Fleur. He came to a small outcropping of rock that seemed to have a cave or den dug underneath it. But to his surprise, standing outside it was…

“Hagrid!”

“Harry! Yer in the lead! Good teh see yeh.”

“Yeah, barely,” he said. “Fleur is bloody fast. I didn’t know you were part of the task.”

“Dumbledore said I was the man for the job,” he said proudly. “I’m s’posed teh watch how yeh all do and report back to the judges.”

“Great. So the last piece of the key is here?”

“Yep. Right in the den. I got an interestin’ critter teh show yeh in there. Don’t think it’ll give yeh no trouble, though,” he added conspiratorially.

Knowing that “interestin’” to Hagrid could very well mean deadly, Harry proceeded with caution, slowly creeping into the den. _“Lumos_ ,” he whispered. He peered into the darkness and strained his ears. He thought he could hear the hiss of quarrelling voices in a very familiar language. He backed up a little. “Hagrid, this thing can’t turn me to stone, can it?”

“Nah, o’ course not. Might bite, mind yeh, but yeh just gotta tell it who’s boss.”

That didn’t sound very encouraging, coming from Hagrid, but he didn’t have much choice, so he pressed on. They couldn’t very well get an actual Gorgon, after all. When he was fully inside the den, he saw glints of gold on the walls and the glints of orange on the floor. The quarrelling grew louder as the light fell on the beast, and he knew it at once: orange and black stripes, though bigger than it should have been. ( _Figures,_ he thought.) And speaking Parseltongue with its three heads.

A runespoor.

 _“Intruder! Be gone!”_ Two of the heads hissed. The middle head seemed to be resting idly. Harry remembered that the heads of a runespoor had different personalities. The right head was the most dangerous—but was that _his_ right or _its_ right. He was pretty sure it was _its_ right. Right?

 _“I mean you no harm,”_ Harry hissed at it.

 _“It speaks!”_ the middle head awoke. _“How amazing. Two-legs almost never speak to us.”_

 _“I am…er, touched by Dark Lord of Snakes,”_ Harry improvised. _“I do not want to disturb your nest. I was compelled here by other humans.”_

 _“It’s a trap!”_ the right head said menacingly. Harry stayed still. This was a delicate situation, especially since an average runespoor was six or seven feet long, but this one must have been the size of a Burmese python. It must have been one of the few that managed to live to a great age.

 _“I am not a snake predator.”_ He noticed the keys hanging on the wall. _“If you give me one of the shiny yellow things, I will leave.”_

_“It lies!”_

_“Enough,”_ the left head said. _“I will do it. If it lies, you will bite it.”_

The right head acquiesced, and the left head reached out and took one of the keys from where it hung. Slowly, it reached forward. Harry, held his hand under the head, and, hesitantly, it dropped the key into his hand.

 _“Thank you, noble serpents. I will go now.”_ He started to back away.

 _“Two-legs!”_ the middle head hissed. _“Come speak to us again. Tell us what it is like to have legs.”_

 _“Um…”_ Strange, but probably best not to antagonise it, he thought. _“If I have time before they send you back to Jungle-land, I will.”_ He quickly backed out and saw Hagrid and Fleur standing outside. “You were right, Hagrid. Parseltongue solved it straightaway.”

 _“Parseltongue?”_ Fleur said worriedly.

 _“Yeah. It’s a runespoor. Very agreeable if you talk to it politely._ So where do I find Hermione, Hagrid?”

“Well, same place Perseus did, Harry. ‘Cept on higher ground, you know?”

“Same place?” he mused. “Chained to a rock by the sea, except on higher ground. Then the only place is…the waterfall! Great!” He turned to go.

 _“‘Arry!”_ Fleur called. _“Aren’t you going to help me?”_ She batted her eyelashes at him.

He smiled at her: _“Come on, Fleur, you didn’t think I’d make it that easy, did you?”_

* * *

“Potter ‘as got past zee runespoor vairy fast,” Madame Maxime reported unhappily. “Of course, being a Parselmouth, ‘e would.”

“Miss Delacour is going in now,” Grayson added.

“Well, that wasn’t so bad,” Dan said. “Snakes are easy for Harry.”

“Uh huh. We’ll see if he’s up for the final challenge, though,” Remus muttered.

The champions were getting closer together, now. Viktor was fast approaching the runespoor’s cave as Fleur went inside. A couple minutes later, Cedric, who had made great time with the hag and the wyvern, left the garden of the Hesperides. But even now, it looked like he was still impossibly far behind and doomed to a fourth place finish. Then, something even stranger happened.

“Ha! Foolish Diggory,” Karkaroff cackled. “He must have read the map wrong. He is going in the wrong direction.”

Indeed, the crowd watched as he ran the wrong way along the woods, away from the runespoor’s cave. Most of the Hogwarts students groaned in dismay and wondered what he was thinking, but Dumbledore merely said, “We will see, Igor. We will see.”

* * *

“My arms are getting really tired,” Astoria Greengrass complained.

“My ears will be ringing for zee rest of zee day,” said Fleur’s teammate said.

The four champions’ teammates were chained up to the rock face behind the waterfall upriver from the castle. It was loud and uncomfortable, but at least they were staying dry thanks to some minor wards they’d asked Catriona McCormack to set up.

“Hey, it could be worse,” Hermione pointed out.

“How?” the French girl demanded.

“In most of the classical depictions, Andromeda was chained to the rocks naked.”

“Ew!” Astoria said. “If they tried that with me, my parents would curse them into next year.”

“There’s still a problem,” Cedric’s teammate said. “We’re supposed to help our teammates when we’re freed, but we’ll be useless with a wand after holding our arms up this long.”

Astoria smirked: “Well, that’s not _my_ problem. Viktor said he has enough power for the both of us.”

The French girl smirked back at her: “Fleur told me she found a healing spell to help with circulation. You see, _she_ already thought about that part.”

“Okay, enough bragging,” Hermione grumbled.

“Eet ees not my fault eef ‘Arry did not zink of zat. I am sure ‘e ees trying ‘is best.”

That didn’t reassure Hermione, though more because she herself hadn’t thought of that problem. “Well, however it works out, we can _all_ consider ourselves lucky that they gave us a choice,” she said. “Remember the Christmas play? In the old days, they used to take hostages for the Tournament.”

“ _Mon Dieu_!” the French girl said. “Zat would be terrible. Can you imagine eef zey took Gabrielle?”

“Hah! There’d be a riot. Everyone loves Gabbie,” Hermione agreed.

They waited a long time, but finally, a small figure darted into the shallow cave through the waterfall.

“Harry!”

“It’s about time!”

“Where are the others?”

“Greetings, Harry Potter.”

Harry stopped short when he saw the unexpected fifth occupant of the cave: half-man, half-horse, with a bow and quiver slung across his back. He knew these were proud and temperamental creatures, so he proceeded with caution. “Greetings, noble centaur,” he said. “Am I to take it that you are the watcher for this part of the task?”

“I am, Harry Potter. My name is Firenze. Albus Dumbledore asked me as a personal favour to watch over the young here and protect them from the dangers of the Forest.”

“Ah, in that case, thank you for watching over my sister and the others. Er, I guess we’ll be going right away, then.” He held up his completed key and unlocked Hermione’s shackles with it.

“Oh, thanks, Harry,” Hermione said as she shook out her hands. She massaged her right shoulder and pushed a warming charm into it, which she kept up as she ran her hand down her arm. Hopefully, that would get her circulation going better.

“So where are the others?” Astoria said.

“I left Fleur at the runespoor’s cave,” Harry said. “I think Viktor wasn’t too far behind her, but Cedric was hopelessly behind him.”

“Runespoor?” Hermione asked.

“Yeah, that was the easy part. I just asked it nicely for its key. Before that, I had to fight a hag and a wyvern, but Fleur helped me.”

“She did?”

“Only because we got there at the same time.”

“Oh. What about the sea monster?”

“There wasn’t one. I figured that was the final challenge or something. Like, we’d need two of us to face it.”

“Hm. Speaking of which, where’s my wand?”

“I don’t know. I thought there would be a clue here.”

“No, McCormack didn’t tell us anything. What’s next in the Perseus Myth?”

“Nothing. He marries Andromeda and goes home.”

“Look to the stars, Harry Potter,” Firenze interrupted.

“The stars?”

“The same stars that have guided you this whole time.”

“Of course! The constellations!” Hermione said. “The constellations for the Perseus Myth are Perseus, Andromeda, Cetus, Cepheus, Cassiopeia…and Pegasus!”

“Brilliant, Hermione! Where are Madam Maxime’s horses?”

Hermione frowned: “Right by the castle. That can’t be right. Where’s the final challenge, then?”

“I don’t know unless…unless it means the thestral stables.”

“That could be. But do you know where they are? Neither of us can see them.”

“No, but the stables are marked on the Marauder’s Map. And they’re not far from the river, either. Let’s go.”

With that plan in mind, they started to leave, but there was a rush of wind and a loud thump outside. A shadow passed across the falling water, growing closer and closer. Firenze raised his bow, clearly not expecting this, and Harry drew his wand, but when the shape broke through the curtain of water, it was the last thing they expected.

It was Cedric.

Riding a hippogriff.

“Bloody hell, why didn’t I think of that?!” Harry shouted, smacking his palm to his forehead.

Cedric just grinned at him. “Sorry, Harry. You can’t win ‘em all.”

“Great. Come on, Hermione, we need to hurry.”

* * *

“Riding a hippogriff?!” Karkaroff exploded. “That’s cheating! I demand your champion be disqualified, Dumbledore.”

“Now, now, Igor,” Dumbledore replied. “If I recall correctly, the rule was no riding of _brooms._ It made no mention of other methods of flight. Mr. Diggory clearly recognised that he was at a great disadvantage and found a loophole to rectify it.”

Karkaroff fumed some more, but he couldn’t refute Dumbledore’s point.

“Well, I think Cedric’s gonna have it locked up,” Sirius said. “Too bad for Harry.”

“But Cedric was in fourth place last time,” Remus reminded him. “I think it’ll come out pretty close by the end.”

“Need I remind you that we don’t care how Harry does? Just that he comes out in one piece?” Emma said.

“True,” he admitted. “They’re certainly not out of the woods yet—and not just literally.”

* * *

Cedric must have needed longer to figure out where to go next because he and his teammate didn’t reach the thestrals’ paddock until shortly before Harry and Hermione got there. They found their missing wand and flew away. Hermione was just about to climb over the fence when Harry stopped her with a hand on her shoulder. She turned to him questioningly.

“Are you a witch or not?” he said.

She nodded in recognition and held out her hand. Within seconds, her wand flew into it.

“That’s better.” He looked at the pen that to them looked empty, though they could hear the animals. “You know, if we hitch a ride, we might be able to catch them.”

“Harry James Potter! I am not riding back on an animal that _neither_ of us can see.”

“Alright, alright. We’ll just follow the river, then.”

Following the river seemed to work fine at first. They were far enough ahead of Fleur and Viktor that second place seemed assured, though they were still wary of the “final challenge” still to come. All was fine until they exited the forest. The castle came into view, and the way seemed unobstructed. And then, it happened. A monstrous head as big as a man’s torso on a long neck emerged from the river with a mighty roar.

Harry froze, and Hermione ducked behind him, ready to bolt. “Eep! Please tell me that’s not a basilisk, Harry,” she whimpered.

“If it were a basilisk, we’d be dead already,” he said.

She chanced a look up and saw Harry staring the beast in the eyes.

“Some kind of sea serpent, I think,” he continued. “I don’t know how they got it up here, though.” He raised his wand and took a step forward. The serpent roared again.

Hermione’s eyebrows rose. “Um, Harry? My Parseltongue must be getting rusty. Did that thing just say ‘None shall pass’?”

“Yep,” Harry groaned. “If it says, ‘It’s just a flesh wound,’ too, I’m hexing everybody.”

“Maybe it’ll let us go around?” she said hopefully.

They tried it, but the serpent was faster. It lunged its long neck out of the water and cut off their path with a hiss. Not wanting to be completely surrounded, they backed up.

“Let me try something,” Harry said. He switched to Parseltongue and shouted, _“I am Great Snake-Talker, touched by Dark Lord of Snakes! I command you to let us pass!”_

To both Harry’s and Hermione’s surprise, that got a reaction. The beast seemed to debate with itself. Harry heard it mutter things like _“Must obey”_ and _“Must stop intruders.”_ Finally, it decided, _“Only the Snake-Talker may pass!”_

“What was that?” Hermione asked nervously.

“It’s only going to let me pass.”

“Harry, maybe we _should_ go back for a thestral,” she suggested. “That thing looks like a class five-X. They really shouldn’t have brought it in at all. I don’t want to fight it if we don’t have to.”

Harry sighed and thought feverishly. There had to be some other way. Could they outrun it on four legs? Maybe he could but Hermione probably couldn’t—wait, that was it! “I’ve got a plan, Mione,” he said. “I’ll cast a smoke-screen and lure it away from the river. You change to otter form and swim downstream. No one will notice anything unusual if you stay in the water. When you get to the ravine, crawl into the first cave on the right-hand side and change back. I’ll meet you there.”

“Are you sure about this?”

“Yes. It’ll let me through, no problem.”

“Okay, but this had better work.”

“It will. Get ready to move.” He cast smoke around them, shrouding them both before he moved away from the river again on his own. “NOW!” he yelled and charged forward.

* * *

“Zis ees odd,” Madame Maxime said. “Potter ees running towards zee castle without “is teammate. I wonder eef something ees wrong.”

“The selma is a _dangerous_ beast,” Karkaroff said with a little too much glee.

Dan jumped up and lunged forward as if he wanted to deck the man one, but Remus held him back. “Calm down, Dan,” he said. “I’m sure Hermione’s fine. They probably used the smoke-screen for the same reason as last time.”

“Harry doesn’t look too concerned,” Sirius said as he watched his godson run towards the castle with Omnioculars, “and we both know he’d never leave Hermione behind.”

Emma anxiously scanned the river as it flowed from the Forest back to the castle. It was hard to see in the rippling water, but she thought she finally spotted a flash of chocolate brown. “Dan, I think I see her!” she said.

“Where?” Dan took the binoculars, and she pointed her out. He was pretty sure it was Hermione, but they couldn’t be certain until she changed back. He lost her again when she reached the ravine.

Meanwhile, Fleur had reached the selma with her teammate, and Viktor finally caught up with her properly with Astoria on his back. He could run very fast, and the crowd had to wonder if he’d done another transfiguration on his legs. The four of them together fought the selma, but all eyes slowly turned back to Harry as he reached the castle without Hermione by his side. He didn’t climb the stairs, though. Instead, he climbed a short way down into the ravine and stopped by a small cave.

As the crowd watched from above, he pointed his wand to his throat, and his amplified voice echoed up, “And now, for my next trick…” He pointed his wand into the cave. _“Alakazam!”_ He reached inside and pulled Hermione out by the hand. She waved with a flourish like a stage magician’s assistant, and the crowd went wild.

A few minutes more, once they defeated the selma, Fleur and Viktor started on the home stretch to the castle at the same time, but Viktor _must_ have done something to his legs because he beat Fleur back, even with Astoria on his back. While they waited, Harry and Hermione climbed up to the battlements, where they fended off all questions about how they had pulled off that trick by Harry insisting, “A magician never reveals his secrets.” Finally, after an emotional reunion with their family and another reunion for Viktor, Fleur, and their teammates, the judges presented their scores.

“Fleur Delacour was fourth to return with her teammate,” David Monroe announced. “She got off to a fast start thanks to some impromptu teamwork with Harry Potter and showed a competent command of magic, but she faltered when confronted with the later challenges alone. Therefore, we award her forty-six out of sixty points.” There was some polite applause, but Fleur crossed her arms unhappily.

 _“You deserved more,”_ Harry said to her. _“I barely beat any of the challenges head-on. You did.”_ She shrugged her shoulders at him.

“Viktor Krum returned third with his teammate and made excellent use of self-transfiguration at several points, but was slowed down searching for several of the way-points,” Monroe continued. “His score is forty-nine points.” Cheers went up from Krum’s fans. Harry found the score a bit surprising. Viktor was pretty smart—you had to be to be a world-class Seeker—but it was more street smarts. Perhaps riddles weren’t his thing.

“Harry Potter returned second with his teammate, and he showed excellent command of wandless magic, quick thinking, and concern for the well-being of others whilst under pressure, as well as another excellent piece of showmanship. His score is fifty-two points.” Loud cheers from Gryffindor, as well as Sirius and Remus.

“And finally, Cedric Diggory returned first with his teammate, exploiting a loophole in the rules to make up for a slow start by riding a hippogriff to the runespoor’s den, the waterfall, and back to the castle. Most of us—” He glanced visibly at Karkaroff. “—feel this outside-the-box thinking is deserving of full marks. However, since he bypassed the challenge of the selma entirely, Mr. Diggory’s score is fifty-five points.” All of the Hogwarts crowd roared—Gryffindor for Harry and the rest for Cedric.

“Oh, bloody hell, I’m still in first place, aren’t I?” Harry groaned.

“Only you could be unhappy about zat ‘Arry,” Fleur told him.

“I told you I’m not supposed to be in this,” he insisted. “And if the judges were fair, I’d be in second place, and you’d be in third, not first and fourth.” Seriously, both Karkaroff and Monroe seemed to be biased—and Bagman was, too, before he left.

Fleur gave him an exaggerated scoff.

“Well, you have to admit, I beat you fair and square on this one.”

She glared at him.

“The third task will be held on Saturday, the twenty-fourth of June,” Monroe said. “The champions will be given information about the task four weeks prior. Thank you all for coming.”

“Good show, Cub,” Sirius said. “Just one more to go. Then we can rest easy.”

“Oh, sure,” Harry groaned again. “Then, I’ll only have Voldemort to worry about.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tetrawizard Tournament Scores:
> 
> First Task: Fleur 50, Harry 50, Viktor 48, Cedric 45  
> Second Task: Cedric 55, Harry 52, Viktor 49, Fleur 46  
> Total: Harry 102, Cedric 100, Viktor 97, Fleur 96


	106. The Football Club

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: There was no substitute for JK Rowling; one should be aware of imitations.
> 
> Does anyone know how JK Rowling managed to go 20 years without ever addressing what happens if there’s a tie in Quidditch? Or how it took me 16 years to notice?

“I see that Lord Potter used the same smoke-screen trick as before, Mr. Barnett,” the Queen said to her Royal Court Magician after watching the second task is a Pensieve. “Do you believe it was the same method?”

“It seems most likely, ma’am, although I’m surprised he was able to do it with his sister,” Maxwell Barnett replied.

“Really?”

“Yes, ma’am, I had thought that was a unique talent of his. If Miss Granger did what I think she did, it’s beyond what even I thought her capabilities were.”

“She sounds like an extraordinary girl.”

“That much is true, ma’am.”

“And Lord Potter seems to be much more of a showman than you described before,” she continued. “Teenage narcissism, perhaps?”

Barnett laughed. That was certainly a different perspective on Harry Potter. “I don’t think so, ma’am,” he said. “At least, there’s more to it than that. Lord Potter is continually resentful of what he considers to be undeserved attention—particularly the adulation he receives for being the Boy-Who-Lived. However, when it comes to ordinary teenage accomplishments, be it dominating on the Quidditch pitch or writing a book about his life, he seems just as hungry for praise as any other teenage boy.”

“Ah, then I can see how he would revel in his lead in the Tournament,” the Queen reasoned.

“Not exactly, ma’am. Even there, I think it’s a little more complicated. Lord Potter is still resentful of being forced to compete against his will. When I talked to him, he said that he was ‘hamming it up’ to poke fun at the whole process.”

The Queen considered this thoughtfully. It bespoke a certain amount of maturity on one level, more than many teenage boys would show, and was more in line with how Barnett had always described him. Yes, Lord Potter was a very intriguing young man. And a surprisingly good writer.

“How is Dumbledore’s investigation into who entered Lord Potter in the Tournament proceeding?” she asked.

“I’m afraid he still hasn’t turned up anything, ma’am. His best lead was Ludo Bagman, who was sacked for illicit gambling this week, but they managed to prove he wasn’t the one who entered the boy. I think Dumbledore is still searching through old cases.”

* * *

“Certainly, a Lord of the Wizengamot would not stoop to such repugnant tactics as murder and torture,” Lucius Malfoy lied his arse off in the memory of his trial. “Now, I admit that my political leanings left me more vulnerable to the influence of true believers like my unfortunate sister-in-law—more exposed to attacks by them. That was how I came to be placed under the Imperius Curse just like so many others in this Chamber. I’m not proud of it, but it’s the truth.”

“Ugh, how he could say that with a straight face I’ll never understand,” Remus grumbled.

“Who placed you under the Imperius Curse?” Barty Crouch Sr asked. “Was it your sister-in-law?”

“No, no, I’m sure she will tell you exactly what she did when you catch her. It was her friend from her school days, Evan Rosier.”

“And Rosier was conveniently dead,” Remus commented. “Honestly, Albus, we’ve been doing this for months. I understand it’s the only lead we have, but do you really think _Lucius Malfoy_ would have come in person to enter Harry in the Tournament?”

“I merely wish to be thorough, Remus,” Dumbledore replied. “Harry, Hermione, have you noticed anything interesting?”

“Not really, Professor,” Harry said. He was only half paying attention and seemed to spend an inordinate amount of time glaring at Crouch. He was the one who had locked up Sirius, after all. “I’m with Remus on this one.”

“Me, too,” Hermione said. “There’s no way Lucius Malfoy would’ve done it himself, not when he could have bribed, blackmailed, or Imperiused someone else to do it.”

“And you did not see anything suspicious to your feline senses, Harry?” Dumbledore said.

“Huh? Oh, no, Professor.” He’d gone back to glaring at Crouch. “Refresh my memory. Wasn’t Crouch’s son a Death Eater?”

Remus gave him a concerned look: “Yes, but he’s dead. The entire family is dead. Junior died in Azkaban ages ago. His mother died of an illness, and Senior was killed in a robbery.”

“He lived alone?” Harry asked.

“Might’ve had an elf or something, but why is it important?”

“Nothing, nothing. I just don’t like the guy.”

“Well, neither do I, to be honest, but he’s dead and buried, so we should probably move on.”

Harry sighed as Dumbledore called up another memory. He and Hermione had become intimately familiar with half the suspected Death Eaters in the country, but they were no closer to any clues as to who was working with Voldemort today, and if they were honest with themselves, they probably wouldn’t find anything by grasping at straws like this. But what else could they do?

They continued their futile work.

* * *

Even with all they had to do, the days became blissfully normal after the second task. It was nice when the most they had to worry about was which ghost was teaching next in History of Magic. As it happened, that ghost was Lord Draben, a Cavalier from the mid-1600s.

“Well, my century was a mess,” Draben told the class. “Look at me. Here I am, a wizard Cavalier fighting for a witch-hunting royalist regime, but what choice was there? Those Puritans and those Roundhead, _Republican_ ruffians were even worse!”

Lupin coughed softly, reminding the ghost not to get too political.

“Excuse me. What were we discussing again?” Draben floated back to consult Lupin’s syllabus.

Draco Malfoy rolled his eyes. This ghost didn’t seem particularly good at lecturing. Granted, anyone was better than Binns, but still. Draco didn’t know the phrase “unreliable narrator,” but he understood the concept, and this ghost had it in spades.

“Right, the witch-hunts. So, while the witch-hunts could and did sometimes round up actual witches, they had little to do with actual witchcraft and were deeply rooted in muggle politics and religion (which at the time were, in many ways, the same thing). You probably heard from the Friar how the Catholic Church began persecuting what it perceived as devil-worshipping witches in the late Middle Ages, even as it tried to curb the worst excesses, like the _Malleus Maleficarum_. But the wave of religious fervour that gripped Europe after the Reformation drove the hysteria to new heights. Indeed, the worst of the witch-hunts occurred at the same time that muggles and wizards alike were killing each other over which church was the ‘correct’ one.”

“So the witch-hunts were about religion?” one of the girls asked.

“Yes and no. Religious fanaticism, superstitious paranoia, personal feuds, money-grubbing opportunists—any of them could fuel a witch-hunt. But it was the religious strife of the Reformation that created the environment in which they flourished.

“The first great wave of persecutions in the British Isles began in 1590 and was instigated by King James VI of Scotland, later King James I of England. You see, James and his new wife were nearly killed by storms whilst sailing home from their wedding in Oslo. James’s brother-in-law, the twelve-year-old King of Denmark, insisted that it _must_ have been witches. James took this to heart and began persecuting alleged witches in Scotland with an obsessive vengeance.”

Draco started at that revelation. He’d never looked into the story that deeply. The whole mess had been started on the word of a twelve-year-old boy? Ha! And the mudbloods thought _wizards_ were the irrational ones. And yet, he still had to check himself. There might well be much more to the story. Was it really the King of Denmark himself, or some regent or adviser? And why did the supposedly more mature King James obsess over it just as much?

“King Christian set up trials in Denmark and King James did the same in Scotland,” Lord Draben said. “Eventually, he rooted out and burned at the stake the witch he believed had cursed him, Gellie Duncan, who was, indeed, a true witch, but whose only crime was being a little too free with her Healing magic in her village. Being a king, and therefore having connections to the magical world, King James was able to investigate far deeper into the affairs of witches and wizards than the muggles ever suspected, yet for all this, he never wavered in his crusade against us. A few years later, he went on to write one of the two great witch-hunting tomes in the English language, _Daemonology_ , which in its original form was far more accurate and extensive than the version now known to muggles.

“King James was regarded as so dangerous that when he took the English throne in 1603, it was the direct impetus for reforming the ailing Wizards’ Council into the more powerful Wizengamot, and the first act of the newly-formed Wizengamot was to purge all record of the magical version of _Daemonology_ from muggle society.”

 _Good to see we had our act together_ , Draco thought smugly. He looked around subtly and saw Potter and his sister exchanging a mouthed conversation and jotting down a couple of notes. He wondered what that was about, but he decided it wasn’t important.

“The other great work of the witch-hunters, of course, was _The Discovery of Witches_ by the Witchfinder General,” Draben continued. Many in the class shivered, and Draco didn’t blame them. The Witchfinder General was almost as much of a bogeyman as the Dark Lord, especially to the younger kids. Potter and Granger, he noted, were looking around in confusion. “Yes, I see many of you have heard the story. During the English Civil War, Matthew Hopkins, a squib cast out by his family and raised by a Puritan clergyman, forged a qualification as ‘Witchfinder General’ and in the space of fourteen months hanged more supposed witches than all the other witch-hunters in the history of Britain put together. His reign of terror crossed the Atlantic and led directly to the Salem Witch Trials a generation later and was a major impetus for the Statute of Secrecy.”

 _Which goes to show how dangerous squibs are,_ Draco thought—or rather, that was the standard line. But then again, he thought, there had been a dozen or more wizard Dark Lords in British history, but only one squib. And would Hopkins have been as dangerous had he not been cast out by his family? If he had that much influence over muggles, what if his family had tried to _use_ him instead?

Okay, he was _definitely_ losing it. Even in the best of circumstances, a squib child was a disgrace to a family and a sign of a poor bloodline. _That_ was perfectly clear.

 _Wasn_ _’t Granger’s grandmother—?_ No. Stop that right there.

* * *

The fairest thing, Madam Hooch decided, was to have the Slytherin-Beauxbatons Quidditch game the week after the second task, since it was the only game left on the schedule that didn’t involve any of the Tetrawizard Champions. The Tournament organisers said that they would need the pitch from late May onward, so the schedule for the rest of the season was announced with one game every other week until mid-May, and the final a week later, leaving the champions the final month to prepare for the third task full-time.

The Slytherin-Beauxbatons game was close, but Draco Malfoy proved his flying skills in the end by winning the game for Slytherin. Harry then proceeded to do the same for Gryffindor two weeks later. Hermione was excited because Angelina let her play that game. She needed to build up her skills on the reserve squad. At that point, it was clear that the final winner would come down to Gryffindor, Slytherin, and Durmstrang, and the betting took off around the school.

Meanwhile, as spring began its slow march into Scotland, interest in outdoor activities besides Quidditch began to rise. Harry wasn’t at all surprised to see that Luna was one of the first to catch the bug. The first reasonably dry day in March, he found her out by the Lake at the edge of the wards, giggling uncontrollably.

“Luna? What are you doing out here?” he said with concern as he pulled her out from the influence of the wards.

Luna grinned breathlessly at him, kissed him, and flopped into his arms.

“Are you alright?”

“Hello, Harry,” she said as if she hadn’t heard the question.

“Luna, are you okay?” he said more clearly. “What were you doing?”

“Oh, I was just practising wandless magic.” She started to come to her senses and stood on her feet again.

“Wandless magic? Luna, don’t you remember what Professor Grayson said? You shouldn’t try this without a spotter. The wards make you…er…”

“Loony?” she suggested.

 _High on ecstasy, more like, with as long as she was standing under them_ , he thought. “I was going to say intoxicated. I don’t know what long-term exposure does to you, and I’d rather not find out. Merlin, I’m sorry; I’ve should’ve talked to you sooner. You told me you wanted to work on wandless magic more.”

“It’s alright, Harry. You were busy with the Tournament. I was doing find on my own.”

 _She was? How long has she been doing this?_ Harry sometimes forgot how strong Luna’s independent streak was. “But still, you’ll be able to learn it faster if you let Hermione and me help you, and you won’t have to worry about getting whammied by the wards.”

“Thank you, Harry. I appreciate it,” she said. “It’s just that there are so many things to learn about, I hardly know where to start. We already started that Parseltongue Dictionary, and I know you and Hermione wanted to learn Mermish, and you still need to worry about the Tournament—”

“Luna.” He stopped her with a finger on her lips. She still seemed a bit giddy. “You are such a Ravenclaw. Look, we can’t do everything every day. I don’t have much to do for the Tournament right now, so let’s just pick two days a week for each of the other things—maybe only one day each if it gets to be too much—just a half hour before my daily workout, alright?”

“Okay, we can do that.”

“Great…Actually, Luna, do you want to join in our workouts? Hermione, Neville, and I always exercise for half an hour before dinner on the seventh floor. It helps us keep in shape for duelling or any other trouble we get into.”

Luna smiled at him: “That does sound nice, Harry. And I should probably learn to be more athletic if I want to be a world-travelling naturalist…Although, I suppose Newt Scamander wasn’t much of an athlete, either, now that I think about it…”

“Trust me, Luna. Around me, you’re going to want it.”

* * *

Luna wasn’t as conditioned as Harry, Hermione, or even Neville by this point, but she enjoyed working out with them, although she requested they do it outdoors once the weather improved. The Parseltongue dictionary actually came along fairly well once they got hold of a word list for Ogden’s Basic English and a few other simplified languages. It was trickier to rigorously work out the grammar, and it didn’t quite capture all the nuances, like the four different words for “slither,” but it was a good start.

Mermish was a much more difficult language than Parseltongue. Parseltongue had very few words and almost no grammar, and since it was really a magical way of interacting with snakes, it was still, in some strange way, a human language. Mermish, on the other hand, had developed almost in isolation from human languages and thus had a completely alien grammar. It had also developed in a completely alien environment and thus had a very different vocabulary. It even had a base-six number system. And worst of all, since Mermish sounded like a dolphin coughing up a hairball (Harry insisted the description was accurate no matter how much Hermione protested that it made no sense), it was extremely difficult for the human ear to distinguish the sounds of the language. Both of them were impressed that Luna had learnt in at all, and they agreed this would have to be a longer-term endeavour.

Meanwhile, Luna proved a quick study in wandless magic once Harry and Hermione started teaching her one on one. Neville joined them part of the time, too, and made some good progress, though he didn’t have as keen an interest. They used similar methods to how they taught themselves when they were little, helping them call forth their magic on command and focus it enough to do little things like lighting matchsticks and levitating paper clips. They made them keep at it until they could do it consistently before moving on, but both Luna and Neville were patient and were pleased with their own level of progress.

In sports, Harry hadn’t forgotten his conversation with the other champions at the Yule Ball, but on that, he was biding his time until the weather warmed. The Quidditch season continued at a breakneck pace. Durmstrang flattened Ravenclaw at the beginning of April, and it was around then that Harry told Hermione his idea. They soon roped in Neville and Luna and a very enthusiastic Dean Thomas and Justin Finch-Fletchley, and even the bookish Natalie McDonald plus a few others and set a date. Harry decided they would approach the champions and other possible recruits after the next Gryffindor match against Hufflepuff in mid-April.

This match went similarly to how it had gone last year, even with Hermione playing rather than Alicia. Cedric was good, but Harry had him solidly outclassed, and Hufflepuff’s Chasers weren’t strong enough to overcome a Snitch catch. The rankings were unchanged and, although Hufflepuff had one more match, there would be no surprises as to who would get into the final.

“Good game, Cedric,” Harry said as he shook the older boy’s hand after the match.

“Same to you, Harry,” Cedric replied, albeit with an edge of annoyance. “You know, after beating me out twice like this, I’d better see you win for a national team, or I’m going to feel cheated.”

Harry chuckled: “I’ll see what I can do.” He still hadn’t given much thought to Viktor’s suggestion that he fly in the next World Cup. He’d have to decide by the end of fifth year whether he wanted to withdraw from Hogwarts and switch to private tutoring to free up his time, and probably decide sooner than that—maybe even this summer—whether to contact the English Team for tryouts. He pushed the thought aside. “Say, Cedric, are you interested in learning a muggle sport or two?” he asked.

Cedric was surprised, but he thought it over. “You don’t mean for competition, do you?” he clarified.

“Oh no, just for fun. So people have more options for games to play on sunny days.”

“Huh. Sounds interesting, I guess. Are you trying to organise something?”

“Yeah. A bunch of us are getting together tomorrow afternoon to try to start a football club. You and Cho should come.”

“Football…that’s the one that’s kind of like Quidditch played on the ground, right?”

“Um…I think Quidditch plays more like basketball, but I guess it has a lot in common with football. The point is, it’s the most popular sport in the muggle world, so we can get the most people to come out.”

“Ah. Sound interesting, then. When is it?”

“Four o’clock tomorrow. On the Quidditch pitch. We asked Hagrid to set up some goalposts. Hopefully, he’ll be able to rig something up.”

“Alright, I’ll ask Cho if she wants to come,” Cedric agreed.

“Great. See you then.”

* * *

Before their football club, though, Harry and Hermione once again had to join Remus in studying old memories of trials with Professor Dumbledore, and after months with no leads, they were about ready to call it quits. “This isn’t getting us anywhere!” Harry complained. “Say, any chance Barty Crouch was behind it before he died? I think I’ve learnt more about him than anyone else.”

“No, Harry,” Dumbledore answered, pointedly ignoring the sarcasm, “The Tournament was not even proposed until after Crouch’s death, and it was not finalised until last summer, after the capture of Fenrir Greyback.”

“This _is_ starting to feel like theatre, Professor,” Hermione agreed. “I think we have to accept whoever did this covered their tracks too well to catch them.”

“Yeah, I didn’t get a vibe from anybody I looked at,” Harry said, “and if Pettigrew is any indication, I might not, anyway.”

“I have to go with the kids on this, Albus,” Remus said. “And we’ve hit the bottom of the barrel with these trials, anyway. I doubt we’d learn anything more if we tried to go over them again.”

Dumbledore sighed. “Alas, I fear you are right, Remus. For all our efforts, we are no closer to an answer. Harry, Hermione, I take it you want to close the investigation?”

“Yeah, I think so, sir,” Harry said. “We’ve got nothing on any of these people besides the Carrows. And that Spanish-sounding woman definitely wasn’t a Death Eater. So unless someone fak—” He stopped.

“Yes, Harry?” Dumbledore asked.

“I…stupid question, sir: is it possible any of the other Death Eaters faked their deaths like Pettigrew did?”

Hermione, Dumbledore, and Remus all blinked in surprise.

“It’s…certainly possible,” Remus conceded. “But that’s getting into the realm of wild speculation.”

“It wasn’t speculation with Pettigrew,” Harry pointed out. “Or could some other Death Eater have framed someone else for their crimes, like he did?”

“You think if we looked at the trials of the ones who are still in Azkaban—” Hermione started, but Remus cut her off.

“No, no, the Ministry went over those with a fine-toothed comb after Sirius was freed. We won’t learn anything there.”

“Still, someone faking their death…?” Harry suggested.

Dumbledore stroked his beard and weighed the idea: “It is a long-shot, Harry. Much more likely is that we have already seen the person who entered you in the Tournament in these trials and did not know it…But if you feel it is worth including the deceased Death Eaters, it may be wise to trust your instincts, which have usually proved good. I can easily get memories of Wilkes’s and Rosier’s deaths from Professor Moody—though as they were no doubt graphic, I think I will examine them privately. And I will look around for what others are available. For now, though, I think this investigation is provisionally closed. I will call you again if I find anything worth watching.”

* * *

Cedric led Cho out to the Quidditch pitch at four o’clock, wondering what he would see. He had only a vague understanding with what a football pitch was supposed to look like, but what they found wasn’t radically different, just a rectangular area about two thirds of the length of the pitch marked off with fence posts at the corners. Two of what he assumed where goals were set up with additional beams at either end of the rectangle. Hagrid was watching the group with interest from the stands.

There were twenty or so students who had come out for the club, though a disproportionate number were muggle-borns. Harry, Hermione, and one of their house-mates, a black boy he didn’t know but thought was also muggle-born, stood up at the front of the group.

“Alright, people, listen up!” the black boy said. “My name’s Dean, and I’m here to tell you about the noble sport of football!”

 _Well, that was quite an introduction_ , he thought.

“ _This_ is a football,” Dean said, and he held up a black and white ball that was a little smaller than a Quaffle. “Any muggle on earth will know one of these on sight—unless they’re American, but probably even then—so it’s a good thing to know. Football is played a lot like the Chaser and Keeper part of Quidditch, except for two things. Number one, it’s on the ground…obviously. And number two, in Quidditch, you pass the Quaffle with your hands. But since the name of _this_ game is football, you _don_ _’t_ use your hands. You use your feet.”

“Well, you can use more than your feet,” Hermione clarified. “You can use your knees or elbows or even your head—”

“Yeah, like this,” Dean said, and he proceeded to bounce the ball off his forehead, to the surprise of the audience.

“Definitely not a Quidditch move,” Cedric whispered to Cho.

“It’s made different from a Quaffle,” Cho said. His girlfriend didn’t play football herself, but she’d seen it on muggle television. “It’s treated so it’s more rubbery and bouncier.”

“—and the keeper is the only player who’s allowed to use their hands,” Dean continued. “Otherwise, you could just kick it over their heads.”

“Makes sense, I guess,” Cedric muttered.

The three fourth-years explained the game in a quick overview. Cedric had only a vague idea what basketball was, but he thought football sounded a lot more like Quidditch if it didn’t have Bludgers or a Snitch…or brooms. There were eleven players on a football team, which seemed a little excessive, but Cho whispered to him that you needed more players to cover the pitch on foot. The rule allowing up to three substitutions for injured players sounded pretty good. Many people had been pushing for that rule for years in Quidditch, where an injured player was far more crippling in a match.

The lack of a Snitch was confusing to some, though. “But how do you know when the game’s over?” one of the younger students asked.

“You buy a clock,” Harry said. “The match always lasts ninety minutes.”

“What if there’s a tie?”

“Same as Quidditch: you leave it as a tie unless it’s a tournament.”

“Yes,” Hermione said, “in a tournament, they add extra time to resolve a tie, and if that doesn’t work, they have a penalty kick competition.”

 _Huh, odd,_ Cedric thought. Ties were rare in Quidditch, but in a tournament, whichever team caught the Snitch got the tiebreaker. Adding extra play time was an alien concept.

The most confusing part of the game, however, was that there was a whole, complex system of different kinds of fouls. A penalty kick was only one category, there were two different non-penalty kicks that could be awarded, and even more ways to put the ball back in play when it went out of bounds (which apparently happened frequently). Besides that, after one or two instances of serious misconduct, a player could be sent off the pitch entirely. The rules for misconduct were stricter than in Quidditch, too, and the referee had a surprising amount of leeway in enforcing them.

When they actually started playing, Cedric found the game fun, though not as fun as Quidditch. There wasn’t as much going on, and several of the players quickly declared it “boring,” but he enjoyed it. Plus, it was an interesting insight into muggle sports. It was similar in broad strokes, but when it came down to the details, they had a very different way of going about it. He also found football to be more of a workout than Quidditch usually was. He knew Harry and Hermione were uncommonly fit, and here was a glimpse into why.

The club, however, was a flop. It technically kept going, but the people who showed up were mostly muggle-borns, and they never had enough for two full teams even at the start. It soon became less of a club and more a few people who hung out and played a pickup football game every so often—not enough to make a big impression on the school.

* * *

“I really thought that would work,” Harry complained after he saw the football club all but fall apart.

“Well, it’s a small school, and wizards are pretty well obsessed with Quidditch,” Hermione said. “I don’t think it’s a big surprise.”

“I guess not. It’s just that so many muggles love football…I was hoping we could start several sports here to give people options like at muggle schools. Maybe we should try a tennis club. We wouldn’t need as many people.”

Hermione shook her head. “A tennis court would be a lot more complicated to set up than a football pitch. Badminton might work, but I don’t know if there’d be much interest.”

“I don’t get it!” he griped. “Not everyone can play Quidditch at home. It takes a lot of people. You’d think wizards would have one-on-one games like tennis.”

Hermione stopped and thought about his words. It wasn’t a distinction she considered a lot. How many players were on a team in muggle sports? It was eleven for football and cricket, thirteen for rugby league, and fifteen for rugby union. Basketball had only five, but netball had seven, and she couldn’t think of any other team sports with teams smaller than six. But there were plenty of individual sports and a few that included doubles, and yet, wizards didn’t seem to have an equivalent.

“It does seem odd,” she said. “Wizards only seem to play Quidditch—well, and duelling, but that’s on the ground. As much as we love flying, you’d think there’d be a place for an individual broom sport.”

“Hmm…I suppose there’s technically broom racing,” Harry pointed out. “And Swivenhodge, but nobody plays that here. The wizarding world seems kind of…deprived.” Harry said.

“I wouldn’t say that. We’ve always said it’s like a small town, right? Well, it’s like a small town where there’s nothing to do. Besides, we still have actual muggle leagues if we really want to play. So do they, if they cared to.”

“That doesn’t explain why no one plays any individual broom sports. I feel like we’re missing something obvious.”

“True,” Hermione conceded. “Why _don_ _’t_ we play Swivenhodge here?”

“According to Ron, no one really plays it. It’s a lawn game for when you can’t get enough people for three-a-side Quidditch. Plus, he says it’s boring.”

“Yes, but we both know Ron’s biased. Maybe we should try it.”

“Really? You think?”

“Sure. Why not?”

* * *

“Yeah, this is boring,” Hermione conceded before the game was even finished.

Swivenhodge was probably more similar to badminton than anything else. It was played by batting a lightweight ball—a pig’s bladder in the old days—across a hedge with the bristle end of a broom. Harry and Hermione of course used school brooms rather than their expensive Quidditch brooms.

A modern Swivenhodge ball was round instead of oblong and was made of rubber, but it was the right weight and thickness so that it behaved the same as the original pig’s bladder. Harry and Hermione weren’t really sure what to expect—never having worked with pig’s bladder or any similar material. It was light, but to their surprise not as light and floaty as a latex balloon—probably more like a miniature beach ball than anything else. It had enough weight to actually fly across the net, but it still had to be light enough to be batted with broom bristles without damaging them. Unfortunately, being so light, it made the game very slow and, as Cedric had said at the Yule Ball, too easy if you were over the age of ten. It wasn’t quite as easy as it would be with rackets, but it couldn’t hold their interest any more than football could for wizards. And playing to fifty points rather than twenty-one or fewer for similar muggle sports was just tedious.

“Wizards have done a lousy job of inventing broom sports,” Harry said.

“I hate to say it, but I think you’re right,” Hermione replied. “Sometimes, I still can’t believe Quidditch even works, and I’ve been playing it for two years…You know, Harry, if we used tennis rackets instead of broom bristles, we could use a tennis ball for this.”

Harry raised an eyebrow. “Tennis on brooms?”

“Not exactly. You couldn’t have the ball bounce in the air, but other than that, I wonder if it could work.”

“Yeah, maybe. Huh, I wonder if it would be more interesting if we strapped the rackets to the front of our brooms. Then, we could pass it off as a new form of Swivenhodge, and people might play it.”

“We could try a few different versions and see what works best…Harry, do you really think we could invent a new broom sport? Sounds a bit half-baked to me.”

“Can’t hurt to try, can it? There’s definitely a niche to fill. I think we should try—and ask Ron, Cedric and Viktor to help out.”

“Oh? What for?”

“They’ve been flying longer than we have. Plus, I don’t feel like becoming the Boy-Who-Lived-And-Started-An-International-Sports-Sensation.”

Hermione whacked him in the back of the head.

“Ow! I’m serious!”

She whacked him again.

“OW!”

“Watch your head, Harry. It’s getting overinflated. Too much Quidditch will do that to you.”

“Hey, I resent that. Don’t you think people will want to play it just because Harry Potter invented it?”

“In Britain, maybe, but not internationally. You know how Fleur scoffs at your fame. And Viktor cares a lot more about your Quidditch skills than fighting dark wizards. We’ll still have to win people over on the game’s merits. But you’re right about getting people who’ve been flying longer. Hm…maybe it’s worth trying.”

They started asking around and, while it took some convincing, the Quidditch players they asked were interested in their idea once they explained their reasoning. Their half-baked plan was on.

* * *

Dumbledore didn’t call them back into his office until early May. It had been good to take a break for a while. Harry, in particular, was much more relaxed. Getting to spend a lot of time with Luna definitely helped, including the occasional Hogsmeade date. And there was the fact that he had something genuinely fun and engaging to work towards that didn’t involve someone trying to kill him, namely, his impeding showdown with Viktor on the Quidditch pitch. But it was time to shift back to serious matters for a little while.

“Have you found something, Albus?” Remus asked.

“Sadly not, Remus. As was expected. I reviewed Professor Moody’s and other Aurors’ memories of Death Eaters who died in the war. I see no reason to trouble you with them, Harry, Hermione. By way of example, I saw very clearly Evan Rosier torn to pieces after he cursed off part of Professor Moody’s nose. There is no chance that he survived and no need to review it. Many of the other memories are similarly graphic. However, I elected to show you one group of memories—merely for completeness, since you wished to be included. These are the trials of those Death Eaters who have died in Azkaban.”

Hermione cocked her head in confusion. “Do you think some of them could still be loose, Professor?” She’d never really bought Harry’s theory.

“Almost certainly not, Hermione. Azkaban has never had an escape, after all. However, for an inmate to supposedly die in Azkaban when they in fact never reached the island in the first place would be just barely possible for a high-ranking accomplice to pull off and would be an ironclad alibi for their actions.”

Well, _that_ was a little worrying, but Dumbledore further assured them that the Death Eaters who had avoided Azkaban had no inclination to further Voldemort’s plans at the time. There were just enough proud, admitted Death Eaters like the Lestranges to make the Imperius Defence sound plausible for many of the others, and they didn’t want to take any chances. They all agreed it was a long-shot, but they sat through the memories of the trials anyway. Naturally, they didn’t notice anything unusual—until the last memory—the last major trial after the war: the trial of the three Lestranges and Barty Crouch’s own son.

You could tell the date of this trial from the fact that the Moody in the memory had collected all of his scars by now. There were four prisoners on the floor, which seemed odd—not really normal procedure. Perhaps the Wizengamot wanted to have the war over and done with. All four had very different expressions on their faces. Rodolphus Lestrange looked nearly catatonic. His brother, Rabastan, seemed very nervous. Bellatrix Lestrange was one scary-looking woman. She carried herself like a queen and radiated an evil power and confidence. Come to think of it, Harry could see some definitely similarities with the foreign woman who was working with Voldemort now, but the Aurors could verify that Bellatrix was still in her cell, so that couldn’t be it.

Barty Crouch Jr, however, was the most terrified-looking prisoner they’d seen in the courtroom. He must have been barely out of school and he spent the entire trial pleading with his father for mercy. With as many probable Death Eaters who had got off on the Imperius Defence, it seemed ridiculous to send this scared boy to prison on such flimsy evidence, but Barty Senior was so angry that he wouldn’t acknowledge his son in any way.

The other usual sight in the courtroom Harry noticed when he looked at the wispy and sickly-looking woman who sat sobbing beside Barty Crouch Sr. She was, of course, his wife and the boy’s mother, but he also saw a pair of bat-like ears poking up behind the bench—the Crouches’ missing elf. Harry’s eyes narrowed. House elves were so rarely seen in public that it was definitely anomalous. He waded through the intangible memory to reach them. The elf stood beside Mrs. Crouch tending to her as a nursemaid.

“Is that normal?” he asked.

“Definitely not,” Remus said. “I’m not sure I’ve ever seen anything like that in public.”

“It happens rarely,” Dumbledore said. “Usually when a witch or wizard is too ill to leave the house, but must appear in public for some unavoidable reason such as this. I suspect Mrs. Crouch was known to be terminally ill at this point, although I’m not sure what her affliction was.”

Hermione was more focused on Barty Junior. “He looks so scared,” she said. “Do you think he was really guilty?”

“That is a complicated question, Hermione,” Dumbledore told her. “He was definitely with the Lestranges when they attacked the Longbottoms. However, the Aurors never confirmed that he cast an Unforgivable Curse. He was a new inductee to the Death Eaters when Voldemort fell, and was likely very reticent. He may not have been deserving of a life sentence.”

Remus had a different view, though: “You may not believe this, but my gut says he was. He was two years behind me in school, and he could put on an act like nobody’s business. The Marauders kept track, and we were pretty sure he was responsible for a lot more attacks by Slytherin House than ever got pinned on him.”

“Alas, we will probably never know,” Dumbledore said.

At that moment, Harry gave a shout of “OH MY GOD!” and fell over when he tried to navigate the intangible steps in the memory-courtroom.

“Harry!”

“What is it?”

“Professor Dumbledore! Professor, play that part again!” he stammered.

“What part, Harry?”

“Like, the last twenty seconds. Come over here and pay attention to the elf.”

They huddled around the projection of Mrs. Crouch and the elf. Dumbledore played back some ranting from Barty Senior and continued sobbing from his wife, but Harry pointed to the little elf when she said, “Please be staying calm, Mrs. Crouch, ma’am.”

“That’s it! Play that one more time.” Harry ordered.

“Please be staying calm, Mrs. Crouch, ma’am.”

“Again!” Harry shifted to cat form to listen more closely.

“Please be staying calm, Mrs. Crouch, ma’am.”

“Harry, what is this about?” Hermione demanded.

He turned back to human in a blink and exclaimed, “That’s definitely her! She’s gotta be.”

“Who’s her?” Hermione said.

“That elf! That’s the elf who was with Voldemort. I recognise her voice from the vision. She’s Barty Crouch’s elf!”

The others fell silent. This could be big—or maybe nothing. It was hard to tell.

“I don’t think it’s that surprising,” Remus reasoned when he came to his senses. “The most likely explanation is that Amycus and Alecto Carrow murdered Barty Crouch Sr and stole his elf along with the rest of his valuables. I seem to remember his murder was never solved, and the Carrows were unaccounted for at the time. Correct me if I’m wrong, Albus?”

“No, you are correct, Remus,” Dumbledore confirmed. “The Carrows have always been my top suspects for that murder. They could easily have acquired the elf that way.”

“Can you steal a house elf, though?” Hermione asked. “They have pretty powerful magic to find their masters…What happens to a house elf after the last member of their family dies—ownership-wise, I mean?”

“If no one claims the inheritance—and you’d have to check the records if anyone did—an elf would be sold off in the estate sale. But that’s only if she got that far. Sadly, most elves in that situation would die of grief. And if she was stolen, the matter is moot.”

“But the Carrows couldn’t formally bind her, could they?” Hermione remembered what they had gone through with Dobby and Kreacher. “There’s a transfer tax—”

Remus shook his head: “They could if she was unclaimed, Hermione. If someone claimed the inheritance, they could call her, but if she was a free elf, the Carrows could have performed the binding ritual without paying the transfer tax. It’s illegal, but that wouldn’t stop them.”

“That’s awful!”

“If the elf was dying of grief and desperate for a master, she might have accepted anyone. It’s a thorny situation. The real question is, could someone claim the inheritance and call her? If we could pull her away from Voldemort to a legitimate master, she could tell us everything.”

Dumbledore thought about this for a minute. “It is possible, if unlikely. If someone _did_ claim the inheritance, or if she is still unclaimed, _and_ if we could find an acceptable heir, since the Crouches are extinct in the male line, then it might be doable.”

“Could we try it, Professor?” Harry asked hopefully. If they could solve all this with such a simple solution, it would be a miracle.

“I will look into it. I will need to check for inheritance claims, trace the bloodlines, and find out the name of the elf, but I believe I can do that before next weekend.”

* * *

 _“Neville?!”_ they said in shock.

“He is, indeed,” Dumbledore said.

Neville looked around Dumbledore’s office nervously. “Um…what’s going on, here?”

“Well, we think we finally found a lead on the person who entered me in the Tournament,” Harry said.

“Oh, that’s great, Harry…but why am I here?”

“Mr. Longbottom,” Dumbledore said, “we have found evidence that the late Barty Crouch’s house elf is currently serving the person who entered Mr. Potter. However, when I traced the bloodlines, I found that your father is the first in the line of succession to inherit Crouch’s estate and his elf. As a member of your father’s household—for the purpose of inheritance, that is—you may have a stronger claim, in which case, you could call the elf to your side.”

“I could?”

“Yes. The elf’s name is Winky. You need only call her name to see if she will come to you.”

“Er, okay…” Neville said. “Winky?”

Nothing happened.

“Well, it was a worth a try, Neville,” Hermione said.

“Indeed. Most likely, Winky has undergone an illegal binding ritual and no longer serves her former family,” Dumbledore explained. “But thank you for your time just the same, Mr. Longbottom.”

“Professor,” Harry spoke up suddenly. “This is going to sound crazy, but what if Barty Crouch Jr is still alive?”

“Still alive?” Remus said incredulously. “He died in Azkaban.”

“We _think_ he died in Azkaban, Remus. Professor Dumbledore, you said it was possible someone could have been smuggled out of going to the island, didn’t you?”

“Indeed, I did, Harry.” He thought it over for a few minutes. “I won’t say it’s impossible, but it still seems very unlikely. After all, we would still have to explain whose body was found in Crouch’s cell a year after he entered. But it would explain Winky’s situation. If she were still bound to Barty Crouch Jr, she could not respond to Mr. Longbottom’s call.”

“I’m not buying it, and my instincts don’t, either,” Remus countered. “It’s too far-fetched. It sounds like a conspiracy straight out of _The Quibbler_.” Then, he realised what he said and added, “No offence to Luna, Harry, but you know what I mean. The illegal binding is _much_ more likely…Although…” he mused. “If it _is_ true, then you need to be even more careful, Harry. If, _somehow_ , Barty Crouch Jr _is_ still alive, he’d be incredibly dangerous. He is _smart_ —I mean like _Hermione_ -smart. He’d be a far greater threat than the Carrows for sure. If you meet him, don’t underestimate him.”

“I’ll remember that,” Harry said uneasily.

* * *

Hundreds of miles away, a battered and downtrodden house elf felt a shiver go down her spine that had nothing to do with the terrifying snake she was milking for venom. She’d felt something—like a distant whisper—like someone from some far-off branch of her family had become aware of her existence. It was crazy—impossible, even—but it gave Winky hope to carry on a little longer.


	107. Ricochet

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: There was only one thing of which JK Rowling could be certain now. Boredom would not be a serious problem for a considerable time to come.

The tiny homunculus form of Lord Voldemort held council with his Death Eaters in Riddle Manor.

“It is time to begin setting our plan into motion,” he said. “Our first order of business is the task itself. Barty, what is the status of your part?”

“Master, I influenced Bagman before he resigned to design a task that will easily hide the champions from view,” the straw-haired man said. “He meant to use a projection system to make them visible to the audience, but not to each other. With my continued input, I have arranged for ample opportunities to sabotage it. I have also influenced the organisers to make the Triwizard Cup into a Portkey to the maze entrance to which I will be able to add an intermediate destination undetected. A sleeper Imperius Curse to make the other champions turn on each other will ensure Potter reaches it first.”

“You realise, of course, that your plan requires three separate things to go right?” the Dark Lord tested.

“Yes, Master. That is why I have been making small adjustments throughout the Tournament and am laying the pieces early. By the day of the task, enough of them will be in place to be sure of.”

“Very good, Barty. You see, all of you, how my faithful servant has been careful to address these contingencies. Such competence will be rewarded. The plan is indeed complex, but necessary. Dumbledore is a shrewd opponent, and he has guarded Potter jealously. The boy has not been left unprotected in a location known to us for a single hour in the past year. It would be a great victory, in addition to being our best option, to swipe him from under the old meddler’s nose.

“Now, for the second matter, we have a new guest with us tonight. Auror Yaxley, I see you have finally seen fit to join us.”

The Auror stepped forward and bowed his head. He was more collected than the others thanks to his job, but clearly still nervous. “I apologise, my Lord,” he said. “It has been difficult to find time to slip away this year with so many irregular events happening.”

“Yes, I’m sure it is very taxing,” Voldemort said sarcastically. “But you have come in due time, so it is no matter for now. Now, I called for an inside man in the Auror Department to present himself for one reason only. I will be staging my return to power soon, and I must be fully equipped. Until now, I have been using the wand of the late Barty Crouch Senior, but it will soon be inadequate for my needs. Tell me, Yaxley, what has become of my own wand?”

Yaxley paled and trembled noticeably. “My Lord,” he said, “I regret to inform you that…after Pettigrew was arrested, the DMLE confiscated your wand from where he had hidden it and destroyed it.” Voldemort hissed in anger, but he pressed on. “I of course tried to stop them, Master,” he said quickly. “I recruited several Unspeakables to petition to study it, I tried to insert myself in the team that retrieved it, and I attempted to replace it with a decoy once they had it, but Madam Bones acted too quickly for me to stop her. She said she was afraid of ruses of just that kind. I could not have done more without losing my cover.”

Voldemort stared into the man’s eyes, sifting his thoughts carefully. After an agonising minute, he relaxed. “You speak the truth, Yaxley,” he said. “And I am pleasantly surprised to see you have made greater efforts to support me than most of my erstwhile followers. Your dedication will be remembered, Yaxley.”

“Thank you, Master,” he said and bowed low.

“I want you to join me on the day of the third task, Yaxley. Make the arrangements with the Auror Department. Lady Pantera, if for whatever reason, Barty is unable to aid you in the ritual, Yaxley will be your substitute.”

“Got it,” the tall witch said. Yaxley glanced at her nervously. He had been shocked when he first saw a well-known dark lady from another continent working with the Dark Lord, and he _really_ didn’t like the way she was eyeing him, especially when she said, “I’ll just need some measurements’ and approached him with a tape measure and a knife.

“But this is most unfortunate,” Voldemort continued, ignoring Yaxley’s predicament. “ _Most_ unfortunate. That was a powerful wand. I shall need a new one to face Potter again—one more worthy of my power. What say you?” he addressed all of them “How might I acquire such a wand?”

The Death Eaters all looked at each other nervously, each hoping someone else would have an idea or, failing that, would be brave enough to break the truth to him: they had no idea how to get a quality wand for the Dark Lord. Most of them had got their primary wands from Ollivander, and no one else in the country could hold a candle to him.

Finally, Lord Nott took the chance and spoke up: “My Lord, none of us are wandmakers here. None of your followers were ever master craftsmen. You could fall back on an underground wand-maker from Knockturn Alley, _or_ we could take the chance of searching out Gregorovitch. He is retired and may not be missed as Ollivander would be.”

“Hmm,” Voldemort considered it. “That plan would be far easier if we had access to Karkaroff. Have any of you made contact with him?”

Lucius stepped forward again: “My Lord, I have, with difficulty, wormed enough clues out of Severus Snape to determine that Karkaroff fears your return and intends to flee if the Mark burns. I see no reason to doubt this since it is well within Karkaroff’s character. And I believe approaching him directly would tip our hand to Dumbledore.”

“If he flees, he will be killed at the first opportunity. Unfortunately, this complicates matters. What of Severus himself?”

“He implied to me that he is staying close to Dumbledore to resume his position as your double agent.”

“I see. He _would_ be useful. Perhaps I will allow him to present his case. Now, we must consider our options for finding Gregorovitch—”

“ _Or_ ,” La Pantera interrupted, “for the right price, I could summon my personal wand-maker.”

Voldemort turned to her: “ _You_ have a personal wand-maker?”

“I told you, Voldemort, religion lends a legitimacy that your radical political ideology does not.”

Yaxley had to wonder what surreal world he’d fallen into that this dark witch had _interrupted_ his Master and was now debating the merits of political strategy. And the Dark Lord _let_ her! Clearly, the rules had changed, and that seldom boded well for the followers.

“Summon your wandmaker, then,” Voldemort ordered. “And inform them that their best work will be expected.”

“He _always_ does his best work, Voldemort. You won’t be disappointed.”

“Good. Now, for the final order of business. Lucius, I am placing you in charge of procuring the ingredients for Lady Pantera’s ritual. You may use any of the Death Eaters we have contacted and any of your connections, but be discreet about it.”

“I’ve made a list,” La Pantera said and handed him a scroll.

Lucius read it and blanched when he saw what she was demanding. “Three—three _hundred_ pounds of lye, _ten gallons_ of undiluted bundimun secretion, one hundred fifty gallons of concentrated _acidium salis_ , seventy-five pounds of blueberry paste, a gallon and a half of Sørensen’s Brew, thirteen European adders, quote, ‘the largest anaconda I can find’…and a live unicorn?”

“That’s just for the base,” La Pantera grinned. “It’s a big batch.”

Big was an understatement. This was the largest potion Lucius had ever heard of—equal to a thousand lesser brews. This ritual would either bring the Dark Lord back to life or wipe out all of Hangleton Valley.

“I trust this will not be too great a strain on your resources, Lucius?” Voldemort said.

Lucius conspicuously did not answer the question when he said, “It will be done, my Lord. I…I note that Lady Pantera has not requested a cauldron,” he took a chance for some initiative points. “This will require one much larger than the standard sizes.”

“You don’t need to worry about that, Malfoy,” the woman informed him. “If the Skrewts keep growing like they have been, I already have that taken care of.”

* * *

Hermione was still sceptical, but the intellectual challenge of inventing a new sport that was both playable and fun intrigued her, and she soon found herself taking charge of Harry’s “broomstick tennis” project—just like Harry hoped she would. She put together a plan to build the various aspects of the game from the ground up and optimise them for a broom-mounted sport. After some back-and-forth, they formed a committee of seven to do it, though they discussed it freely with their other friends and solicited advice from them at times.

One of the biggest questions has how high to put the net. There was a general consensus that it should be well off the ground—higher than a Swivenhodge net and much higher than any muggle sports, though probably not as high as the fifty-foot Quidditch goalposts. With a heavier ball than Swivenhodge, there would be a lot more vertical play, and for that, they would need a higher net. There was some of discussion of whether to have a net or a simple bar at that height, too, but that was a minor issue.

Harry continued to be an advocate for strapping the rackets to the front ends of the brooms, and he wasn’t the only one, but it soon became apparent that this wouldn’t work with the vertical play. Without the round bristle ends of flying brooms from Swivenhodge, players would have to roll sideways to hit the ball significantly up or down, and that would be much more awkward than back and forth.

Cedric, who had healed some of his wounded pride by pulling off a win against the Beauxbatons Seeker, took the lead transfiguring different sizes and shapes of rackets to see which one handled best on a broom. He seemed to prefer a long-handled racket, but with a larger head than a badminton racket. Ron wound up helping Cedric with the task after some convincing from Harry. Being a Keeper, he was the best at the kind of high-manoeuvrability flying that would be needed for this sort of game, and so he could best combine the flying with the racket handling.

As Seekers, Harry and Viktor were trying out different kinds of balls to see how they flew and how good their visibility was. The tennis ball was definitely out. It had to be pressurised, and the felt surface came off as weird to wizards. Instead, they eventually settled on a thick-walled rubber ball similar to an American racquetball. The colour would be red, but more of a flame-coloured red, brighter and more orange-tinted than a Quaffle, making it easily visible.

Fred and George were tasked with figuring out the dimensions of the court, since they were already the best at smacking balls around. The court would be large, owing to the mobility of brooms—at least tennis court-sized and maybe even basketball court-sized. Once they had some dimensions they liked, they asked Hagrid to build a large, high bar to take the place of the net for testing purposes.

Harry and Hermione worked on the actual game play, since they were already familiar with tennis and badminton. That was the tricky part. The game itself was similar, but the dynamics were very different.

“I’m telling you, it’s not going to be exactly like badminton, Harry,” Hermione insisted as they organised their notes. “I know the design looks the same, but I think it’s going to work differently because we’re not using a shuttlecock. The ball’s going to travel a lot faster, and that means it can fly in flatter trajectories, like in tennis, and the large, three dimensional court means there could be a lot of plays where one player is above or below the other, and that’s _completely_ different to sports we’ve played on the ground.”

“Okay, I get it,” Harry conceded. “But the scoring’s going to be the same as badminton, isn’t it? Point if the ball hits the ground inside the court?”

“There’s still the question of the short service line, and whether to have left and right service courts, and whether to award a point on every rally or just on a player’s own serves.”

“Oh, right. I guess we’ll have to go out there and play a few games to work it out.”

“Exactly.”

“What about the score? Do you still think we should use a different number of points?” Most games based on rallies of this type were scored to eleven, fifteen, or twenty-one points, although tennis technically only went to four points. Since wizards couldn’t even use normal numbers for their money, Hermione figured their new game should be scored to a different number.

“I think so. Numerologically, I think seventeen would be best,” she argued. “It’s already a significant number for wizards. Wizards come of age at seventeen, and there are seventeen sickles to the galleon. And a match of three games would equal the length of one Swivenhodge game.”

“I don’t know,” Harry disagreed. “I still think we could get away with twenty-one—you know, seven times three. Or even fourteen. It doesn’t have to be an odd number, right? And there’s gotta be some cool symbolism about making thirteen the game point.”

“Hmm. I don’t know if people would go for that…but we’re really not the most qualified to answer this. We should ask the others who were raised in the wizarding world.”

“Yeah, good idea.” Harry wrote the question down in their scattered notes on the game. So we think we’re pretty close to what we want on the court and equipment—?”

“Hi, Harry. Hi, Hermione,” two small first-year girls interrupted as they passed them in the Common Room.

Harry looked up. “Oh, hi, Demelza. Hi, Natalie,” he said. He looked back down at his parchment, but he got an idea. “Hey, Demelza, I have a question for you.”

Demelza Robins turned to face him with wide eyes. “You do?”

“Yeah. If you were making up a new game, what do you think would be the best number of points to play to between eleven and twenty-one?”

Natalie McDonald gave Harry and Hermione a “What the heck?” look while her friend tilted her head in a wolf-like gesture and tried to process what she’d just heard. “Um…I think I’d go with seventeen,” she said.

“Alright, then. One vote for seventeen,” Harry said, making a note.

Natalie looked at them all like they were mad. “Why not a normal number like fifteen or twenty-one?” she asked.

“What’s so normal about that?” Demelza asked.

Natalie opened her mouth again, but thought better of it and changed the subject: “What are you working on?”

“We’re trying to invent a new broomstick game,” Hermione said.

That got both girls excited. A flurry of questions poured out of them. “Really?” “What kind of game?” “Is it like Quidditch?” “Why don’t we have more broom games?”

“Okay, okay,” Hermione cut them off. “Demelza, Harry and I were trying to play Swivenhodge a couple weeks ago, and we decided it was boring, and there are so few broomstick games that we wanted to try to create one that was more fun.”

“Oh, cool,” Demelza said.

“What’s Swivenhodge?” asked Natalie.

“It’s closer to badminton than anything else,” Harry said. “But we’re trying to redesign everything. Viktor and I have been figuring out what kind of ball to use. Cedric and Ron are designing the rackets—”

“Why don’t you just use tennis rackets and balls?” said Natalie.

“Because snobby purebloods will be more interested if it’s not so muggley,” Demelza said without missing a beat.

Natalie stared, but Harry and Hermione laughed. “Yes, that’s exactly right, Demelza,” Hermione agreed.

“Yeah,” Harry agreed. “And it’s not just the snobby ones. Even Ron thinks muggle games are weird curiosities. Plus things work differently on a broom, so we figured it’d be better to start from scratch.”

“Cool,” Natalie said. “Have you played it yet?”

“Not a proper game. We’re still sorting out the rules. But we’re gonna go out to the pitch soon to test it out. You can watch if you want.”

“Wow, that’d be great!”

* * *

By the time Harry and Hermione and the others on their “committee” got to playing their test games, they had a significant audience. They faced off against each other on their brooms across the bar that served in place of a net. Each half of the court was currently a forty-foot cube, although they thought they might go bigger.

Harry took the first serve. For this game, they had decided to allow a very free-form serve, so he tossed the red ball high in the air and hit it hard down into Hermione’s court. She dropped down to hit it back over the bar, just clearing it. Harry surged forward to hit it back to her, and she was able to hit it long enough that it went over his head, but still landed in the court, giving her the first point. A few people clapped.

Hermione served from a little higher to gain some altitude advantage on Harry, but he was able to recover, and after a couple more hits, he took the point. On his next serve, he also flew higher, and she matched his altitude, but she soon realised her mistake when he hit the ball below her and took the next point without her even having a chance of returning it.

It soon became clear that this was a mere example of a larger problem. Hermione dropped lower to return the next serve, but Harry was getting better at smashing the ball. He could hit the ball down from above, and when she hit it back up to him, it didn’t have the speed to get past him, and he would just smash it again, and she couldn’t rise from her lower position, or she wouldn’t be able to hit it. Finally, she called a stop, and they rejoined their committee back in the stands.

“It’s no good, Harry,” Hermione said. “I don’t have a chance once you get the high ground. You can keep smashing it, and I can’t get it back above you.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” Harry agreed. “We need to stop one player from getting at advantage that big. What if we said you have to serve from below a certain altitude—like level with the bar or something?”

“That would take care of the serve, but how easy would it be to force your way back into that position?”

“Depends who you’re playing against,” Fred pointed out.

“Yeah,” said George, “if they were just as good getting you in a tight spot—”

“—as you were them—”

“—it could be a pretty tough match-up.”

“But then, the whole game would turn into trying to get above the other player,” Cedric observed. “It wouldn’t be any fun that way.”

“Would a maximum height be any help?” Ron suggested.

 _“Nyet,”_ Viktor argued. “You could then hit ball over their head.”

“What if you give people more than one hit to get it over the net?” Natalie asked from the row in front of them.

Everyone stopped and stared at her. They’d hardly even noticed she was listening in.

“You know, like in volleyball?”

The purebloods were all confused, but Harry and Hermione stared at each other in understanding.

“That…is… _brilliant_!” Harry exclaimed.

Soon, the game was going a lot better, and the small crowd got more and more excited as first Harry and Hermione, and then some of the others under their instruction, hammered out the rules. It took several sessions on the pitch to work it all out, but they thought they had a pretty good set up before the second-to-last Quidditch game.

“We still need a name,” Harry told the group at their final meeting. “Any ideas?”

“Quidditch was named after where it was invented,” Ron pointed out.

“The Hogwarts Broom Game?” Harry said.

Ron shrugged: “It’s just an idea.”

“No…it worked for Eton, but I don’t think it’ll work here.”

“Most other broom games seem to be plain descriptions of the game in medieval dialects,” Hermione said. “Same for a lot of muggle sports for that matter if they don’t end in ‘-ball’.”

“Racketball!” Fred and George said in unison.

“Taken,” Harry and Hermione replied, also in unison.

“What about Racketswiven?” Cedric suggested.

“A bit unwieldy, maybe?” said Harry.

“Swivenbar or _Raketkabar_ might be better,” said Viktor. “Certainly shorter.”

“Mmm, I’m not sure we want it to sound too similar to Swivenhodge,” Hermione said. “We wouldn’t want it to be tied to an unpopular game. And sorry, Viktor, but I don’t think naming it in Russian is such a good idea, either.”

“You know, the ball moves pretty fast, even by Quidditch standards,” Fred said. “You could call it Lightningball.”

“Fireball!” George offered.

“Blitzball!”

“Thunderball!”

“Maybe, no, maybe, and that’s a James Bond film,” Harry said.

“Oi, we don’t see _you_ making any suggestions, do we?” George replied.

“Honestly, I haven’t been able to think of much that doesn’t sound like a muggle game—or like a muggle tried to name it—things like Broom Tennis or Broomswat.”

“That’s why we’re asking you,” Hermione added. “To get a wizarding perspective.”

“Well, I’m sure we can come up with something,” Cedric said.

But after brainstorming for a while, no one had come up with a concise name that really captured the spirit of the game while still distinguishing it from other sports, both magical and muggle. They tried place names, too, like Hogwarts, Easttower, and even Scotland, and names related to the Tetrawizard Tournament, but nothing seemed to fit. Fred’s Blitzball was one of the best they’d come up with, but Harry wasn’t really happy about it.

“It’s a tough question,” Hermione concluded. “It needs to be awfully esoteric in some ways, but still relatable.”

Suddenly, Harry smiled: “Hey, I know someone we can ask for esoteric,” he said. He jumped down a couple rows to join Luna where she was watching the group in the stands.

“Are you serious, Harry?” Ron said.

“Ronald, be nice,” Hermione whispered at him.

“Hey, Luna’s great for esoteric,” Harry defended her. “Luna, do you have any ideas?” Luna enjoyed casual flying and watching Quidditch, but wasn’t much for actually playing sports, so she hadn’t got strongly involved in this project. But now, she tilted her head and thought seriously about it. “Hmm…what do you think of Narglebane, Harry?”

Harry frowned, and he heard Ron whisper “Told ya” at Hermione. He could tell the others weren’t impressed, either. “Um…Narglebane, Luna?” he asked.

“Well, a ball bouncing around that fast would sweep a lot of nargles out of the sky.” she said seriously. She thought for another minute. “I suppose you could call it something more normal like Ricochet if you wanted.”

The whole group’s eyes widened, and smiles began to creep onto their faces. “Ricochet,” Harry repeated. “I like it.” He kissed her quickly. “What do you guys think?” he asked the others. “Sounds edgy and actually kinda tells you what it’s about.” He saw several people beginning to nod. “The ayes have it. Ricochet it is.”

“Told ya,” Hermione whispered back at Ron.

“Alright, we’ve got a game,” Cedric said. “How do we get people to play it?”

“Exhibition game right before the Quidditch final,” Hermione said at once. “That’s how muggles start new sports—more or less.”

“Right,” said Harry. “Cedric and Hermione, you two are the only ones who aren’t playing in that game, so I thought maybe you could do it?”

“But I’m not on Hermione’s level,” Cedric said. “You’ve both played that muggle tennis. You should probably at least get a Beater to play against her.”

Hermione considered this. “We don’t know the Beaters from the other teams that well. What about you and Cho? You’re both Seekers, so you’re on about the same level.”

“Hmm, yeah, I think I can get Cho up to speed by then,” Cedric agreed. “Wow, I wasn’t expecting us to come this far, but I’m glad we did it. We might actually have something here.”

“Yep. At least some good came out of this year,” Harry said.

* * *

The penultimate Quidditch match of the Northern European Academic League’s season was fast and fierce. Seeing as it was Slytherin versus Durmstrang, both sides played rough, although Krum insisted his team not use dirty tricks, and Snape ordered Montague to hold his team to the same standard. Nonetheless, it was still the roughest game both sides could get away with without excessive fouls.

Draco swerved through an aerial Chaser battle as he tried to stay in the air and search for the Snitch. Krum was running a fast circuit of the pitch, his sharp eyes scanning the whole arena for the slightest glint of gold. Slytherin weren’t making it easy for him, though. Their strategy was to turn most of their defence to blocking Krum to give their Chasers time to score and give Draco a fighting chance. The Beaters were after Krum almost non-stop, while the Chasers were practically playing the role of human Bludgers to try to keep a lid on Durmstrang’s squad.

Krum was definitely a step up from Potter as an opponent. Draco wasn’t sure he could ever reach the level of the superstar’s stunt flying, and he liked to think he could reach his level as a Seeker if he flew full-time like Krum did, but he really wasn’t sure he had that level of talent. The outcome of this match was honestly a foregone conclusion, but he wasn’t about to roll over by any means.

Draco saw that Krum was keeping one eye on him, too, no doubt trying to find the right moment to catch him flat-footed (so to speak) when he finally went for the Snitch. If he spotted it first (which was more likely than not) he could afford to let it lie and watch from a distance for a little while. If, on the other hand, Draco was lucky enough to spot it first, he was lighter and might be able to push his Firebolt faster.

Krum spotted it first, but Draco was ready for him. He tore off in the direction Krum seemed to be going as fast as he could, hoping he would spot the Snitch in time to aim properly and catch up. If he guessed wrong about the distance, he would end up way off course. He only had a couple of seconds, but he spotted the sun glinting off the Snitch’s golden wings as it sped away from them. Lying flat on his broom as Potter had done in their first match, he pulled neck and neck with Krum. He thought his higher speed might win out, but at the last second, Krum swerved in a kind of barrel roll without even looking at him. Draco reflexively jerked his broom to the side, losing his lead before he could recover. Krum grabbed the Snitch with Draco sweeping through half a broom length behind him.

The Slytherin team was disappointed, but at least they didn’t complain like when Potter beat him. They shook hands with the Durmstrang Team civilly.

“That vas good game, Mr. Malfoy,” Krum said when he shook his hand. “You definitely have potential.”

“I’m glad to hear it, Mr. Krum,” Draco replied. “Perhaps we’ll have the chance to compete again in the future.”

He felt quite a bit better after that. There was no shame in losing to Viktor Krum, after all, and hearing such praise from him was a big deal. He hadn’t thought that much about playing professionally. It wasn’t exactly a Malfoy thing to do, but if he was good enough at it, why not? His annoyance returned, however, when he saw Krum talking with Potter a few minutes later. He been spending a lot of time with Potter, Diggory, and the Gryffindor team lately, and the Slytherin Team had been feeling a little snubbed.

“Bet you enjoyed that, Potter,” Draco sneered after Krum had left.

Potter looked confused for a moment, but he replied quickly, “You getting beat by Viktor? Can’t say I’m disappointed.”

“I meant getting to play the final,” he said. “Hooch was so sure it’d be you Gryffindorks and Durmstrang that she gave you the last match from the start.”

“It was a good guess the way the points were three games ago, Malfoy. And _you_ _’re_ the ones who chose to play a Seekers’ game,” Potter replied. “As a team, the better strategy would have been to push a Chasers’ game to get more points.”

“We weren’t about to let Krum take the Snitch in five minutes,” Draco objected.

“He might not have. Remember the World Cup? Viktor didn’t catch it till seventeen goals in.”

Oddly, Draco found he couldn’t refute that. It would have been a gamble, but they probably would have had a better chance of elbowing their way into first place on points. Naturally, he changed the subject. “Well, I guess you get your moment of glory, Potter. At least I’ll have the satisfaction of seeing you lose.”

“We’ll see, Malfoy. I’ve got more chance than you do.”

“Ha!” Draco scoffed. “You wish. ‘Perfect’ Potter, I suppose you’re going to play for the national team next?”

“I’m thinking about it,” he said smugly. “And if I do, I look forward to kicking your arse there, too.”

“You—wait, what?” Draco said.

“Oh, you mean you’re _not_ going to play for a national team, Sparrow?” he said. “Shame.”

What was that? Harry Potter had just suggested he play national—in the most condescending way possible, of course. Merlin, he hated that nickname. It didn’t even make sense. “I didn’t know you thought so highly of me,” Draco said whilst forcing an equal smugness.

“Oh, come on, Malfoy. We both know how good you are. I may have gone thirteen and nought, but do you think I haven’t _noticed_ that every time I’ve beaten you, it’s literally been by inches? No one else in this school has come close. You’re could play for a national team.”

“We both live in England, Scarface!”

“What? You’re filthy rich! Just buy a house in Wales, and join their team.”

This might be the weirdest conversation Draco ever had at this point. Was Potter actually trying to be helpful? Had he actually _complimented_ him? _And_ given useful Quidditch advice? They were supposed to be arguing here! Although, come to think of it, Potter’s attitude always seemed a lot different on the Quidditch pitch than about his other famous exploits—more sportsmanlike, if he were honest. Well, whatever he was thinking, that _was_ a good idea.

“Maybe I will, Potter. And _then_ we’ll see who has the last laugh.”

“I’ll look forward to it, Malfoy,” he replied, and he walked away, grinning like a Cheshire cat.


	108. The Quidditch Final

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Against JK Rowling the gods themselves contend in vain.

_“A hedge maze? How will the audience see what the champions are doing?”_

_“I was thinking we could set up some kind of magical projection system to show where they are above the maze.”_

_“That…that could actually work.”_

* * *

La Pantera’s personal wand-maker was a little man who spoke Spanish, Nahuatl, and Mayan, but only a few words of English. The language barrier caused some trouble in letting him in to see Voldemort, and if there had been more Death Eaters at Riddle Manor, it might have got ugly, but he made it to the inner sanctum without any bloodshed.

“Voldemort, this is Master Chicomostoc Coquihani,” La Pantera introduced him. “He is the finest wandmaker in Latin America and does all of my important wandwork. I trust he will be adequate to your needs. Shall I translate for you?” she said.

 _“That will not be necessary, Lady Pantera,”_ Voldemort replied in perfect Spanish. He was pleased to see a flicker of genuine surprise flit across her face. _“Did you think I have been idle these eleven months?”_

_“I see you have not been. I will leave you to it, then.”_

Chicomostoc Coquihani walked up to Voldemort and peered at him closely. Barty and Artemis Crouch flanked the high-backed chair, preventing him from getting to close. _“A homunculus,”_ he said, _“I’ve read about them, but I’ve never seen one in person before. Very interesting._ Very _interesting_ _…I would see the wand you are using now, Lord Voldemort.”_

Voldemort didn’t hand his wand over directly. He handed it to Barty, who handed it to the wandmaker. He examined it carefully, running his fingers along its length. Wandlore was not a subject Voldemort had ever felt a great need to learn, so he could only guess what the man was doing. He turned to the side and cast a couple of innocuous spells and handed it back.

 _“Custom wands are more complicated than merely finding the correct materials and putting them together,”_ he said without preamble _._ _“We cannot possibly try enough combinations for one of them to choose you. Instead, we need to choose materials that are approximately right for you and have you assist in the crafting process to infuse the wand with your magic. Wands bond to your soul and magic alone, so the homunculus body won’t matter, and you will be able to use it just as well after going through this ritual the High Priestess is planning.”_

 _“I should hope so,”_ Voldemort replied. _“It would not be worth the cost otherwise. Begin when you are ready.”_

Coquihani opened a briefcase, showing various core samples. _“A man of action, I see. What was your original wand?”_

_“Yew and phoenix feather, thirteen and one half inches.”_

_“Curious. A powerful combination, no doubt. Since you used phoenix feather before, you will definitely wand thunderbird.”_ He set aside his other materials and examined several feathers to find one the right length. _“I can use phoenix feathers, of course, but I’m more familiar with these. And…thirty-three centimetres, I think. That’s almost exactly thirteen inches—both significant numbers. Now, the wood is the tricky part. I’ve brought several wand-quality branches for you to examine.”_ He opened a second compartment, revealing a number of fine, straight twigs of different woods laid out on a velvet cushion. _“Let’s try redwood.”_

Voldemort knew of redwood wands. They were said to bring good fortune, but more accurately were attracted wizards who were good at adapting and landing on their feet. It would be a reasonable fit. But as it was not an actual wand, he felt nothing special when he ran his fingers over the wood. Wand-quality wood did hold a tiny bit of natural magic, which he could sense, but didn’t expect it to be enough to detect an affinity for a particular wood.

 _“No. Not that one, I think,”_ Coquihani said. _“Another popular wood: well-aged bristlecone pine.”_

It was another good guess. Ancient woods would be more powerful, having drawn energy from the earth for longer, but Voldemort again felt almost nothing.

_“No. No. Something else. Something else.”_

He tried black locust, yucca, mesquite, and a couple of woods that the wandmaker didn’t bother to identify, but suddenly, Voldemort felt an unusual tingle from one of the branches. Even without a core, it seemed to sit better in his hand. Perhaps he ought to take a closer look at nature magic. It seemed there was more to it than he realised.

The wandmaker smiled. _“Ah, yes. I thought it might be that one._ Kalmia latifolia. _Appalachian mountain-laurel._ _”_

Voldemort hissed and set the branch back in its place. _“Laurel?”_ he said. _“Laurel is a wand for quests and heroics and foolish notions of honour.”_

The wand-maker shook his head: _“Same name, completely unrelated plant._ Kalmia _is a part of the heather family, elegant, but hardy, thriving in cold weather and acidic soils—and deadly poisonous. It has a few uses in topical potions, but anyone who consumes it will die painfully within hours._ _”_

 _“Ah. I see. Then_ that _is more my style._ _”_

_“Then let us begin!”_

* * *

Harry was on a hair-trigger the day of the Quidditch final. This was sure to be the greatest athletic challenge of his life. He was going up against the world’s top Seeker, and if he was less anxious now than when he faced Voldemort himself, it was only because no lives were at stake today. He was as prepared as he had ever been for it. He had practised all week to replicate the manoeuvres he had seen Viktor fly against Malfoy. He’d even asked Dumbledore to borrow his Pensieve, but the Headmaster had thought that might not be fair.

Hermione was aggravatingly distracted by a newspaper article their parents had sent by post—not from the _Prophet_ , though, but from the _Times._

 _OUTBREAK OF EBOLA VIRAL HEMORRHAGIC FEVER—ZAIRE_ , the headline crowed, and his sister was thoroughly engrossed in analysing it and looking through today’s _Prophet_ for any mention of it.

“Maybe they haven’t had time to print it yet,” she muttered. “Surely, they’re taking _some_ action if the muggle governments are noticing.”

“Hermione, can it wait till after the match?” Harry said.

“Harry, this is serious!” she said. “Hundreds of people have died, and they’re worried about it spreading outside the region, and a wizard started it.”

“Yes, Mione, it’s tragic, but there’s nothing _we_ can do about it right now. I doubt there’s anything even Dumbledore can do about it right now. And I can only take one thing that’s about to make me sick at a time.”

Hermione huffed, but she said, “Sorry, Harry. We can look at it later. And I’m sure you’ll fly great, whatever happens.”

“Thanks, sis,” he said.

But before he got to fly, he had a little exhibition game to watch, and when the crowds assembled at the pitch, the commentators announced themselves to the school and to the radio audience.

“Good morning to Hogwarts and to all of you listening at home on the Wizarding Wireless!” Lee’s enthusiastic voice boomed over the stadium. “I’m Hogwarts’ star Quidditch commentator, Lee Jordan, and with me today is my special guest: you know her from Pride of Portree and the Scottish National team for the past four decades, and she is now Director of Magical Games and Sports: Catriona McCormack.”

The crowd cheered, and McCormack took the microphone: “Thank you, Lee. It’s good to be here at Hogwarts this morning. This may be the most anticipated Quidditch match of the year: the final of this year’s Northern European Academic League Tournament, and we have two stellar teams competing today: Gryffindor House featuring undefeated Seeker, Harry Potter—!”

The crowd roared, and the Gryffindor section sang out, “Harry Potter is our king!”

“—and the Durmstrang Institute, featuring the World Cup runners-up Seeker, Viktor Krum of Bulgaria!”

A large minority of the crowd cheered Durmstrang, and many of Viktor’s fans started chanting, “Krum! Krum! Krum!” It took some time for the noise to die down enough for Lee to start again.

“Thank you Catriona,” he said. “Yes it promises to be a big day today. Everybody is here. Before we start, we’d like to welcome our other special guests, Minster for Magic Cornelius Fudge—” Polite applause. “—former Director of Magical Games and Sports, Ludo Bagman—” More applause, but also some boos. “—and _Daily Prophet_ correspondent Rita Skeeter.” Feminine-sounding cheers and a groan from Harry. “Miss Skeeter has taken a break this year from her regular gossip column in order to cover sports, in a move some are calling ‘highly irregular’. When asked why, she replied that she merely wanted to cover the major social events of the year, which many would consider a likely story—”

“And let’s get to it, shall we.” Harry laughed as McCormack grabbed the microphone away from Lee before Rita Skeeter realised he was mocking her. “There’s an extra addition to our schedule today. Before we get to Quidditch, we have a special treat: as part of the Tetrawizard Tournament festivities, the teams have agreed to host an exhibition game of a brand new broomstick sport designed by a group of seven students here at Hogwarts.”

“That’s right,” Lee said. “Welcome to the first ever game of ‘Ricochet.’ If the rumours are true, it should be pretty interesting. Playing today will be Hufflepuff Seeker and Hogwarts Champion Cedric Diggory and Ravenclaw Seeker Cho Chang. Hermione Granger of Gryffindor will be refereeing the game.”

Cedric, Cho, and Hermione took their places on the court that Hagrid had set up. They met on the ground, and Hermione flipped a coin to determine the first serve. Cedric won it, and they rose into the air.

“Alright, so Fred and George Weasley explained the game to me, and assuming they weren’t messing with me, here’s how it works,” Lee continued. “Each player has a court forty-five feet square, separated by a bar thirty-five feet high. The have these funny-looking rackets, and they need to bat a small red ball back and forth over the bar. And they said that if you think that sounds like Swivehodge…you aren’t paying attention.”

“Diggory takes the first serve,” McCormack said. “Whoa. Definitely faster than Swivenhodge. They’re batting it back and forth—hold up! Chang hits it up and then down hard at Diggory—”

“Yes, in Ricochet, you’re allowed two hits to get the ball over the bar,” Lee said. “That’s so no one can get the high ground and shut the other player out.”

“One-nought Diggory. He serves again. So on each rally, if the ball hits the ground in your opponent’s court, you get a point.”

“Ha! Chang fakes Diggory and hits it over his head! One-all.”

“Okay, if you’re listening at home, I honestly don’t know how to describe this properly,” McCormack said. “That ball is going faster than most Bludger shots, and it is taking some serious aerial acrobatics for Diggory and Chang to—Wow! Diggory flips over to save that one—Chang slams it down past him—point! He overreached on that one. Two-one Chang.”

“I’m told that move is called a smash,” Lee said. “Hit the ball down at an angle into your opponent’s court as hard as you can so they can’t reach it.”

“Well, whatever you call it, it works. Some of those shots must be breaking a hundred miles an hour. This isn’t you’re granny’s Swivenhodge; I can tell you that. Ricochet is a whole new animal.”

“We’re at three-all, now. The first player to seventeen points wins, _but_ you have to win by two points, so it could go extra-long. And Diggory hits it about fifty feet in the air. It’s an easy hit for Chang. She nails it—Diggory returns—yikes! Nearly hit her in the head. Four-three Diggory.”

The crowd grew more and more excited with each point as they started to get into the game. Lee and McCormack did their best to commentate it whilst explaining the rules at the same time. They explained how a serve had to clear a service line for it to count and how normally, a match would be played to two out of three games. And all the while, they struggled to convey the excitement of the game to an unfamiliar audience on the radio. Meanwhile, on the court, it was close, but Cedric slowly pulled ahead.

“It’s getting heated…Chang’s flying sideways—Oh! Out of bounds! Eleven-eight Diggory,” Lee called. Some of the crowd groaned, and others cheered. He was pretty sure the radio listeners could hear the enthusiasm by now. “Keep in mind these two have only been playing this game for a couple weeks. I’m kinda surprised they haven’t gone out of bounds more.”

“Not to mention they’re both Seekers, and that’s the wrong skill set for this,” McCormack agreed. “It’s not an easy game. It takes the swinging skills of a Beater and the agility of a Keeper. But they’re both doing pretty well. And that’s twelve-eight Diggory.”

Ricochet really took even more agility than a Keeper needed because the ball was faster and a smaller target. And it required good aim, too—maybe not _better_ than a Beater, but they did have to estimate where the ball would land on the grass so it wouldn’t go out of bounds, and that was an added layer of complication. Cho fought hard, but she couldn’t close the gap, and Cedric had soon won.

“And that’s the game, folks!” Lee announced. “Cedric Diggory wins seventeen to thirteen. That was some exciting stuff. What do you think, Catriona?”

“That was a lot of fun to watch, Lee. I haven’t seen a new sport played in a long time, and I don’t know if I’ve ever seen one that fun to watch. I think I’m going to have to try out Ricochet for myself.”

“Yeah, I’m with you there. Might not be much time right now with the third task and the duelling tournament, but I think there just might be a Ricochet tournament in the cards for next year. Alright, well, that was the opening act for you. We’ll now take a short break while the Quidditch teams get into place.”

Now, it was time. Hagrid hauled away the bar and court markers from the Ricochet game, and the two teams marched to the centre of the pitch. Madam Hooch was waiting for them, and they shook hands across the centre circle.

“May best team vin, Harry,” Viktor said.

“Same to you, Viktor. This should be good,” Harry replied. The whistle sounded, and fifteen brooms rose into the air.

Harry was much less aware of Lee’s commentary while he was flying. He was on high alert, his cat-like reflexes primed. He had to shut out all the other movement on the pitch and in the stands to watch for the Golden Snitch and for any moves Viktor made (and not get hit by Bludgers or other players). He had to be able to spring into action instantly, for he wasn’t about to give the world’s best an easy time of it.

_“Let’s face it, Harry, your odds against Krum are low and mostly based on luck,” Angelina had told him when they were planning their strategy. “You said yourself Slytherin made a mistake playing a Seekers’ game. If we want to win the Cup, our best chance is to push a Chasers’ game hard and try to pull an Ireland.”_

_“I get it,” Harry had replied. “Do what you have to do.”_

_“Okay, but that means you’re gonna be on your own more than usual. You don’t need to run interference for us. The Twins will take care of that, but you won’t have much support, either. Just…do whatever you can to slow Krum down, and try not to get pummelled.”_

The good news for Harry was that Durmstrang also seemed to be operating under the assumption that Viktor would very likely catch the Snitch, and they weren’t giving Harry much grief, instead focusing on trying to stop the Gryffindor Chasers from running up a big lead. Thus, both Seekers were left relatively to their own devices.

Harry knew Viktor wouldn’t tolerate him shadowing him, so he adopted a strategy of trying to get in his way as much as possible, flying a relatively fast patrol pattern at right angles to Viktor’s and repeatedly cutting him off. Viktor scowled as he was forced to adjust his own flight path again and again. It was a sort of cat-and-mouse game. Viktor would move to a more favourable position, and each time, Harry would move across his path and get in his way again. It was normally a bad strategy—and an unsatisfying one to the audience—except when there was one very asymmetric player like Viktor. It slowed Viktor down by distracting him, but it distracted Harry even more, so the only reason to bother was Viktor’s superior skills, although Harry hoped his natural hunting instincts would give him an edge to make up for it.

“And Potter’s not letting up,” he heard Lee announce distantly. “He’s not giving Krum a chance to sit still and watch the pitch at all. Tricky strategy. You’ve got to be kind of an arse to pull it off, but desperate times call for desperate measures, you know? It might just work to slow Krum down.”

“And Bell scores!” McCormack called. “That’s sixty-twenty Gryffindor.” Harry was surprised. Were they really that far in already? “At this rate, the game might still be in play,” she added. “Gwenog Jones, take notice: the Gryffindor Chasers are a well-oiled machine.”

That much was true. Fred and George had started a pool that had a lot of money riding on all three of the girls going to the Harpies.

Krum took the offensive, trying to throw Harry off with a series of feints. He didn’t lead with a Wronski Feint, knowing that Harry _would_ follow, but would be too cautious to be tripped up until he was sure it was for real. Instead, he tried several more conventional feints at intervals before diving into the Wronski with extra gusto.

But Harry had seen the final of the World Cup and had vowed to do better than Lynch, who had face-planted twice. He knew exactly how fast he was going and when he needed to pull up. He followed Viktor even after he could see it had been a trick and finished with such precision that his feet brushed the grass for show. He reflected that it was a good thing his parents weren’t there to watch, or he would’ve been totally grounded.

“Holy mooncalf!” McCormack exclaimed. “Harry Potter just matched Krum’s Wronski Feint _perfectly!_ I’ve never seen a kid his age dive like that. He really looks like a pro flying out there.”

“That’s our Potter!” Lee agreed. “Best flier this side of Glen More—present company excluded, of course.” (Portree was _also_ on this side of Glen More.)

“Harry, how long have you been practising dat move?” Viktor called to him when they levelled off.

“Ever since I learnt I’d be facing you,” he grinned.

A perfectly executed Wronski Feint was probably Viktor’s most powerful tactic, since it could knock out an opposing Seeker in one stroke, but he had plenty of other tricks up his sleeve. After all, this was a man who could do handstands on his broom when that wasn’t even part of his required skill set. Harry hadn’t even tried stunts like that.

“Let us see vhat else you can do,” Viktor taunted. He flew at Harry, narrowly missing him and pushing him towards the boundary lines. The penalty for straying out of bounds was a Quaffle turnover, and Viktor was doing his best to force him over the line. They soon found themselves on a merry chase around the edges of the pitch at top speeds. The hard part was at the scoring areas. At those speeds, the Firebolt couldn’t handle the tight turns at the ends of the pitch that well, even though “tight” still meant well over a hundred feet in circumference. Harry could feel the g-forces threatening to throw him off his broom, but he kept up.

Viktor tried a few more stunts to try to shake Harry, by he kept up with him, predator-like, albeit with a couple of shortcuts. This was slightly dangerous since cutting across the inside of a curve gave Viktor a chance to give him a shove from his blind spot, but he got a clear view of his opponent with the same barrel roll Viktor had used against Malfoy and was safe.

The pair broke off, but this time, Harry took the initiative by attempting a feint that took both Seekers straight through the path of the Bludgers. What Viktor didn’t know was that he had prearranged a hand signal for Fred and George to break off from their Chasers’ game for a minute and attack Viktor with everything they had. They nearly nailed him, too, but Viktor was used to tricks like that.

“Nice try, Harry, but I have seen better from Japanese team,” he called.

“Don’t worry, I’m just getting warmed up,” Harry said.

At that moment, Durmstrang scored, and Angelina yelled at Fred and George to get back in line. Rounding on Harry, she said, “Alright, I gave you your minute. We need the Twins on offence.”

“It’s alright,” Harry assured her. “We’ll get them back.”

He did just that for her not long afterwards. After a little back and forth, he pulled a feint that comprised a vertical dive straight into the Durmstrang Chasers. Viktor followed and, before he realised the trick, managed to block his own teammates from scoring.

“Did you see that?” McCormack said. “That was a Gagawala Gambit! That’s a tough move to do right.”

Harry hadn’t even realised that move _had_ a name, but he was proud of himself. It worked out even better when Alicia grabbed the Quaffle, took it all the way the the other end of the pitch, and scored before anyone could stop her. That made the score two hundred twenty to one hundred fifty for Gryffindor.

“Vell played, Harry,” Viktor said, “but now I must defeat you.”

Like lightning, he took off, and Harry flipped his broom over and followed. This time, it was no trick. He saw the Snitch fluttering up ahead. He pressed himself to his broom, relying on his smaller body mass to gain more speed. Viktor tried to roll to push him out of the way, but he was ready and rolled to match. Viktor rolled the other way, but Harry was ready for that, too, and avoided a collision without losing speed. They were nearly on the Snitch when it took a sharp turn left. Harry slowed and pulled his broom left as hard as he could to follow, nearly sliding off from the g-forces.

But then, Viktor did something with his broom that Harry had never seen done before—that he didn’t think the Firebolt _could_ do. He pulled a Crazy Ivan.

Harry couldn’t believe his eyes as Viktor somehow _kicked_ his broom, and it flipped around three-eighths of a turn, deliberately overshooting and pointing back in the direction the Snitch was going. Harry had only a split second to take in the image, but his Quidditch-frenzied mind put the pieces together instantly. Viktor was hugging his broom tightly with his feet braced on the stirrups up near the shaft, putting the g-forces along the line of his body so he could turn tighter. The Firebolt’s overpowered Propulsion Charm acted like a muggle rocket, killing his forward speed and putting him where the Snitch was a full broom length ahead of Harry, where the Bulgarian swiped it out of the air.

Then, they nearly collided.

That was the “Crazy” part of the Crazy Ivan. Viktor predictably had no control in that position, and Harry was turning so tight that he couldn’t correct in time, so he was lucky that Viktor didn’t kick him in the head as he stabilised himself, but few people noticed because at that moment, the crowd went wild.

“OHHH! KRUM DID IT!” Lee shouted. “KRUM GOT THE SNITCH! THE KING OF THE LIONS HAS BEEN _DETHRONED!_ DURMSTRANG WINS THE CUP THREE HUNDRED TO TWO-TWENTY!”

“That was a game for the history books, folks,” McCormack agreed. “If anyone could stop Krum, it was Harry Potter, but he didn’t quite have the skills to win it. But I’ll tell you, Potter is one of the best I’ve seen. Give them a rematch in ‘98, and it could be a very different game.”

Harry flew back down to the pitch, feeling the sting of his first ever loss, but he was still happy about his performance. He had got close—closer than Lynch had—and that at fourteen years old. Plus, he was pretty confident he’d flown better than Malfoy.

“Good game, Viktor,” he said breathlessly as they shook hands.

“Very good game, Harry,” he replied. “You are vorthy opponent.”

“Since when can a broom do a Crazy Ivan? I’ve never heard of anyone doing that before.”

“My friend Shatalov on Russian team figured it out. It is bad for broom and has no control, but it vorks vell in pinch.”

Harry nodded and would have continued the conversation further, but both teams were called up to the teachers’ box for the presentation of the Cup. Harry’s teammates and house-mates congratulated him on his performance, despite his loss, and both teams were making a great show of sportsmanship. Hermione gave him a big hug when he reached her and promptly shouted at him not to scare her like that.

Catriona McCormack presented the Northern European Academic League Cup to Viktor and his teammates, and Fudge and Dumbledore congratulated all of the teams on a fine season, and with that, the season was over. But Harry was glad to have made some new friends and improved his skills beyond what he had ever thought possible, so despite his record now standing at thirteen and one, it was a good day.

* * *

The four champions were called down to the Quidditch Pitch four weeks before the third task. It had been completely transformed since the final Quidditch game. Low hedges about a foot high were growing in every direction out of the grass. David Monroe met them there to explain. “We’re telling you what the third task is now because it will soon become obvious to everyone,” he said. “As you can see, we’re bringing back an old favourite and growing a hedge maze, but fortunately for you, there will not be a cockatrice in it. The Tetrawizard Cup will be placed at the centre of the maze, and the first champion to touch the cup will win.”

“What? What about the points?” Cedric demanded.

“The champions will enter in order according to the number of points they’ve accumulated. Mr. Potter, you will get a six-minute head start over Mr. Diggory, who will enter nine minutes ahead of Mr. Krum, and Miss Delacour three minutes after him. We’ve estimated this will give the stronger champions a significant advantage while still leaving the others a fighting chance.”

Harry thought that was a really bad way to do it, but this Tournament was so messed up already that he didn’t bother saying anything.

“The maze will be filled with dangerous creatures, traps, and enchantments, so you must be prepared for anything,” Monroe continued. “And we’re using space-distorting charms, so don’t bother trying to map it from above. The layout won’t be finalised until the night before the task.”

“How will the audience see what’s going on?” Harry asked. The stands wouldn’t be high enough to see down into the maze if the hedges were twenty feet high.

“Part of the space distorting charms will be a magical projection system that will bend the light so that the audience can see you, but you won’t be able to see each other. Any other questions? No? Then good luck to all of you.”

Harry and Hermione spoke with their parents and Sirius on their mirrors that night, but without knowing exactly what was going to be in the maze, all they could do was to prepare Harry with as broad-based a defensive spell repertoire as possible. It wasn’t much to go on, but he would still be as ready as he could be. It would be a long shot, but maybe it would be worth trying after all.

* * *

Voldemort held his new wand lovingly in his tiny hands, running his fingers along it. Whatever doubts he had had at the beginning of the process were gone. It was truly a work of art. Infused with his own magic, the wand had bleached from its original pale yellow-brown to bone-white, like his old one, but it was much more ornate than his old one—thicker and carved with an intricate skulls-and-snakes design in the style of Mexican art, with a handle of three finger bones hollowed out and slipped around the wood. The bones were actually those of a lowland tapir, human bones being too thin, but they looked acceptably like a stylised human finger.

 _“A fine wand you have crafted, Señor Coquihani,”_ he said. _“Perhaps even superior to my original. Your reputation is well-earned._ Bring in the prisoner!” he called.

The prisoner, in this case, was a poor muggle tramp from the village—someone who would not be missed. He wasn’t picky in this case, and discretion was his main concern—for now. The quaking, ratty-looking muggle was led into the chamber with prods from a wand, looking around fearfully, trying to process what he was seeing. Voldemort didn’t give him any time to understand, though, as he pointed his new wand and christened it in the best way possible.

_“Avada Kedavra!”_

The muggle dropped to the floor, and he waved for the Death Eaters to drag him away.

“Yes, this will do very nicely,” he said. “Now, for our plan. Barty, your measures are in place?”

“Yes, Master. I’ve worked my sabotage into the projection system unnoticed, and Krum will seek out and attack Delacour and Diggory rather than the Tetrawizard Cup. I will alter the Portkey when it is placed in the maze.”

“Very good, Barty. Lucius, what about the ingredients?”

“I have…nearly assembled them all, my Lord,” Lucius said anxiously. “Acquiring the mundane ingredients in such large quantities proved to be easy once I discovered that I could compel muggle suppliers to provide them. I of course personally tested their purity. I am still working to acquire more bundimun secretion, but I will have no trouble assembling the required amount before the day of the task…Only the live unicorn is proving difficult. My contacts believe I am not trustworthy enough to convince a legitimate breeder of my motives.” Of course, that was entirely true. “It may be easier to capture one in the wild, but they can sense ill intent…”

“Well, if you do, just remember I need it in one piece,” La Pantera cut in. “It breaks the aura of purity if its blood is spilt.”

“Yes, it is a very sensitive part of the ritual,” Voldemort said. “Do not forget. Artemis, do you know anything about hunting unicorns?”

Artemis was surprised to be addressed, but she answered, “They’re fast, Master. Faster than werewolves. We chase them sometimes, but we never catch them.”

“Then perhaps a lure would be more useful. Lady Pantera, would subduing one with a Sleeping Draught be acceptable?”

“It wouldn’t mess up the ritual, but the hard part would be getting the unicorn to drink it. They can sense all manner of potions and other dangers. They’re almost more spirit than beast. That’s why nothing can touch them unless they want it.”

“I see. Macnair? Your thoughts?” Voldemort asked.

“You want me to catch it without making it bleed, my Lord?” the tall Death Eater said. “Not my department…but maybe…maybe we’re hunting the wrong thing.”

“What do you mean?”

“Find someone innocent who has a reason to go looking for unicorns—like a wandmaker—and hunt them instead. Follow them invisibly at a distance. Then, when the unicorn gets close to them, stun them both and bring the beast here.”

“Interesting. Will stunning it work?”

“It will with good aim and a lot of power,” Macnair said. “I could do it.”

“Very well, Macnair. See to this plan, and consult Lucius if you need assistance. The rest of you are dismissed. Barty, I believe you have earned some time off with your _lovely_ cousin for your work.”

Barty didn’t even flinch at the implication of indecency. He just grinned and said, “Thank you, Master,” before taking Artemis by the hand.

 _Oh well_ , Voldemort thought. _The eccentric ones often prove specially useful._ “Soon, Potter,” the Dark Lord said, looking at his new wand. “Soon, you will face your death.”


	109. The Third Task

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: Harry Potter is a tremendous network of JK Rowling.
> 
> Parts of this chapter are quoted from Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.

Harry stood with his family at the entrance to the hedge maze. For most of the school, the third task was an exciting day (and it didn’t hurt that it was also the last day of the term). Minister Fudge was there, as was Rita Skeeter and (for some reason) a brass band. But for the Granger Family, it was an anxious day.

“Stay alert today, Cub,” Sirius said. “We still don’t know what Voldemort is planning, but it would make sense for him to make his move today.”

“Yeah, I know, Sirius. But he can’t get here, can he?” Harry asked.

“Not with Dumbledore around,” Remus said. “Our best guess is that he’s going to make a move tonight while everybody’s distracted, celebrating the end of the Tournament—or he’ll use the task itself as a distraction and attack somewhere else.”

“Do we have _any_ idea why he entered me in the Tournament yet?”

“I wish we did. Maybe it’s part of the distraction or just a show of power, but honestly, it still makes no sense.”

“Just remember, son, you don’t have to win it,” Dan said. “Just come back to us in one piece.”

“I’ll do my best, Dad. But I do have to put in _some_ effort, though. The contract says so.”

“We know, but be careful,” Emma said. “Remember, caution is a strategy, too.”

“Yes, Mum.”

Sirius quickly changed the subject to try to keep things lighter: “So, how are the Slytherins liking the new book?”

Harry grinned. “Oh, they’ve been bickering all week about it.” Harry’s new book, _Harry Potter and the Heir of Slytherin_ , was much-anticipated, especially being released only six months after the last one. Several students had received copies by owl order on Tuesday, and by Wednesday, it was all over the school (and the rest of magical Britain) that Harry was accusing Voldemort of being a half-blood. “A bunch of them have tried to hex me, but the other Gryffindors have been helping protect me. They don’t want their champion getting hurt.” He rolled his eyes.

“It’s not funny,” Hermione said. “They’ve been awful all week, and they were so mad a bunch of them got disqualified from the duelling tournament for fighting dirty.”

“Uh oh. Malfoy?” Sirius asked.

“No, Malfoy wasn’t any worse than usual,” Harry said. “He’s been quieter this year. Might be finally learning some Slytherin subtlety. But I wound up facing Pucey in the rirst found of the sixth year tournament, and I won by default because he tried to use an illegal spell against me.”

“What?” Emma gasped. “You didn’t tell us that.”

“It was a Fire Whip Curse,” Remus said grimly. “Dumbledore had to step in himself. Pucey was suspended for the rest of the term.”

“I was okay,” Harry protested.

“But you could’ve been badly hurt. We should have thought of that before we published.”

“No, Remus, I’m the one who insisted on publishing before the third task,” Harry insisted. “I just didn’t consider the duelling tournament. And anyway, the rest of it worked out.”

The duelling tournament had otherwise been fun, but also good practice for the champions. Harry in particular had dominated the fourth-year competition, taken second among the fifth-years, and landed in the middle of the pack among the sixth-years. Cedric was the all-school winner for Hogwarts, but he lost out to one of the Durmstrang boys who had already been on the professional circuit last summer.

“On the bright side,” Remus said, “some of the Slytherins were literally hopping mad when they heard about Voldemort’s heritage.”

“Yeah, Theo Nott looked like he was having some kind of episode,” Harry offered.

“Even Malfoy looked pretty unnerved,” Hermione said. “He just had the sense to keep quiet about it.”

“What do people think outside the castle?” Harry asked.

“It’s one of the big things people are talking about,” Sirius said. “ _One_ of them, besides the Tournament and stuff. A lot of people are convinced Dumbledore fed you that line, but a lot of other people believe it, and the brave ones had a laugh about it. Hard to say if it’ll slow Voldemort down, though.”

“Anyway, we should get ready for the task,” Remus said. “Harry, did you bring the Marauder’s Map?”

“Right here, Moony,” he handed it over.

“Good. I’ll watch for anyone who isn’t supposed to be here. You stay alert, too.”

“Champions, it is time to begin,” Dumbledore’s voice sounded over the Quidditch pitch. As the judges had said, the field was covered with a maze twenty-foot hedges with menacing sounds emanating from within. The third task was held immediately after dinner instead of in the morning, apparently so that the creatures would be more active, although sunset in June was so late in Scotland that there was still plenty of light. “Welcome, everyone, to the third and final task of this year’s Tetrawizard Tournament!” the Headmaster announced. “And a special welcome to Minister for Magic Cornelius Fudge.”

Fudge waved to the crowd from his place with the judges in the staff box. David Monroe, though he had previously announced the tasks, was sitting quietly, staring intently at the pitch.

“The champions will soon enter the maze in order of their scores,” Dumbledore said. “Inside the maze are numerous hazards and traps, animal, vegetable, and magical. The champions must navigate these hazards to the centre of the maze, where we have placed the Tetrawizard Cup. The first champion to touch the Cup will be the winner, and so there is no question of who won, the Cup has been made into a Portkey that will return the winner to the entrance of the maze.”

“A Portkey?” Harry and Hermione gasped in unison. “Moony, could that be a problem?” Harry said quickly. He knew well that unregistered Portkeys were one of the dangers they’d been trying to protect him from all year.

“Only Dumbledore can make a Portkey on school grounds,” Remus assured them. “It should be fine, but I’ll still keep an eye out regardless.”

Feeling mostly reassured, Harry turned his attention back to Dumbledore.

“In order to give the audience a clear view of the champions, we have placed additional charms and enchantments on the maze in order to form a rather ingenious magical projection system, like so.” He waved his wand, and distorted images of magical creatures of various sorts appeared above the maze. They stood at odd angles as if they were climbing on very steep hills just below the hedge tops, but they were clearly visible. The enchantment must have been bending the light coming up out of the maze horizontally towards the audience. Harry was dismayed to see one or two of Hagrid’s Blast-Ended Skrewts wandering around. The beasts had grown to ten feet long over the year, and they were a menace to anything that came near them.

Dumbledore waved his wand again, and the images vanished just as quickly. “With this projection, the audience will be able to see the champions, and vice versa,” he said, “but the champions will not be able to see other parts of the maze from inside it. And now, Mr. Ollivander will inspect the champions’ wands for the task.”

Most unfortunately, while Ollivander checked their wands, Rita Skeeter made her way onto the pitch.

“So, Harry,” his least favourite reporter said, “it’s been a big week for you this week. You’ve made a lot of buzz with that new book of yours. What made you decide to release it now? Maximising the publicity, perhaps?”

“I’m just trying to focus on the task for today, Ms. Skeeter,” he said. He noted again the odd quality of her face—the slightly dumpy visage, the small, searching eyes offset by large, jewelled spectacles.

“Oh, of course, of course,” she said, but she naturally didn’t let up: “You’ve certainly set high expectations for yourself: killing a basilisk, winning the first two tasks. How do you feel about your chances for tonight?”

“I’m just trying to get through the task in once piece,” he said. Rita’s movements were swift and furtive as she scribbled some probably-slanderous notes on him. Seriously, where had he seen her face before? She looked almost like a…

“And we all hope you do. Are you worried about what dangers you may face—?”

“Beetle,” Harry whispered to himself.

He didn’t think Skeeter would even notice, but instead, she turned deathly pale. “Wh-what d-did you say?” she stammered.

“Nothing,” he said honestly. He finally remembered when he had seen her—or someone like her, rather. But it was in his mind’s eye between the pages of Orwell: short, stout men (and women) with scuttling movements and unreadable faces—and a penchant for ratting out their neighbours—beetle-like men, the author had called them. Skeeter seemed, oddly, to fit the bill. But it was certainly nothing of importance, and yet, the woman quickly left him and moved on to the other champions after that. Harry shrugged and was just thankful she was gone.

Meanwhile, Ollivander spoke to him quickly as he checked his wand. “Good job with the new book, Mr. Potter,” he said. “That was a brave move, revealing He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named’s secrets. I was nearly certain myself, of course, but I had no evidence.”

“Just trying to win in the arena of public opinion, Mr. Ollivander,” he replied.

After that, the champions lined up at the entrance, with their families giving final words of encouragement. Harry heard Amos Diggory clearly say, “Good show, my boy. All-school duelling champion. This little maze should be no problem after that, eh?” Fleur’s and Viktor’s families were speaking in French and Bulgarian, respectively. Harry’s parents hugged him and said, “Good luck in there. And stay safe.” They all took their places, the cannon sounded, and Harry entered the maze.

From the moment he stepped inside, his view of the sky above changed. Instead of the clear blue above, he could see the audience peering down at him as if he were at the bottom of a large bowl. He turned around once for a better view. It was intimidating having so many people appear to literally look down at him as he attempted the task, but he knew that to them, he appeared to be walking just above the tops of the hedges.

The sound from outside seemed to be muted, presumably so he couldn’t hear the commentary and get clues from that. It was strangely isolating to see the crowd watching him but not be able to hear anything.

He knew he had six minutes before Cedric entered the maze, so he tried to cover some ground from the entrance before he did. He could keep his bearings with his view of the audience, but that wouldn’t help him get to the centre quickly. Well, he might as well check the obvious shortcuts, he thought. He tried cutting and then blasting through the hedges, but they were spell-resistant and closed up too quickly to pass. He laid down flat on his stomach to see if he could crawl or dig his way under them. He probably could as a cat, but he had no way to hide his transformation. No, he’d just have to search.

Harry moved quickly, but took care looking around each corner. One of the first brought him to a section where the hedges closed over in a canopy covering a large plot of Devil’s Snare. Fortunately, a few fire spells easily got him through that. His next encounter, he wasn’t so lucky. He rounded a corner and found himself face to…er, whichever end it was of one of the Blast-Ended Skrewts. The surviving hybrids had grown so large that Hagrid had (reluctantly) given up on having even the seventh-years handle them weeks ago. Harry uttered a word he hoped the audience couldn’t hear as he dodged a massive fireball that the Skrewt blasted at him. He jumped back and considered hie options a moment, but when he had to dodge a deadly stinger, too, he decided discretion was the better part of valour and ran back to take the other path at the last fork he’d passed.

Over the course of eighteen minutes, the other three champions entered the maze. Harry didn’t see any of them, but he heard the sounds of increased activity in the neighbouring aisles. He _did_ encounter several beasts, most notably a troll, and it was a good thing it was a wild one, too. From what he heard, security trolls could be pretty nasty. This one, however, was stupid enough that he was able to knock it out with its own club and a Levitation Charm.

He came across a very cleverly disguised pit trap that he only refrained from stepping in thanks to feline instinct. He decided to try to climb the hedges to get past it rather than expend the effort to make a bridge. This proved to be a mistake because the hedges started shuddering as soon as he pulled himself off the ground, and vines whipped down to knock him loose. Of course, the organisers didn’t want anyone climbing over the hedges. But he found that if he crouched down and shuffled quickly, he could stay clear of the vines

Around that time, he noticed that his view of the audience was gone. It was all clear, blue sky again.

* * *

“What’s the matter? Where’d he go?” Emma asked as their view of Harry flickered out.

“Something’s wrong with the projection system,” Remus said. “I thought it might be overcomplicated. I don’t know if they’ll be able to fix it fast enough…”

“Remus, I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” Hermione said.

“Now, don’t panic, Hermione. I can still follow him on the Map. Look here.”

* * *

Soon after the projection disappeared, Harry heard a blood-curdling scream. Since the maze was still silenced to the outside, it could only be Fleur. He shuddered at the thought of what she must have run into. He still moved on at first, but then, he heard loud bangs and shouting amid the screams: “AHH! Viktor! Stop! AIEEE! What are you—” BOOM! “—doing?! No! AHHHH!”

Viktor was attacking Fleur? And that didn’t sound like a mere duel, even for the sake of winning the Tournament. He sounded like he was trying to kill her.

Harry had to help. They had to be close by, from the sound. But how could he get there in time through the maze? Then he realised the audience couldn’t see him. He changed to cat form and squeezed under one hedge, then another, and then, he saw an awful sight. Viktor was standing over a banged-up Fleur, trying to curse her into the ground. She held out behind a shield, but she was injured and pinned down and couldn’t strike back. Viktor was fighting like a demon and probably using dark curses. What had come over him? Harry leapt before fully thinking and climbed up Viktor’s back in two bounds. Once he had purchase, he applied the lesson he’d learnt from Fenrir Greyback last year and went straight for the eyes.

This might have been a bad move. Viktor whirled around and flung Harry into the hedges before he could get a good scratch in. He raised his wand, but before he could cast a spell, there was a weak call of _“Stupefy!”_ behind him, and Fleur nailed him square in the back. Viktor dropped to the ground, unconscious, but before he did, Harry thought he saw a glazed-over look in the man’s eyes. The Imperius Curse, he wondered? Or had he just imagined it?

An irate Fleur sat, still pointing her wand at Viktor, but she didn’t seem to notice Harry watching from the shadows as a cat. She flopped down to lie on her back. It looked like her leg was injured, and she apparently decided she couldn’t continue, because she shot red sparks into the air, probably hoping to attract the organisers’ attention for help.

* * *

“Oh, no! What happened? Is Harry hurt?” Hermione cried when she saw the sparks.

“I don’t know,” Remus said. He watched the Map intently. “He’s—no, wait, he’s still on the move. It’s Fleur and Viktor who are hurt. Harry’s still going through the hedges. He’s headed almost straight for the Cup!”

* * *

Harry wasn’t quite as lucky as Remus thought. His mind was racing, and he wasn’t fully paying attention. Viktor’s actions put a whole new perspective on things. Was he Imperiused? If so, why attack Fleur? To knock her out of the running? It was possible Karkaroff had Imperiused him to be more aggressive and do anything to win, but…what if someone else did it to fix the Tournament? To fix it so Harry would win? But then, what was the goal? Who benefited?

He was so lost in his thoughts as he crawled to the centre of the maze in cat form that he almost got himself killed when he took a moment too long to notice the bloody giant spider the size of a horse that appeared right in front of him! This was not a job for a cat. Acromantulas were sentient, so outsmarting it would be tough, and he probably looked like dinner to it. He changed back to human in a flash and realised at once that he probably _still_ looked like dinner to it.

 _“Stupefy! Reducto! Impedimenta! Diffindo!”_ He threw any curses he could think of at the monster as he backed down the path as fast as he could. But the thing was magic-resistant and kept coming. It was only when he heard a loud voice far past the spider shout _“Arania Exumai!”_ that it finally went down. And when his view cleared, he saw Cedric staring at him.

“Phew, thanks, I—” Harry started to say, but Cedric started running straight at him. Harry was confused for a moment, but then, he put two and two together and turned around. There was the Tetrawizard Cup, not thirty yards away. He ran for it. Cedric was faster, but Harry had a big head start. He raced to the Cup, reached out to grab it…”

And hesitated.

Cedric skidded to a halt about ten feet away and stared at him in confusion. “Harry, why’d you stop? You got here first.”

“Something’s wrong here,” he said, half to himself.

“What’s wrong?” he said. “Is this about the spider? You had a clear path. You probably could have made it.”

“No, it’s not that.”

“It’s not—? Oh.” Realisation dawned on Cedric’s face. “You saw what happened to Fleur and Viktor, didn’t you? Viktor tried to curse me, too, but I got away. I don’t know what was up with him.”

“Viktor was trying to kill Fleur, I think,” Harry said. “He attacked her with everything he could throw at her. I think he would’ve done if I hadn’t stopped him. I didn’t get that good a look, but…I think he might have been Imperiused.”

“Imperiused?” he gasped. “How? Why?”

“I don’t know, but I think it might be connected to the mess I’ve been mixed up in all year.”

“Okay…but why didn’t you take the Cup? You won fair and square, or close enough.”

“I just have a feeling if I touch it, something really bad’s gonna happen.”

“…You really think so?” he said.

“Yeah. With my luck, it’s practically certain.”

They stood in silence for a minute.

“I’d offer it to you if you wanted it,” Harry added. “I still wasn’t supposed to be in this thing from the start. You’d deserve it, but I’m worried something bad will happen to you, then.”

Cedric considered this for a moment and said, “We’ll take it together, then. That’s the fairest way, isn’t it? And if something bad _does_ happen, there’ll be two of us to face it.”

Harry raised his eyebrows: “Are you sure?”

“Yes. We can’t just stand here all night and wait for the others to find us, and if we send up sparks, it’s a forfeit. They can’t have no winner.”

“Alright, then. God help us,” he muttered to himself as Cedric stepped beside the Cup. “On three, then. One…two…three!”

They each grabbed one handle of the cup. They felt the familiar hooking sensation behind their navels, and they were gone.

* * *

“Oh, God!” Remus gasped.

“Remus?” Sirius said worriedly.

“They’re gone.”

“What?”

“Harry and Cedric both disappeared from the Map.”

_“WHAT?!”_

“They’re _gone_ , Padfoot! They were both standing by the Cup for over a minute, and then, they disappeared, but they’re not—” He pointed to the maze entrance, which was still conspicuously bare.

“Oh, God,” Sirius said. “Albus!” He grabbed the Map and scrambled over to where Dumbledore was standing over a rune stone, still trying to get the projection working again. “Albus! Harry and Cedric are gone! They grabbed the Cup and disappeared from the Map!”

Dumbledore paled noticeably, and he took the Map and examined it with wide eyes. “Both at the same time?” he asked quickly.

“Yes. It had to be the Portkey. They’d already made it to the Cup.”

“But the Portkey was only to bring them back to the entrance of the maze,” he said. Sirius could tell from the flashing in his eyes that Dumbledore was livid and was racing through possibilities in his mind.

“Is it possible to tamper with a Portkey’s destination?” Sirius asked.

“Not as such,” Dumbledore said. “I’ve heard that it’s possible to add an intermediate destination, but I’ve never seen it done. But the Cup did not leave my sight from the time I laid the _Portus_ to the time it was taken into the maze.”

“Who put the Cup in the maze?”

“Well, it was—” But Dumbledore was shocked when he turned to see an empty seat beside him.

Sirius and Dumbledore looked at each other in horror, and then turned their eyes back to the Map. Looking a bit further afield, they saw a lone figure running to reach the castle gates.

 _David Monroe_.

* * *

Harry and Cedric landed hard. Harry blinked once and didn’t need two seconds to assess his situation. “Buggering hell!” seemed to cover it.

They were not at the entrance to the maze.

They weren’t even at Hogwarts anymore.

The falling light had grown noticeably darker, and the air seemed warmer, which strongly suggested they had gone a long way southeast—well into England.

They were also standing in a graveyard.

Harry took in all these facts in the time it took him to say, “I knew it! I knew it! Someone tampered with the Portkey! Quick! Wands!” He dropped the handle of the Cup that Cedric was still holding to pull out his wand. Cedric drew his own as well.

It was then, that they heard a rich, melodic, and supremely _creepy_ woman’s laugh. It was low-pitched and seemed to have an accent to it. The laughter was echoed around the graveyard, and half a dozen or more robed figures stepped out of the shadows. All but one were wearing skull masks.

“Death Eaters,” he hissed.

And then, he heard a voice that he was already half expecting, but that made his blood run cold: a high, sibilant voice that he had rarely heard outside a nightmare: “Very astute, Potter…Kill the spare!”

Harry only had time to turn.

_“Avada—”_

_THUNK!_

“CEDRIC!” Harry screamed, but it was too late. Cedric looked down with wide eyes, as if he couldn’t believe what had happened, at the bone-white knife handle sticking out of his chest, before he collapsed to the ground.

* * *

Harry was tied to a headstone. When had that happened? The last thing he remembered was Cedric collapsing. Frantically, he looked around. Was there still time? But no, he saw Cedric lying outside the circle of robed figures, the knife still in his chest, bright red blossomed across his yellow robes, and his eyes still open. His wand was still sitting loosely in one hand and the Tetrawizard Cup in the other, making a mockery of what should have been his proudest moment.

How had the Portkey brought them here? He was still in the graveyard, but there were more Death Eaters than before—a couple dozen of them. Vaguely, Harry began to remember a burst of searing pain in his scar just after Cedric collapsed. He must have been knocked out for a few minutes. Now, they had him bound in ropes and pinned to the headstone by the scythe of the Angel of Death. Fitting. None of it would budge for his wandless magic. If he twisted his head far enough, he could just make out the name he already knew would be there.

 

TOM RIDDLE

 

“He’s awake, Voldemort.”

Harry’s head whirled around. Had someone just called Voldemort by his name _to his face?_ When he saw who it was, he knew it was the woman from his vision: tall, olive-skinned, with an accent from Latin America. She was also the woman who had thrown the knife—who had murdered Cedric—faster than a Death Eater had been able to cast—almost faster than even Harry’s Seeker eyes could follow.

She had been the one figure who was unmasked before, but she had changed her outfit in the few minutes he was out. She now sported an indigo shawl, a large, gilded collar, and a huge headdress made of green feathers.

“Ah, excellent,” the high, cold voice said. “So kind of you, Harry Potter, to join my rebirthing party. As you can see, I have been very busy preparing for it.”

And Harry was dead, he was sure of it. Almost perfectly protected for a year, and all for nought. Fourteen years old and barely old enough get a steady girlfriend, and he almost certainly wouldn’t live through the night. Even his animagus ability wouldn’t get him out of this one. It was hopeless with this many Death Eaters watching him. And strangely, all he could think of at the moment was that he wanted some damn answers already.

“This was your plan, then?” he said. “You went to all the trouble of entering me in the Tournament just to get me to touch a Portkey?”

“But you were so well-protected, Harry,” Voldemort said. Harry couldn’t see him at first, until he remembered that his current form was very small, and he spotted one of the Death Eaters carrying a bundle. An enormous snake was coiled around the same Death Eater’s feet. Harry could hear it hissing in unusually cogent Parseltongue. “Dumbledore was very thorough. This was the easiest way available,” Voldemort said. Suddenly, Harry heard a pop outside the circle. “Excellent. My most faithful servant has been able to return—the only one outside of Azkaban who did not hide from me, but was held against his will in his own home.”

“I have, Master,” the man’s voice sounded out of breath, but Harry’s blood somehow ran even colder when he realised he recognised it. “It was close. Dumbledore nearly caught me. Lupin had a Map that spotted when the Portkey activated.”

“But Dumbledore will not be able to track the Portkey?” Voldemort pressed.

“No, Master. Not without the physical object. He will know there was an intermediate destination, but not where.” The man stepped into the light, and Harry’s fears were confirmed.

He was David Monroe.

“You!” Harry shouted.

“ _Me_ , Potter,” Monroe said with a grin, but Harry soon saw that he wasn’t Monroe. He quickly drank a small phial of potion that must have been a Polyjuice antidote, and his appearance began to change. Within a minute, Harry was staring at a dead man.

“Barty Crouch Junior?!” he gasped, then coughed as the ropes were crushing him. “But—but that’s impossible!” he coughed again. “You showed up as David Monroe on the Map.”

The man grinned wider. “I see you’ve been doing your homework, Potter,” he said, “but Barty is more of a nickname these days. You see, I had my name legally changed in the muggle world—thanks to my lovely cousin, Artemis.” He walked up to a slim, female Death Eater, lifted her mask, and kissed her on the mouth.

“That will do, Barty,” Voldemort hissed while Harry tried not to gag. “We are ready to begin the ritual.”

Suddenly, everything fell into place. David Monroe had taken an interest in Harry from the start of the Tournament. As head of International Magical Cooperation, he had altered Harry’s records at Uluru in secret to enter him. He had offered him advice for each task, and he had scored him highly on the first two tasks. He’d fixed the whole thing from the start, but of course, it was never the _original_ David Monroe at all—not while he was at Hogwarts. It was the newly-renamed Barty Crouch Junior in disguise. Remus was right. He _was_ Hermione-smart—smart even to fool even the Marauder’s Map.

Crouch-Monroe moved to the middle of the circle, where Harry saw that the apparent Aztec priestess had taken her position beside an enormous cauldron. It was the largest cauldron Harry had ever seen, in fact. And yet, it was not a normal cauldron. It was an oblong boat shape about six feet long and three or four wide and deep. The shiny grey texture of its outer surface seemed familiar to Harry, and in the fading light, he thought he could see segments to it. He tilted his head as far as he could, and he gave a lurch when he saw it. The cauldron was made from the carapace of a Blast-Ended Skrewt.

“I hope you appreciate the work that went into this ritual, Harry,” Voldemort went on as the Aztec woman waved not a wand, but a black dagger with a white handle that seemed to work just as well for her.

The vault beneath Harry’s feet cracked open, and fragments of bone flew out and into the cauldron. The woman began chanting, _“Bone of the father, unknowingly given, you will renew your son!”_

“We had to dissolve a live unicorn whole in a vat of lye for this, and that was only the first step,” Voldemort boasted.

That was quite possibly the sickest thing Harry had ever heard in his life, and it didn’t help his stomach when the woman took Crouch-Monroe’s hand and sliced it off with her black knife in one stroke. He wondered if it would hurt the ritual if he threw up on the grave.

_“Flesh of the servant, willingly given, you will revive your master.”_

“And I shall have to thank Hagrid when I see him. He has again proved useful. His Skrewts make for excellent cauldrons.”

“It was even good enough for me to improve my ritual,” the woman said as she approached Harry while a smile as deadly-looking as her knife. Up close, Harry could see it was chipped, black stone with a bone handle, but longer than any stone knife he’d seen in a museum. “The Skrewt carapace will give Voldemort’s new body greater strength and resistance to fire.”

 _Is she kidding? She_ _’s making the bad guy_ more _bad?_ But Harry’s thoughts were interrupted when she stabbed the knife into the crook of his elbow and drew out a phial of his blood, which she poured into the cauldron. That was even worse that the other parts. Blood magic was nasty stuff.

_“Blood of the enemy, forcibly taken, you will resurrect your foe.”_

The potion inside the cauldron glowed a blinding white. The woman then began chanting in what Harry could only guess was Aztec, and the bundle in the Death Eater’s arms began to float. The swaddling fell away, revealing Voldemort himself, looking like a deformed, stillborn baby, and then, he dropped into the cauldron.

 _Please let her have messed up,_ Harry thought. _Please let her have messed up. Please let her have messed up._

But there was no mistake. A burst of red flames erupted from the cauldron, and within the flames was the outline of a man, tall and skeletal. As the flames died down, he became clearer: white, hairless skin, glowing red eyes, and no nose, but mere slits for nostrils. He raised a hand to one side and wandlessly summoned a robe. Then, he raised his other hand and wandlessly summoned a wand, and he seemed to float up and out of the cauldron to land almost delicately on his feet.

_Lord Voldemort had risen again._

“Ah, much better,” he hissed. His voice was less high, now, but no less sinister. “It has been thirteen long years since I have been able to feel my own skin, Harry,” he said. “Do you know what that feels like? The _pain_ of being ripped from one’s body, of surviving only by possessing the frail bodies of beasts? The agony when you forced me from Quirrell’s body?” Harry felt a shiver pass through him against his will. “Yes, you remember that, don’t you? You felt then a small fraction of the pain I felt for those thirteen years. But now, you see how futile your efforts to thwart me have been. I have returned—” He made a gesture, and red flames leapt up from the ground and licked their way over his body without harming him, and vanished just as quickly. “—more powerful than ever. Not even your mother’s sacrifice could stop me. Yes, I know about that, too. One of my rare miscalculations. I should have seen it before. But no matter. You wonder why I went to such lengths to acquire you for this party, but _you_ were the most important ingredient in the ritual. Thanks to your contribution… _I can touch you now_!”

Voldemort touched a finger to Harry’s scar, and this time, it was only Harry who felt the pain. He screamed, unable to help himself, while Voldemort _laughed_.

The Dark Lord stepped back, and Harry tried to recover his wits. _I can touch you now,_ indeed. He suddenly felt the need to vomit again, and, before he could think better of it, he spat, “If you’re gonna kill me, can you at least not be creepy about it?”

The Death Eaters gasped indignantly, but he immediately heard the Aztec woman burst out laughing. “ _El chico_ has _cojones_ ,” she said. “He’s tougher than he looks.”

“Enough!” Voldemort glared at him. “You must learn respect, Harry. Even now, at the end, it is important to have good form, is it not?”

Harry wasn’t about to give him the satisfaction. “Did your followers know you’re a half-blood?” he coughed.

_“Crucio!”_

Pain. There was no thought to it—no brainpower to spare to articulate it. He felt like he was on fire. The pain was crushing. He was sure, in some subconscious way, that he was dying. He actually _wanted_ to die in some equally subconscious way.

It was over. It was a _strange_ feeling when the curse stopped: a split second of rushing relief that seemed better than anything he had ever experienced just by comparison. But he barely even had time to register it before it gave way to numbness, and he barely had time to register _that_ before he realised that every muscle in his body was aching like he’d just been run over by a lorry. He was lying on the ground, panting for breath. Voldemort must have untied him. In retrospect, taunting the evil wizard was probably a bad idea.

“Stand, Harry,” Voldemort said, the false congeniality gone from his voice. “Clearly, you are untrainable—a typical Gryffindor, naturally. Your report has spread far this week, it is true, but _we_ know where true power lies, you and I. True power lies only with those who are strong enough to seek it.

“Nonetheless, you have shown great power and skill with magic, so I will grant you the dignity of dying as a proper wizard—wand against wand—a noble death, and a true proof of my strength—no luck nor sacrifice to save you this time, Harry. Look well, all of you,” he said to the Death Eaters. “Harry Potter is known for an accomplished duellist at Hogwarts, duelling two grades above his age—very impressive. But you will see now which of us is stronger. Go on, Harry, you know what to do. Summon your wand to yourself, and we will duel.”

Harry staggered to his feet. He rubbed his chafing wrists and briefly considered refusing, but he discarded the idea at once. A wand was better than no wand. He held out his hand and concentrated, and a few moments later, his wand flew into it.

“Most impressive. It is a fine wand,” Voldemort said. “A brother to my own, I believe. Unfortunately, that wand was lost. But I contracted a master wandmaker to make me a new wand just for this occasion. It has paid off very well. It is even better than my old one, I think. I’m _sure_ you will appreciate it.”

Harry had only seen Voldemort’s old wand once, when the Aurors retrieved it from where Pettigrew had hidden it in Salisbury, and he didn’t remember much about it. All he could see of his new wand was that it was intricately carved and seemed to have a skeletal finger as a handle. It _did_ seem to suit him, but Harry had more important things to worry about right now.

Voldemort bowed—slightly, not taking his eyes off Harry. Harry didn’t bow in return. Despite the still-smarting pain, he wouldn’t give him that satisfaction.

“Come, now, Harry. You have been taught your manners. The niceties must be observed…Bow to death.”

The Death Eaters laughed, but Harry still stood upright.

Voldemort scowled. “I said _bow_!” He jabbed his wand and Harry was bent double by a spell that was not the Imperius Curse at all, but instead physically pushed his body as if he were a puppet. “Very good,” Voldemort said mockingly. “This is a good death. There is no shame in this, a wizard’s death, a wizard who has done fine works. And now…we duel.”

Harry guessed that Voldemort’s first move would be another Unforgivable, or at least something he couldn’t block, so he tried to dodge. Unfortunately, Voldemort’s silent _Crucio_ was faster. Harry was writing on the ground again, screaming his lungs out.

When he came to his senses again, he ached worse than before. His throat felt sore and scratchy, and he was worried about being able to speak spells properly if this went on. When he forced himself to his feet, he found his sense of balance was off, too.

“That hurt, didn’t it,” Voldemort said. “You don’t want me to do that again, do you?”

Harry said nothing.

“Answer me,” he said softly.

Harry kept his mouth shut.

“I said answer me. _Imperio_!”

The Imperius Curse Harry could handle. It even felt good. His aches all but vanished. He felt a bit numb, perhaps, but he wasn’t in pain. But he had to resist the temptation to lie back into it and do what Voldemort said.

_Just answer no_ _…just answer no…_

But he didn’t. He’d resisted Moody’s Imperius curse on the first try better than most of his classmates ever could. He could do it to Voldemort, too.

_Just answer no_ _…just answer no…_

Combining the bliss of the Imperius Curse with a will as strong as Harry’s and an enemy he hated must have had a strange reverse effect because he forgot his earlier resolution not to taunt Voldemort again and said, “Go play with your snake, Tom!”

_“CRUCIO!”_

There was anger in his voice this time, not just cruel domination, but it didn’t feel any different to Harry. If he were capable of coherent thought at the moment, he might have reflected that his nervous system must be so saturated by pain that he couldn’t feel any more of it. When the curse was lifted, he had trouble standing. His arms and legs wouldn’t support him at first. He wasn’t sure he’d felt this bad since Uncle Vernon beat him when he was five.

How long had Neville’s parents been cursed that they couldn’t function day-to-day without advanced Alzheimer’s drugs? Voldermort couldn’t have been intending his “party” to go all night, could he? Dumbledore would know soon, if he didn’t already, that the Portkey had taken him. Could he hold out? Could he convince Voldemort to finish him off quickly instead?

Or could he escape—or fight back? Despite the certainly of death, Harry looked around the graveyard, hoping against hope for something he could use. Some small advantage…Then, he saw it: the Tetrawizard Cup, still lying in Cedric’s outstretched hand. Crouch-Monroe had said it had an intermediate destination on it. So if he touched it again, would it take him back to Hogwarts…he hoped. It was a long-shot. It might even be revealing the “power the Dark Lord knows not.” But it was the only chance he had.

“Defiant to the end, Harry? I had hoped—”

But Harry didn’t wait for him to finish that sentence. He changed to Ratsbane and ran straight for the Cup.

He heard a shout from Voldemort: “What?! No! Stop him!” And curses began to fly from the Death Eaters, but as a cat, his reflexes were on a hair trigger, and his pain tolerance was higher. With his greater magic sense, he could _feel_ the incoming curses and dodge them. He thanked God for those blindfolded duelling lessons Remus had given him and Hermione all those years ago.

But then, he heard a new sound: a roar, and just before he reached the Cup, a huge leopard jumped in front of him, baring its fangs. Or maybe it was a jaguar—oh, who cared? It was a bloody giant spotted cat that wanted to _eat_ him! The Aztec woman was an animagus.

He changed course instantly, running behind a headstone that put him out of the line of fire of most of the Death Eaters. But the jaguar bounded after him, growling. Ratsbane was alarmed to find that he could translate her growls in the common feline tongue, and he was even more alarmed when he figured out what she was saying.

_Come out, prey!_

Ratsbane ran flat-out, dodging and zigzagging to stay away from the jaguar, which his animal brain insisted was the greatest threat at the moment. His human brain tried to think of any strategy that might help. He had never been prey before, except perhaps with Greyback—certainly never prey to a beast with human intelligence. Jaguars and house cats were both ambush predators—not built for a long chase. The jaguar was faster, but he could tell—more from looking than from his academic knowledge—that she was heavily built, short-legged, and short-tailed, making her lumbering and less manoeuvrable from his smaller perspective. He managed to stay ahead of her by changing direction quicker than she could, at one point doubling back and running between her legs.

Her roars grew louder. She was getting frustrated. The Death Eaters and even Voldemort weren’t firing as many spells at them, presumably not wanting to hit the larger target, but Ratsbane knew he was one good paw-swipe away from death. He had to manoeuvre himself back to the Cup. He couldn’t hope to escape the jaguar any other way.

He darted back and forth a few more times before he spotted an opening. He zigged around a headstone tight enough to put it between him and the jaguar and the Cup right in front of him, and he went for broke running flat-out at it. The jaguar cleared the headstone and bounded after him. She was gaining on him. Wait! Was she turning aside? He kept running. He was nearly there—

In his rush, he never heard the final shout of _“Avada Kedavra!”_ from Voldemort, and he saw it coming only too late, when the green light filled his vision and left him sprawling lifeless on the grass.


	110. Heathrow Airport

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: At night, when Harry Potter lay down to sleep, he felt that his brain was resonating with the heartbeat of JK Rowling.
> 
> Parts of this chapter have been quoted from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

He lay face down. He seemed to be doing a lot of that tonight, but he knew at once he wasn’t lying on the rough ground of the graveyard. It was…well, it really felt more like glass than anything else, but it seemed too…abstract to be any real surface. There was no shouting or cursing around him, and the pain was gone, too, which was even better. He could _feel_ as much as hear that he was totally alone—almost blissfully alone for the first time in longer than he could remember.

He couldn’t quite make out where he was, though. There was no sound and no wind. He wasn’t even certain he was breathing, if it were possible. And yet, both the air and the surface he was lying on seemed to be a perfectly comfortable temperature.

It took him a little longer to realise that there was light seeping in through his eyelids, and this light was not the fading twilight and spellfire he had seen a minute or a lifetime ago, but a pure, white light, bright and even.

Harry opened his eyes and slowly pushed himself to a sitting position, and then to his feet. He was standing in what looked like a large, open concourse with rows of chairs and large, blank windows along the sides—if a concourse could be made entirely from a vague white mist and illuminated seemingly from everywhere at once. He himself seemed to be the only spot of colour in the place. He didn’t realise until he looked down at himself that he wasn’t wearing his glasses and yet could see perfectly. He was also naked.

He opened his mouth. His tongue stuck for a moment, and his voice creaked as if it had never been used before, but he picked it up quickly. “I’m naked,” he muttered to himself. “Why am I naked?”

It was a question uttered in confusion rather than concern, but nonetheless, the moment he said it, a coat rack appeared in front of him with a pure white robe hanging on it. He looked around, but saw nothing but more white from whence it could have come. Slowly, he reached out to pick it up and put it on. It somehow felt velvety and fluffy at the same time. It was easily the most comfortable thing he had ever worn.

“Okay, this is getting a little too Book of Revelation, here,” he said out loud. “Am I supposed to be alone? Isn’t there supposed to be a Pearly Gate or a Book of Life or something?”

“Those are at the _next_ infinite domain of pure whiteness.”

Harry spun around so fast he almost fell over. He was quite certain there had been no one there a minute ago. He instinctively snapped his fingers to draw his wand before he remembered he wasn’t carrying it. But then, he registered who was standing there.

A young man and woman faced him. They giggled at his reaction. They looked so _young_ in person, although he knew they were eternally twenty-one. They actually _weren_ _’t_ wearing white. The man was dressed in something like a fancier version of the Gryffindor school robes, and he also was conspicuously not wearing glasses. The woman was wearing the same emerald dress robes that Hermione had worn to the Yule Ball, which matched her eyes perfectly.

“Mum…? Dad…?” he whispered.

“Harry. Our wonderful, beautiful boy,” Lily Potter said, her eyes shining with tears.

And that was enough. Harry stumbled forward, nearly tripping over his feet to embrace the parents he remembered only from old photographs.

He didn’t know how long they stood there, holding him. He wasn’t even sure time meant anything in this place. All he knew was that as he stood in their embrace, he was gradually overcome by emotions he couldn’t properly name until he sank to the ground and sobbed into his mother’s robes like he was five years old again. For their part, James and Lily just patted him on the back and waited for him to cry it out.

“I’m sorry,” he choked out. “I’m sorry…I tried my best. I thought I could make it. I never wanted…” He couldn’t finish the sentence.

“Harry.” Lily whispered to him. She tipped his chin up so she could cup his face with her palm and look him in the eye. “You have already done more than any boy should ever be asked to. You fought with everything you had, and you never, ever gave up. Whatever you accomplished in your life doing that, we couldn’t be more proud of you.”

At that, Harry managed a small smile and hugged his parents again. It took a while, but he finally calmed down enough to take another look at his surroundings.

“So that’s it? I’m really dead, then?” he asked.

James opened his mouth, but he paused a moment in thought, and said, “Well, here’s the thing, son. This hasn’t happened to us before. If you were really dead like we are, we wouldn’t be meeting…here…wherever here is.”

Harry looked around again. The terminal—for that was what he was pretty sure it was—looked familiar to him. “Well…” he said, “it looks a lot like Heathrow Airport, except all white and ethereal and…heavenly.”

“Heathrow Airport?” James said in surprise.

“Told you,” Lily said smugly. “Looks like metaphors for spiritual crossroads have gone high-tech these days.”

“Alright, you got me, Lily. But the point is, since you’re here, in this…Limbo-place, we’re pretty sure you’re only _mostly_ dead.” He grinned. “There’s a big difference between mostly dead and all dead. Mostly dead is slightly alive. With all dead, well, with all dead there’s usually only one thing you can do.”

“Go through his clothes and look for loose change!” James and Harry finished in unison.

Harry laughed loudly, but he suddenly stopped. “Hey, wait a minute,” he said. “That movie didn’t come out till “87. How do _you_ know it?”

Then Lily laughed. “Silly,” she said, ruffling his hair, “we’ve spent most of the last thirteen years watching you.”

Harry stared in surprise. He’d always known, because Dan and Emma had told him, that James and Lily were “watching over him,” but somehow, he’d never taken it that literally. He started to wonder what else they had seen, but he quickly remembered the more important issue at hand: “But what do you mean? How can I be mostly dead? I got hit with the Killing Curse, didn’t I?”

James and Lily frowned and helped him to his feet. “Follow us,” James said. They led him a short way down the terminal, and James pointed to a bench. “Look under there,” he said.

Harry did and immediately recoiled. The _thing_ under the bench looked like the homunculus body Voldemort had inhabited before, but scarred, bloody, and more infantile in proportions. It twitched feebly as it struggled to breathe. “What is that?” he hissed.

“We’re pretty sure,” James replied, “that it’s a horcrux.”

“A horcrux?”

“Yes. Specifically, we think it was a horcrux that until now was bound to your scar, and the true reason for your connection with Voldemort.”

“My sc-scar?” Harry gasped. “I have—had—a horcrux in me? _That_ _’s_ what it was? Why? How? How do you know?”

“Harry,” Lily interrupted, “we’re not entirely sure. Being dead doesn’t make us omniscient. We only know for sure what we’ve heard people in the land of the living say.”

“Although we can peek in on Dumbledore whenever we want, so that’s still quite a bit,” James added.

“Dumbledore? _He_ knew about this?” Harry demanded.

Lily sighed. “Yes, Harry, Dumbledore knew. He suspected ever since he learnt you could speak Parseltongue. But we’ve talked it over, and we think you shouldn’t be too hard on him for it. He was trying so hard.”

“What do you mean?”

“That’s why he had Ambassador Grayson do those tests on you. He wanted to find a way to remove the horcrux before he told you. He didn’t want you to ever have to bear that burden. We don’t agree with him keeping you in the dark, but he really did do it for your sake. And at least now, your scar and your visions should never trouble you again.”

Harry thought about this, and he supposed he could understand it. If he’d had to go around knowing he was a horcrux it would have been even worse than all the other stuff he’d been through. “Okay, but I still don’t get it,” he said. “How was I a horcrux, and how am I not dead now?”

“Let’s come away from here,” Lily said. They led him away from the mutilated piece of soul to a lounge area where they could sit comfortably. “So you know that when I gave my life to protect you that night, it caused Voldemort’s Killing Curse to reflect off of you and strike him,” she said plainly.

Harry nodded, feeling a little awkward talking about it like this.

“Well, as near as we can figure out, Voldemort had already prepared the ritual to make a horcrux that night—”

“Or maybe his soul was just that unstable,” James cut it.

“Right. It could be that, too, but whatever the reason, the ritual completed, but it went wrong without the horcrux vessel on hand, and a piece of Voldemort’s soul broke off and attached itself to the nearest living thing, which was you. My protection kept it from corrupting or damaging you, but it was still able to hurt you some.”

“My headaches,” Harry said.

She nodded.

“Now, here’s where it gets fuzzy, Prongslet,” James said, becoming more animated. “You’ve got your mum’s protection in your blood. It’s why Voldemort couldn’t touch you before. But then, that crazy Aztec priestess _took_ your blood for her home-brewed ritual, and it sort of gave _him_ the protection, too, so you couldn’t hurt him.”

“Like a vaccine,” Lily clarified.

“Right. But I think, and this is just a guess, mind you, that when he hit you with the Killing Curse just now, your mum’s magic didn’t die with you like it would have otherwise. Part of it’s still in _him_ , and that part is keeping you alive.”

Harry screwed up his face. “That…that doesn’t make any sense,” he said.

James opened his mouth and closed it again. “It does seem to have lost the plot now that I say it out loud, doesn’t it? Hm, I don’t know, maybe it’s just that one Killing Curse equals one soul, and Death considers the books balanced. Or maybe it’s both. Or neither. Dumbledore could probably work it out if you ask him. Whatever it is, though, I wouldn’t count on it working again.”

Lily rolled her eyes at him. “What we’re trying to say, Harry, is that you’ve been given another chance. The horcrux has been purged from your soul, so you don’t have to worry about it anymore, but you wouldn’t have been brought _here_ unless you had a choice.”

“A choice?” he said. “You mean…you mean I could go _back_?”

“You haven’t fully crossed over yet. You can go back if you want to.”

Harry was stunned for a few moments. This wasn’t anything like he’d expected. “And…the other choice?” he asked for clarity.

“Well, you’re in an airport, aren’t you? If you wanted, you could…board a plane.”

“You mean…I could go with you?”

His parents both gave him a sad smile. “Yes, you could,” James said, “but you shouldn’t. You have too much to live for down there. You have a family who love you, great friends, an adorable little girlfriend, and a bright future ahead of you once this mess gets sorted out. And we’re doing fine here. We don’t need to see you for a good, long while yet. _And_ …be honest, now: would you really want to give up while Voldemort’s still out there?”

Harry thought of his family: his adoptive parents who had taken him in almost on a whim and never looked back, his sister who fought tooth and nail to protect her little brother no matter how much trouble he got into, Sirius and Remus who had rebuilt their lives for him. He thought of Luna, who had already suffered the loss of a parent herself, and Neville, Ron, Ginny, and the rest of his circle of friends at Hogwarts. He knew how devastated they would be if he didn’t come back, especially on top of Voldemort’s return. They couldn’t understand, most of them, if they ever even knew of his choice. And then, when he thought of all the death and destruction that Voldemort would visit on the world, he knew how absurd it was to think he do otherwise.

“I have to go back,” he said through his tears. “I can’t leave them all like this.”

“We knew you would, Prongslet,” James said. “Neither of us could have stayed away either if we had the choice.”

“We wish we could come back with you, but we know you’ll be in good hands,” Lily said. “We were hoping you could take some messages back from us, though.”

“Of course. Anything,” Harry said.

“Alright, then,” James said. “There’ll be a few of these for you to remember, so we’ll try to keep it simple.”

Harry smiled: “Trust me, Dad. I don’t think I’ll ever forget one word of this.”

They grinned back. “Well, then,” Lily began. “The first one has to be for Dan, Emma, and Hermione. Tell them…we can’t thank them enough for adopting you and giving you a home and supporting you all these years, knowing all along how hard it would be. We’re so happy that you found new parents and a sister who love you as much as we do, and we’re proud to call them part of our family.”

“I’ll…I’ll tell them,” Harry promised. He was sure they’d be overjoyed to hear that.

“Okay, now I have one for Padfoot and Moony, Prongslet,” James said seriously. “I want you to tell those two clowns to stop blaming themselves for the past. It was our choice to make Peter the Secret Keeper, so that was our mistake. And neither of them were in a condition to look after you afterwards through no fault of their own, so we don’t blame them for that either. Tell Moony we’re sorry for suspecting him, too. And tell both of them not to hold back in going after their own happiness, whatever form it might take.”

“I’m sure they’ll be glad to hear that…Prongs. Oh, and by the way, the name is Ratsbane.”

James laughed. “Too right it is. Youngest animagus this century. Ha! I don’t know how you did it, son, but it’s brilliant. Alright, Lily, that’s the family stuff. Did you have anything you wanted to tell Dumbledore?”

“Dumbledore?” she said thoughtfully. Harry new Dumbledore had quite a few things to answer for—the neglect in his early years, trying to use him in first year, and, apparently, still keeping him in the dark about some things. But she eventually decided, “Why don’t you just give him a good, hard smack in the back of the head from me?”

James and Harry both laughed, and Harry said, “Will do, Mum.”

“That’s my Lily,” James said proudly and kissed her on the cheek. “Alright, now, Harry, this is important. I have a message I want you to give to Luna.”

“Luna?”

“Yes. She’s your girlfriend, after all, and since she doesn’t get a chance to meet us properly, the least we can do is send her a message. I just want you to tell her that we approve of her. I think that’ll mean a lot to her.”

Harry was sure it would.

“Your father was still rooting for a redhead,” Lily said.

“Hey! The hair colour doesn’t really matter, Harry,” he insisted. “We can tell Luna is loyal, wicked smart, and a lot of laughs—in the best possible way. And tell her we hope she stands by you and helps keep your spirits up when times get tough.

“And as for _you_ , Harry, you’ve got yourself a great girl there. So however long this lasts with her, you treat her right. She needs help, too, so you be the support she needs for _her_ troubles. And don’t go and do anything stupid—like, you know, dumping her to try to protect her or something.”

Harry blushed. That _did_ sound like something he would do.

Lily, however, grew more solemn, now. “Okay, Harry,” she said, “those were the easy ones. The last two are going to be more difficult, I think—for both of us.” She took a deep breath. “And there are some things you should know first, so please let me explain. The first message is for Severus Snape.”

 _“Snape?”_ Snape hadn’t been _that_ bad the past year or two, and he knew the two of them had been friends once, but he couldn’t imagine she had anything to say to him now.

“Yes, Snape. You see, Sev and I first met when we were nine. We grew up in the same town, although he was from the “wrong side of the tracks.” His home life wasn’t good. He never wanted to talk about it, but I got the impression his father was almost as bad as your uncle.”

Harry’s eyebrows shot up. He couldn’t imaging Snape growing up like that. But then, he couldn’t imagine Snape as a child at all. Surely, he’d just emerged fully formed from the shadows in the dungeons or something.

“Petunia disapproved of him just because he was lower-class,” she went on, “and I think that was one of the reasons she wound up hating magic so much. Of course, the main reason was she was jealous.”

“Jealous?! Aunt Petunia?” Harry gasped. It was unfathomable. Even though he hadn’t seen his aunt for nine years, he couldn’t imagine her ever being anything but antagonistic to magic.

“Oh, it’s true,” his mother said. “I caught her writing to Professor Dumbledore right before I left for Hogwarts begging to be allowed to go, too, but of course, it was impossible, and she just couldn’t face it after that. I never imagined she’d get as bad as she did, though.”

“It’s alright, Mum,” he said, patting her on the arm. “So I knew you and Snape were friends, but—wait, Snape was raised muggle?”

She nodded. “He’s half-blood. Muggle father, witch mother.” She laughed a little. “He even called himself the Half-Blood Prince, after his mother’s maiden name—just between the two of us, you know. We were close for ages, but as he got older, he got deeper into the dark arts, and most of the people who practised those were elite purebloods, and I hated both. Eventually, I couldn’t make excuses for him anymore, and I had to part ways with him. But honestly, seeing him over the past thirteen years, I don’t think he ever fully got over it, and I hadn’t expected that. I won’t pretend he’s a great and noble person. He’s not. He could never get over himself enough to even _try_ to tolerate your father, even after James saved his life—”

“ _Especially_ after I saved his life,” James corrected.

“True, but the bottom line is, I do believe he deserves better than he got.”

Harry nodded, though he wondered what message his mother would be able to convey to someone she had such a complicated relationship with. “What did you want me to tell him?” he asked.

“Tell him…” She thought for a minute. “Tell him that I know there’s still good in him, and I’m sorry I didn’t see that before. Use the Half-Blood Prince name. I’m the only one who knew about it.”

Harry nodded.

“And I think…also tell him to quit living in the past,” she added. “Spending his life feeling sorry for himself doesn’t become him.”

“Mum!” he said in horror. “You _really_ want me to tell him that?”

“I think it would help him, yes…And tell him to get himself a girlfriend.”

“ _Mum!_ Are you _trying_ to get me killed again?”

She laughed, despite the morbid joke: “Okay, I was kidding about that last bit. But you might wish I weren’t when I tell you the last message.”

“Why? What do you mean?”

“I mean my last message will be the hardest for you. I know you never wanted to see her again, but I want you to find Petunia. See if you can get through to her. I think she’ll listen if you go to her. Remember, I’ve been watching her, too, so I hope you’ll do it for me.”

Harry knew he ought to accept. He knew the worst his aunt could do was throw him out of her house. But still, it was Aunt Petunia, and on some level, he’d never really confronted the idea of seeing her again. His tongue refused to obey at first, but he told himself he could do it for his mother. “O…okay, Mum,” he managed.

“Thank you, Harry. I want you to tell Tuney that she could have done better than Vernon.”

He raised an eyebrow. He wasn’t sure he believed that.

“That will prove it’s from me,” she explained. “I told her that several times before her wedding. She always felt overshadowed by me, even though I tried to include her in things as much as I could. Deep down, I think she never thought she was good enough or pretty enough to get anyone better than Vernon. I tried to tell her I still believed in her, but by then, she didn’t want to listen. If she’ll listen to you then, warn her about the danger. Voldemort could still go after her because of her connection with you. Warn her, and then tell her…that I never stopped wanting my sister back, and it’s still not too late for her to be a better person.”

Harry hugged his mother tight around the neck, at a loss for words. He could see now what people meant when they said she was one of the most kind-hearted witches they knew. He didn’t think he ever could have brought himself to say all that on his own.

“We’re so proud of you, Harry,” she said.

“I’ll say,” James agreed. “You’ve done some amazing things. You taught yourself wandless magic, you’ve written three books, and you invented a new sport. Not many wizards can claim that.”

Lily rolled her eyes. “Yes, James, but more importantly, you’ve done so much good in the world, and not just fighting Voldemort or even working for equality in the Wizengamot. You’ve stood up for your sister, you stood up for Luna when you first met her, for Colin and Demelza this year, even for Dobby when he was only causing you trouble. And then, when you helped Neville’s parents…we couldn’t believe it. That was a real miracle, and even we didn’t see it coming.”

Harry smiled: “I was just trying to do the right thing.”

“We know, son,” James said. “You have your mother’s heart. Don’t ever lose that. Your friends and family are the most important people to have by your side. Not that facing Voldemort three times wasn’t great work, too, but we really wish you didn’t have to get involved.”

“Me too, but trouble always seems to find me anyway.”

“Yes, we’ve noticed. Although taunting him like that was pretty stupid. Awesome, but stupid.”

“Yeah. I got that.” He sighed: “It’s gonna be harder now, isn’t it?”

“Oh, yes. _Much_ harder.”

“But I still need to go back, don’t I?”

Lily stroked his cheek again. “Harry, even with all this trouble, you still have a chance to live a long, happy life. You shouldn’t give that up. You’ll have your friends at your side, and we _know_ they’ll do better with you than without you. And Voldemort isn’t invincible, no matter how powerful he is.” She looked back to where the soul fragment was lying under the bench. _But know this, Harry, that you have less to fear from returning here than he does_.”

Harry hugged her tighter and hid his face in her shoulder as he thought he might start crying again. “Is it bad that I don’t want to go?” he said.

“No, it’s not,” she assured him. “But we also know you won’t stay. It’s who you are…Somewhere there’s danger, somewhere there’s injustice, somewhere else the tea’s getting cold. Come on, Harry. You’ve got work to do.”

His eyes snapped up to meet hers. “You’re a fan,” he whispered.

She grinned at him: “All the way back to William Hartnell.”

“Oh, she’s a fan, alright,” James agreed. “She even got _me_ into it when Tom Baker was on. _Plus_ , your mother has been petitioning the Boss to tell the BBC to make more _Doctor Who_ for the past five years.”

Harry’s eyes widened: “And by “the Boss,” you mean…God?”

Lily giggled. “He doesn’t normally tell us a whole lot of His plans, but we’ve heard a few rumours. I do know the BBC’s in talks for a television movie, and it looks like it’s actually going somewhere.”

“Well, I _have_ to go back for that, don’t I?” Harry said.

“That’s the spirit!” James said. “Now, there’s one other thing you need to know before you go back. You saw that big snake Voldemort had slithering around?”

“Yeah.”

“It’s another horcrux.”

“Oh, no. It is?”

“Yes. It was originally just a meadow viper with a bunch of scary dark rituals on it, but he turned it into a horcrux the same night you had that vision. And since snakes aren’t sentient, it acts with his will. It’s basically equivalent to him possessing it. You’ll need to tell Dumbledore.”

“So it’s Voldemort in scary snake form. Got it. Say, do you know what the power the Dark Lord knows not is, by any chance?”

“Afraid not, but we doubt it’s the animagus thing. It’s too bad you had to give that away, but we don’t think it was _the_ power. It may sound daft, but we think Dumbledore probably isn’t far off with his ‘love’ idea.”

“Seriously?”

“Don’t act so surprised. I told you how important it was to have your friends by your side. That makes all the difference. We know. Voldemort has allies, but no one who truly _likes_ him—except maybe Bellatrix Lestrange.”

“Well, I guess…but there’s one other problem,” he realised. “I’ve been gone a long time. Hasn’t Voldemort burnt me to a crisp or something by now?”

His parents chuckled. “No need to worry about that, son,” Lily said. “Time is immaterial here. Come, look.” She waved her hand, and a portal appeared in the air, the dark scene on the other side marring the perfect whiteness. The first thing he saw was Cedric lying on the ground, the Triwizard Cup in his hand. A few feet away, much closer than he realised, he saw himself, his feline body stretched out. The Aztec woman was stooped over him, human again, presumably determining whether he was dead, but she was frozen in place. No time was passing in the image.

“You were right about the Cup, Harry,” she said. “It will take you back to Hogwarts. You’re very close. Two good bounds will get you there. If you’re fast, they won’t have time to react.”

Harry leaned towards the portal and examined the scene carefully. It was strange to look down on himself like that and stranger still to see himself in cat form. But he really was close. One half-leap to find his feet, and he’d be only one good pounce away from grabbing the Cup. Suddenly, his prospects seemed much better. “Yeah, I can do that.”

“Good. Oh, but wait a moment,” Lily said. “I think we have another soul coming through.”

To Harry’s amazement, a ghostly image of Cedric rose up from his body and stepped through the portal to join them with a solemn expression on his face. He looked around to make sense of what had happened to him.

“Cedric,” Harry gasped, “I’m so sorry. I never meant—”

“It’s okay, Harry,” he stopped him. “It was my choice to fight with you. I just never imagined we’d run into someone that _fast_.”

“I’m sorry. I had no idea. I knew it might be bad, but I had no idea it would _that_ bad.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” he insisted. “I died for what I believed in—and for someone who had done a lot of good for me and mine.”

“I never wanted anyone to die for me.”

“We did it so you could live a happier life, Harry,” Lily said softly. “And we know you would have done the same for any of us whether we liked it or not. It is enough.”

A disembodied voice sounded, crisp but unidentifiable, over what might have been the airport’s public address system. “Flight Aleph-Null to the Other Side now boarding. Flight Aleph-Null now boarding, all seats.”

James and Lily smiled sadly. “Well, that’s our flight, Harry,” James said. “Yours, too, Cedric; come with us.”

They walked slowly to the entrance to a skybridge that began glowing a brighter white than the rest of the “airport.” Cedric seemed to understand automatically what it meant, even though Harry doubted he’d ever been in an airport. Or maybe he didn’t even see it as an airport. But he turned back to him for a moment and said, “Tell my parents I love them, will you, Harry? And tell Cho I wish we could have had more time together.”

“Of course. I will,” he said.

There was a lot more Cedric could have said, he was sure. Harry knew he could have given him as many messages as his parents had—to tell his parents they should be proud of him for fighting for what he believed in and that he hoped they would do the same. To tell Cho to keep going and live her life to the fullest. To ask Harry to watch over Colin and Demelza and tell them not to give up on his account. But one look at his face said it all. He trusted Harry to take care of things.

 _“Tell me one last thing,” said Harry_ , overcome by a sudden doubt. It seemed absurd to ask after all this, but he needed to know for sure. _“Is this real? Or has this been happening inside my head?”_

James laughed. “Of course, it’s real, Harry. But if you need proof, I know a secret about Hogwarts that you couldn’t possibly know and can verify when you get back. If you go to the seventh floor, across from the tapestry of the dancing trolls, there’s a vanishing room that can turn into lots of different things. Right now, it’s mostly used by the elves for storage, but it looks like it can be anything.”

“Cool,” Harry said. “How do I get in?”

“Well, that’s the hard part,” James said. “I’m not quite sure how it works. But I’ve been watching, and I’ve noticed that the elves always walk back and forth down that corridor three times before the door appears.”

“Alright, I’ll remember.”

“Goodbye, Harry,” Lily said. “Remember, we’ll be watching you. Always.” The three of them stepped into the portal of light and vanished.

When they had gone, Harry was alone again. He turned to see the scene before him back in the land of the living. He took a deep breath and stepped through the portal.

* * *

He was lying face-down on the ground again—the real ground this time. The smells of the real world bombarded his feline nostrils.

“Is he dead?” Voldemort’s voice said.

It was a grating thing to hear as the very first thing when he came back, but Harry knew he didn’t have time to reflect. On instinct, he kicked with his hind legs and propelled himself forward. He had just enough time to hear Voldemort shout “NO!” and the women scream the first half of a spell before his front paws landed on the Portkey, and he felt the now-familiar tug whisk him away.

* * *

A great unease had fallen over Hogwarts. After the audience lost its view of the champions, thing had gone from bad to worse as two of them were hauled out of the maze unconscious after a brutal dual with each other, and the other two (according to the whispers circulating the stadium) vanished into thin air, and they took a turn for the surreal when Headmaster Dumbledore, Professor Lupin, and Sirius Black chased David Monroe off the grounds.

“Come now, Albus,” Fudge demanded. “What was all that about?”

Not all that much time had passed, so Fudge wasn’t too worried—yet, but Dumbledore clearly was. The old wizard was busy casting spells to try to lay extra protections on the audience and find out what happened to the other two champions, even though the latter was probably futile. Most of the audience probably thought they were still just watching the task, but the Ministry officials were on high alert.

“I told you, Cornelius,” Dumbledore said, “I have reason to believe Mr. Monroe was being controlled by an outside force. I now believe he was almost certainly the one who entered Harry in the Tournament.”

“But who, Albus?” the Minister demanded. “Who could have controlled him?”

Dumbledore didn’t get a chance to answer because loud screams rang out through the stadium. They turned and at once saw why. Cedric Diggory was back, lying at the entrance to the maze with a knife in his chest and his robes soaked in blood.

At first, it seemed he was alone, but then, a small, black cat let go of the Tetrawizard Cup and ran towards Dumbledore. A few steps later, and the cat somehow turned into Harry Potter! As he staggered to his feet, the crowd shouted louder, but he screamed over the din. “PROFESSOR! IT WAS VOLDEMORT!” Half the audience screamed in fear. “HE’S BACK!”


	111. He's Back!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: New Harry Potters will soon be discovered by the JK Rowling Space Telescope…er, or something like that.

The pitch was in chaos with screams and sounds of running footsteps filling the air around him as Harry’s family climbed down to try to find out what had happened to him. He was clearly hurt, having trouble walking and having cuts and scrapes all over, and as soon as they reached him, he collapsed into his sister’s arms. Harry held onto Hermione so tight he worried he might be hurting her, but the world was spinning around him, and blackness was creeping into the edges of his vision, and he felt that he would faint if he let go.

Dumbledore was at their side at once. “Harry! Harry, please look at me,” he said. Harry struggled to look up as his parents—his _other_ parents took him and tried to support his weight. He felt a gentle probing of Legilimency from Dumbledore, and he didn’t resist. He was far too spent to resist anyway or even think straight. He was pretty sure Dumbledore only got flashes of images from him, but it was apparently enough.

“Dumbledore! My God, Dumbledore, what happened?” a voice yelled behind the Headmaster. It was Minister Fudge. “Diggory lying there—! And Potter—he can’t…he can’t have meant…”

“I am certain Harry would not be mistaken about this, Cornelius,” Dumbledore said. “He will need to be taken to the Infirmary at once. Thank you, Mr. Granger. I will take him from here. _Mobilicorpus_.”

Harry felt himself floating on a cushion of air, with no strength left to move on his own, but it was something approaching comfortable, and the world stopped spinning so much as Dumbledore rushed him to the castle with his family hurrying behind him, so he supposed that was an improvement.

It wasn’t until he was laid in a hospital bed that he fully registered that he had changed back to human, despite his shouting at the audience. He hadn’t really thought before untransforming and giving away his ability, but his enemy knew now, so it really didn’t matter.

Madam Pomfrey, naturally, was all over him at once shooing his family back far enough that they wouldn’t disturb her and trying to diagnose what had happened to him _this_ time. She had been by the maze in case any of the champions had been hurt, so she had heard Harry’s shouted warning and knew it would be bad, but it was anyone’s guess how bad. Shaken as she was, she tried to stay professional. “What did he do to you, Mr. Potter?” she asked.

“Un…Unforgiveables,” Harry coughed. The aches were coming back worse than ever, aggravated by fatigue and his falling adrenaline levels. It seemed dying hadn’t helped matters.

“My God, Cruciatus?” she said, reaching for a potion.

Harry shook his head slightly and winced. “All—all three,” he said.

“WHAT?!” his family gasped. Even Dumbledore looked shocked.

“You mean…the—the K-Killing Curse?” Sirius said.

“Again?” Remus clarified.

Harry tried to force a smile: “I don’t want to go on the cart.”

“Oh, Harry!” Hermione broke down and tried to hug him, but Madam Pomfrey pushed her back to feed him some potions.

“You’ll need nerve repair, Mr. Potter,” she said. “This one works on peripheral nerves, but it’s slow because it’s a very dark curse. It only works at all because nerve damage is a side effect and not the intended effect. Go on. That’s it.” Dumbledore stepped towards the bed, but she waved him back, too. “Albus, he needs to rest while the potion works,” she said. “If you’ve got something to ask him that can’t wait a few hours, do it now, and make it quick.”

“Very well, Poppy. Harry, do you know where the Portkey took you?”

“A…a g-graveyard,” he said. “It had…it had his father’s grave in it.”

“Little Hangleton, then, though I doubt he’ll have stayed there. I assume he came back fully to life? A new, _human_ body.”

“Yes…maybe…looked like he was half-snake, but close to human.”

“Close enough. Did you see _how_ he did it, Harry?”

“A ritual. That woman—the foreign woman from my vision—she’s some kind of…like, Aztec priestess. She did the ritual. She…she killed a unicorn to do it—” He swooned dizzily. “She took my blood—”

“She took your blood for the ritual?” Dumbledore said urgently.

“Yeah. Oh, and she did something to make Voldemort immune to fire or something like that.” He stopped and went into a coughing fit. Madam Pomfrey helped him with a glass of water.

“Immune to fire?!” Sirius said. “As if he wasn’t bad enough before!”

Dumbledore filed these bits of information for later. “I’m nearly done, Harry,” he assured him. “Did you see any Death Eaters? And how many did you see?”

“A…a couple dozen, I think. They were already there.”

“Then Voldemort is already rebuilding his forces,” he said to himself. “That isn’t good.”

“Then it’s a good thing we’ve already restarted the Order, too, Albus,” Remus said.

“Yes, it should be. But if David Monroe can betray us, I don’t know who we can trust anymore.”

“Wasn’t Monroe,” Harry rasped, pushing Madam Pomfrey’s hand away again.

Dumbledore turned back to him. “What did you say?”

“It wasn’t David Monroe.” He tried to push himself up, but failed. “Oof—It was Barty Crouch Junior! Like we thought. He was using Polyjuice.”

“No. That’s impossible,” Remus said. “He showed up as David Monroe on the Map.”

“He had his name legally changed in the muggle world,” Harry said. “He told me the whole story. He’s been getting in all year that way.”

Sirius and Remus stared at each other in horror. Even the Marauder’s Map couldn’t be trusted now? What would they do? While they and Dumbledore digested this, Madam Pomfrey gave him a final potion.

“That’s enough, Mr. Potter. You need to rest. Drink this. Dreamless Sleep. They can sort the rest out when you wake.”

Harry drank the potion and sank almost instantly into blissful oblivion.

* * *

When he next woke, he was feeling markedly better—this despite the fact that he still felt like he was getting over a bad case of the flu—he had awful aches all over, and he had a whanging headache. But for the first time in a long time, it at least wasn’t localised in his scar. With the horcrux gone, he felt lighter in a way he had never noticed feeling weighed down before.

He also noticed he was in cat form again. That was a little worrying. He hadn’t changed form in his sleep since the Catnip Incident when he was seven. But he felt more rested that way. As Sirius had learnt in Azkaban and he had learnt as a child, lying down and letting the animal take over for a while did wonders under the right circumstances. He blinked slowly, stretched his sore limbs, and meowed, which brought Madam Pomfrey to his side. She shook her head at him. “I still can’t believe it. Younger than your father. Could you change back, please, Mr. Potter? I need to check you over, and I’m a Mediwitch, not a veterinarian.”

With practised skill, Harry rolled over and untransformed so that he was lying on his back. Madam Pomfrey waved her wand over him. “How are you feeling now?”

“I don’t feel like I’m gonna die anymore,” Harry said. “Is that good?”

“I should hope so. The Dreamless Sleep didn’t last half as long as it normally would. That’ll be the aftereffects of the Cruciatus Curse, I’m afraid. Hm, you look well enough to be awake for now, but you may regret that in a few minutes. You have a crowd of people waiting to talk to you, and I have a bad feeling they aren’t going to take no for an answer.” She scowled. “I heard talk of a warrant.”

Harry groaned. “You might as well send them in. I’m gonna have to tell them sooner or later.”

Pomfrey sighed. “Alright, then, but drink these first.” She placed some more potions on the bedside table. “And give me a holler if it gets to be too much for you. You’re going to need a _lot_ more recovery than this.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Harry looked around as she went to the door. It was nearly dark outside. He could guess it was around midnight. Hogwarts was so far north it never got fully dark in June, so that was the only time it could be. He doubted anyone else would be sleeping tonight.

The Infirmary door opened, and Harry heard arguing voices at once.

“You didn’t have to get out of bed for this, Amelia.” That was Minister Fudge, he was sure.

“Who says I was in bed? I was listening to the task on the Wireless, and the minute I heard You-Know-Who’s name, I came out here to investigate for myself.”

“The boy was tortured,” Fudge said. “Terribly tragic, but you can’t be sure of anything that comes out of his addled mind.”

“I think you will find that Harry’s mind is quite keen, Cornelius, even under such strain.” That was Dumbledore.

“And besides, Albus has been warning me of the danger for the past year,” Amelia Bones added. “It’s only right that I look into this for myself. Now, Ambassador Grayson, what is your interest in this case?”

“If Mr. Potter will confirm a few facts, I believe I can identify the knife that killed the Diggory boy,” the Australian wizard said.

“Oh?” Bones sounded surprised. “Very well; come on, then.”

“Harry’s not going to like being mobbed like this,” his mum’s—Emma’s—voice said. Boy, that was going to be confusing for a while. “Can’t we go easier on him? He needs to rest.”

“If it becomes necessary, Mrs. Granger,” Dumbledore said. “However, it is still important that we get the full story from him as soon as we can. If he is feeling up to it now, he will be able to recover more smoothly later.” He approached the bed and said, “Harry, it is good to see you are awake. We _are_ sorry to disturb your rest, but—”

“I heard, Professor,” he answered.

“Of course.” He waved his wand and conjured eight chairs in a circle around Harry’s bed—far more visitors than Madam Pomfrey would normally allow at one time. On one side sat Dan, Emma, Hermione, and Sirius—his legal family—and on the other sat Dumbledore, Fudge, Madam Bones, and Professor Grayson. Fawkes rode on Dumbledore’s shoulder, warbling softly.

“How are you doing, son?” Dan asked.

“I’ve been better,” he said.

“Lord Potter,” Bones said. “I assume no introductions are necessary?”

He shook his head. “No, ma’am.”

“Good. Now, you say that when you were taken by the Portkey, you saw You-Know-Who return come back to life?”

“Yes, I did,” Harry said. “He’s back.”

“Preposterous!” Fudge jumped in. “You-Know-Who returned? It’s impossible! He’s dead!”

“He’s not dead, Minister. I _saw_ him!” Harry snapped.

To his astonishment, Fudge actually smiled a little. “Now, I know you’ve been through a lot, Lord Potter,” he said, “and perhaps you _believe_ you saw someone—”

“It was him! I ought to know! He _Crucioed_ me three bloody times!” He tried to push himself up a little, but his arms gave out, and he slumped down. He was shaking again.

“We should leave this till morning, Headmaster,” Emma insisted.

“Pardon me, Mrs. Granger,” Fudge said in what was probably supposed to be a friendly voice, “but we really do need to take care of this. Your son has already gone and incited a panic—”

“I told the truth!” Harry snapped.

“Harry, Cornelius, please calm yourselves,” Dumbledore said, and Fawkes let out a few long, soothing notes. Harry felt relaxed on hearing them, and a bit more of the tension came out of his muscles.

“Minister Fudge,” Grayson spoke up. “If Mr. Potter will cooperate, I believe I can make a positive identification of one of the people involved in tonight’s events. Would that be enough evidence for you?”

“You can, Ambassador?” Fudge said in surprise. “Well, I’d…I’d certainly consider it. Alright, then. Let’s see.”

Grayson showed one of his hands. Above it floated an all-too-familiar stone knife. Harry shuddered when he saw it. Seeing his distress, Hermione decided to act. Knowing his secret had been outed, she moved from her seat to the edge of his bed and reached down to scratch him behind his ears. Fudge looked bemused by the action, but the other adults seemed to recognise it. Dumbledore chuckled slightly, and Madam Bones cracked a small smile. Harry tried to push himself up and closer to his sister again, but without much success.

“Harry, just rest,” Emma said.

“I’ve got it, Mum,” Hermione told her. She raised her other hand and wandlessly summoned two pillows from neighbouring beds, which she used to prop Harry up into a reclining position.

Harry could see the group properly, now, though he was confused by Grayson’s “evidence.” Voldemort wasn’t the one with the knife. How did that help? But Grayson spoke again: “Mr. Potter, I suspect you know that this is the knife that was found to have killed Mr. Diggory.”

Harry nodded weakly, fighting back tears.

“Can you describe the person who did it to me?”

He nodded again. “Sh-she was a—Latin American—I guess Mexican woman,” he said. “Tall…black hair…er, middle-aged, I think. She was a…she was dressed like an Aztec priestess or something—big crown of green feathers and everything.

“That’s closer to the Aztec royal garb, I think, but it’s not important. Did you happen to see her wand?”

“Her…no, she didn’t use a wand…she was casting spells with a knife—like that one, but bigger.”

“I thought so. You see the handle here?” he said to the group. The knife’s blade was black, but the handle was bone-white. “That’s dragon bone. She uses it in place of a wand. Did you notice anything else unusual about her, Mr. Potter?”

Grayson clearly knew who the woman was, but Harry told him the last bit just to be sure. “Yes. She was an animagus, too. She turned into a—well, a big cat. I’m pretty sure she was a jaguar.”

“You were attacked by a jaguar, too?” Hermione gasped.

“Yeah. She, uh, she was a natural hunter…It was close.”

“Well, that settles it, Minister,” Grayson said. “This knife belongs to a woman named Meztli Ocelotl, but she is better known as La Pantera—the Jaguar—and the Dark Lady of Veracruz. She’s known to the ICW, but they haven’t taken action against her because she rarely operates outside of Mexico. She fancies herself the one true successor to the Old Ways of Aztec magic, and she’s no stranger to human sacrifice and other dark rituals—even inventing new rituals. It wouldn’t surprise me if she were capable of bringing your Lord Voldemort back from the dead.”

Madam Bones was frantically scribbling notes, but Fudge, though he was starting to sweat, was still in denial. “Fine, Ambassador, but just because some foreign dark witch is skulking around here doesn’t mean that You-Know-Who is back.”

“That doesn’t much matter—” Grayson said.

“What? What do you mean, it doesn’t matter? Of course it matters!”

“No, it _doesn_ _’t_ matter, Minister, because she’s as bad as he is!”

At this point, Sirius fell out of his seat. The Grangers gasped. Even Harry was shocked. He could tell that the woman was bad news, but everyone in Britain talked like Voldemort was the most evil wizard of all time, except maybe Grindelwald. The thought that he had escaped not just one, but two of the most dangerous magic users in the world was overwhelming.

A very shaken Amelia Bones looked at him and said, “Lord Potter, I really think we need to hear the full story.”

“I…I don’t…” Harry stammered.

“You don’t have to do it now, Harry,” Emma whispered to him.

“Mrs. Granger, if it is truly necessary, it can wait,” Dumbledore said, “but not for long, I fear. Harry, you have shown great bravery already in facing what you faced tonight. And if I could ease your emotional pain by letting you sleep through it like Madam Pomfrey has for the physical, I would do so. But it would only delay the inevitable, and in the meantime, we must know the truth, and matters have grown urgent. So I must ask you to be brave one more time and tell us exactly what happened from the moment the projection cut out in the maze.

“And Cornelius,” he added warningly, “I am sure this will be very difficult for Harry, so I must ask you to listen patiently and withhold your judgement until he is finished.”

“Oh, alright, then, Albus,” he grumbled, though he looked paler than before. “So, Lord Potter, tell us what happened.”

Harry still wasn’t sure he wanted to do it, but at that moment, Fawkes flapped over to perch on his headboard and sang again, this time a warm, uplifting song, which seemed to strengthen him. And so, with a deep breath, he began to speak. He told them of the duel he had broken up between Viktor and Fleur and his suspicion that Viktor had been Imperiused. He told them how Cedric had saved him from an acromantula and decided that they should take the Cup together despite Harry’s warning. He told them how fast that La Pantera woman could throw a knife.

When he got to the part about the ritual itself, Dumbledore stopped him. “All of us here know Occlumency,” he said. “Minister, I believe you at least know the basics. I won’t ask for a Vow, but I think we should all agree that the details of this ritual should not leave this room.”

They all agreed quickly, albeit with much eye-rolling from Fudge. Harry described each element of the ritual in as much detail as he could remember, since exacting details were very important for such things. Everyone who knew advanced magic gagged when he said how La Pantera had allegedly killed a unicorn to begin the ritual—one of the most heinous acts there was in the magical world. They gagged again when he described the Death Eater formerly known as Barty Crouch Junior sacrificing a hand.

“Do you know what happened to Monroe, Professor?” he asked when he got to that part. “The original Monroe, I mean?”

“Aurors are searching for him as we speak, Harry,” Dumbledore said. “I have hope that we will find him alive. I suspect that Voldemort did not wish for his return to be announced so publicly, so he would have made plans for Director Monroe to return to work unnoticed.”

“Albus!” Fudge protested. “Barty Crouch Jr can’t be alive. He died in Azkaban twelve years ago!”

“I’m telling you, I saw him!” Harry said.

“We were already considering the possibility that he was alive and involved, Cornelius,” Dumbledore said. “Last summer, Harry experienced a vision of Voldemort involving Barty Crouch’s house elf.”

“Visions, now?! As if this whole thing weren’t mad enough!”

“ _Ahem,_ that does raise the question, Lord Potter,” Bones said, “if it _was_ Crouch Jr, as you say, how could he have escaped from Azkaban?”

“Er…well, Voldemort did say something about him being a prisoner in his own home. I don’t really know.”

“In his own home? You think Barty _Senior_ was involved?” Fudge said. “He was the most upstanding citizen—”

“Excuse me,” Sirius interrupted. “He threw me in prison without a trial!”

“We must consider the possibility, Cornelius,” Dumbledore agreed. “Think. You and Barty Crouch Sr were fellow Department Heads at the time. Did you ever talk? Do you remember anything unusual about the circumstances of his son’s death?”

“No, there was nothing…nothing except…well, the timing was a little odd, I suppose, but that doesn’t have to mean anything.”

“Odd how?” Dumbledore pressed.

“It’s just, I remember when old Barty’s son died. It was the night after the last time he and his wife visited him. But like I said, it doesn’t mean anything. He probably just had the Aurors notify him when Junior was on his deathbed.”

“Was it within twelve hours of the visit?”

“Twelve hours? Er, I suppose it was. Why?”

Something clicked in Bones’s mind: “Twelve hours is the maximum time that Polyjuice Potion lasts. And it doesn’t revert after death. The Director of Magical Law Enforcement replacing a prisoner with someone under Polyjuice? It would definitely be within his means. And was Old Barty’s wife ever seen in public after that? I know she was terminally ill herself and died soon after.”

“Amelia, do you hear what you’re saying? Old straight and narrow Barty Crouch replacing his son with his own wife in Azkaban?”

But before she could answer, Harry spoke up: “He must have done, Minister. I saw him there in the graveyard. And Artemis Crouch was there, too. She was one of the werewolves who attacked Hogwarts last year.”

“And Barty Junior’s estranged cousin,” Sirius pointed out.

“Not so estranged anymore. I saw them snogging,” Harry said.

“Eww!”

“But Artemis Crouch is dead…dead in…Azkaban…” Fudge said uneasily.

“Could they have used the same trick?” asked Harry. “Is there someone missing they could have replaced her with?”

“Bertha Jorkins still hasn’t been found,” Bones said, growing pale.

Sirius groaned: “The same Bertha Jorkins who knew all about the Tournament when it was being planned?”

At that point, Madam Bones let out several muttered curses and quickly considered her options. “Any magical evidence on the bodies will be long gone by now, but I’ll definitely be adding some new security measures at Azkaban,” she said. “If we’re lucky, we’ll at least find the real Monroe alive, and he’ll be able to confirm something. Please continue, Lord Potter,” she said before Fudge could interrupt.

Harry started again. The wizards paled when Harry said that La Pantera took his blood for the ritual, and his claim that using a Skrewt carapace as a cauldron made Voldemort resistant to fire must have seemed just plain overkill to them. In any case, he went on to describe the “duel” to them, not omitting the parts where he taunted Voldemort to his face.

“Harry, you’re an idiot,” Hermione said.

“Yeah, I know. In my defence, I wasn’t expecting to get out of there alive.”

Sirius laughed, but even he was properly uneasy. Dumbledore just sighed with resignation. Madam Bones looked torn between berating him and admiring him.

“Ill-advised swan songs aside,” Bones said, “how _did_ you get out alive?”

“I sort of didn’t, ma’am.” He described how he got away only to be chased by La Pantera in Jaguar form as he tried to get back to the Cup. “I was almost there, but I wasn’t fast enough. Voldemort hit me with the Killing Curse.”

He stopped and gauged the reactions from the room. His family was tense, listening with rapt attention. Dumbledore looked anticipatory. Even Fudge seemed conflicted—torn between not wanting to believe it and being caught up in the drama of the story. It looked like the Killing Curse was a step too far for him, though.

“The Killing Curse?” he said. “Again? Don’t be ridiculous! Even you couldn’t…” he trailed off at the sight of Dumbledore’s harsh gaze. “So what happened next, if you died?”

“I got better,” Harry said.

“You got _better?_ You can’t just say you got better! You all see how ridiculous this is, Albus? How could he have survived it _again_ if it really happened?”

“Minister, what happened in that moment…” Harry looked up at his family. “…is private. Not something you need to know. Suffice it to say, I got better, took a flying leap before Voldemort could react, and landed on the Cup. It pulled Cedric and me back to Hogwarts, and the rest you know.”

“Thank you, Lord Potter,” Bones said. “That is very helpful. Minister, we’ll need to take action at once.”

“Oh, come now, you don’t seriously believe this, do you, Amelia?”

“It sounds pretty convincing to me, Cornelius. Harry Potter has no reason to lie. _Someone_ has been manipulating the events all year. We have the physical evidence of the knife. And even if it _is_ somehow just this La Pantera woman, it sounds like we still have a very large problem.”

“You know of the activities that have gone on this past year,” Dumbledore reminded him. “The terror at the World Cup. Rumours of Death Eater activity around the country. You saw yourself how David Monroe, one of the most anti-Death Eater wizards in the country, was either controlled or now, it seems, impersonated. You cannot deny the signs.

Fudge stood up and straightened his robes. “You’re right, Amelia,” he said. “Someone _has_ been manipulating the events all year. But I can’t help but notice that the source of most of this testimony is one man and his close associates—a man who never wanted the Tournament here in the first place. And a man who would have rather a lot to gain from swaying the public to his side—to gain from destabilising everything we have worked for these last thirteen years.” He stared over at Dumbledore.

“How dare you?!” Sirius shot to his feet and got right in the Minister’s face. “Albus Dumbledore working against magical Britain? Against the Ministry? That’s the maddest thing I’ve ever heard from you, Fudge, and I’ve heard a lot.”

“Step aside, Lord Black,” Fudge said. “I know where you stand, too. I don’t know what you’re trying to pull, Dumbledore—if you have designs on the Minister’s chair or if you’ve finally lost your marbles. Certainly, it’s a very elaborate scheme to involve this many people. But I can’t believe that You-Know-Who is back. It’s simply not possible.” He turned to go in a huff.

“Cornelius, you can’t actually _believe_ all that!” Bones said.

“Thank you for your assistance, Amelia, but I won’t require any more for today.” He went to storm out the door.

“Cornelius—” Dumbledore called.

He didn’t listen and kept walking. But just as he reached the threshold, he stopped short. He froze in surprise, then pushed forward again, but he found he was pinned in place by the collar of his robes like a dog at the end of its chain. Another push or two, and he spun around with wide eyes to see Harry Potter, his hand outstretched towards him, empty, but shaking with the effort of holding him in place.

At a slight twitch from the Boy-Who-Lived’s fingers, Fudge found himself pulled towards him by his collar. He’d heard of the boy’s prowess with wandless magic, but he never imagined he could pull this off whilst in bed and recovering from curse exposure. He stumbled forward a few steps, then a few more, until they were face to face again.

Harry knew he shouldn’t ham it up under the circumstances, but this was probably the only chance he’d get to use this line. “I find your lack of faith disturbing,” he said in a deep voice. Then, he finally released his wandless Summoning Charm and reached out and grabbed the man’s robes with his hand. “Cornelius Oswald Fudge,” he said, trying to infuse his voice with an air of authority. “Do you realise that Albus Dumbledore has been offered the position of Minister for Magic no fewer than seven times, the first of them in 1939? If he wanted to take over magical Britain, he could’ve done it when you were in knee-pants!”

Fudge was sweating, now. Harry’s family were surprised he had that much strength left, and Amelia Bones, who had had less contact with him, was amazed. This could be one for the legendarium, depending on what happened next. “Well—you see—he—” Fudge stammered.

“And if Dumbledore is mad, how do you explain yourself?” Harry went on. “Haven’t you relied on Dumbledore’s advice for most of your term? You haven’t questioned his wisdom until today, have you?”

“Well, not exactly, but—”

“And if Dumbledore is mad _or_ power-hungry, how do you explain Edward Grayson, who has testified to our claims? He’s a Grand Sorcerer, a war hero, and has _already_ been the respected leader of his own country. What interest does he have here?”

“Look, Lord Potter, this is highly irregular—”

“No more irregular than you questioning Dumbledore’s honesty, Minister. Voldemort is back whether you like it or not.”

“You-Know-Who is dead!” he insisted.

“Then why are you still afraid to say his bloody name?”

Fudge reeled. Harry let go of his collar and collapsed back onto the bed. Maybe he’d finally found a way to get Fudge him to second-guess himself after all, but he didn’t give him time to try to rationalise it away. “Cedric is _dead_ , Minister,” he said. “He was murdered in a plot so massively complicated that only Voldemort would go to that much trouble. Why would La Pantera do it on her own, or even _be_ here on her own? And it sounds like she’s dangerous enough as it is. But it was all so Voldemort could get through my security just once, and that was enough for him to come back. You can’t ignore that.”

He took a deep breath and changed tack: “By the way, Minister, did you know that Hermione’s great-great-grandfather was Hector Fawley, the Minister for Magic at the start of Grindelwald’s War?”

“Huh? Er…no, I didn’t know that,” Fudge said, clearly thrown for a loop.

“I’m not surprised. It’s not something the Fawleys like to talk about much. You see, Hector Fawley ignored the threat posed by Grindelwald until it was too late to avert the war, and they threw him out of office in favour of someone better equipped to fight. Today, Hector Fawley is only remembered for letting Grindelwald slip past him—unfairly so, since it was at the end of a long and prosperous term.”

Fudge said nothing, but he could plainly see where this was going.

“You can choose to believe the evidence that’s right in front of you and be remembered well, Minister. Even if you fail, you’ll be remembered as a man who tried his best and didn’t back down when times got tough. Or you can ignore it. But mark my words, Fudge; if you let this pass you by, you will be remembered as a worse Minister than Hector Fawley ever was.”

Fudge paled further as his attempts at rationalising away his fears fell apart. He truly did have solid evidence of, at the very least, a very dangerous dark lady operating in Britain. Meanwhile, he might be able to take on Dumbledore and Potter in the press, but they already had Bones and worse, a disinterested foreign dignitary on their side, and he still had a dead boy on his hands. And worst of all, Potter had already shouted the news to the entire crowd while at the same time revealing a shocking new ability that people would take as a show of power. They wouldn’t soon forget that.

And as much as he didn’t want to admit it, even his political mind couldn’t contort its way out of Potter’s argument. Why _would_ some dark witch from Mexico, of all places, be here unless someone else had brought her? “He can’t be back,” he muttered to himself. “He just can’t be…we’ve had peace for thirteen years…”

“Wanting it not to be true doesn’t make it so, Minister,” Grayson said.

“Dammit…damn it all…” Fudge looked up at Harry as if he were looking to a saviour. Harry thought he might actually be _crying_. “What do I do?” he pleaded. “What do I do?”

Harry wasn’t about to let any notion of being an _actual_ saviour take root. “I think that’s for you and Madam Bones and Professor Dumbledore to work out, Minister,” he said.

“I believe I can offer a few ideas, Cornelius,” Dumbledore agreed.

“Oh, right, right. Yes. We’ll need to…do something.”

“Come on, Cornelius, Albus,” Bones said. “We’ve got a lot of work to do.”

“Of course, Amelia. I will just need another minute with young Harry here. Edward, if you don’t mind?”

Grayson and Bones left, leading Fudge out, although Bones stopped at the door and said, “Oh, and Lord Potter, Professor Dumbledore told me about your unique circumstances, and I admit I have to agree with his reasoning…so you have thirty days to register as an animagus, or it’ll be a thousand-galleon fine.”

Harry gulped. “Yes, ma’am.”

Dumbledore looked older and wearier than the Grangers had ever seen him as he turned back to them. They’d known this threat was coming for years, but it was abstract until now—something they could safely put out of mind most of the time. Now, it was all too real. But for all that, Dumbledore smiled down at Harry. “Thank you for that, Harry,” he said. “I admit I had feared Minister Fudge would prove completely intractable. Even I was surprised at how you were able to convince him.”

“Me too, Cub,” Sirius agreed. “That was some old-school powerful wizard stuff there.”

“Just wandless Summoning,” he corrected.

“Well, whatever it was, it was impressive. And I think we’re all gonna owe you a lot for not having to fight against Fudge, too.”

“No problem. Professor, I need to tell you—”

But Dumbledore held up a hand to cut him off: “Harry, I will tell you the same thing Madam Pomfrey told me a few hours ago: if there is anything so urgent that it cannot wait till morning, say it quickly. We will deal with the rest later.”

Harry opened his mouth, but hesitated. He wanted to tell them everything—all about meeting his parents in that Place. He wanted to track down Luna and tell her and his family everything they’d told him. But he felt the weariness and aching washing over him again. He’d really overreached himself holding Fudge like that, and he could see Madam Pomfrey approaching with another Dreamless Sleep Potion. It would be better, he knew, to do this in the morning, when he was well-rested and could remember clearly.

“Er…just one thing, Professor,” he said. “Voldemort’s snake—it’s another horcrux. I thought you ought to know.”

“Indeed,” he nodded. “Do get some rest, now, Harry.”

“Yes, sir…I do have a lot to tell you in the morning, though…and tell Remus and Luna to come, too.”

* * *

“Why didn’t he die?” Voldemort hissed when they reconvened in Riddle Manor. “Pantera! You said the ritual would take away his mother’s protection! What happened?”

“I’m working on it, Voldemort,” La Pantera growled. She wasn’t much happier than he was that her prey had got away from her. “The ritual worked exactly as intended. You got your body back, fireproofed, and you were able to touch Potter. It must have been something else.”

“Something else like what? You aren’t going to say I missed, are you?”

“No, I saw the curse hit. And I smelled it. Potter was _dead_ …and then he got back up.”

“But how? _He_ couldn’t have a horcrux, could he?”

“Don’t be ridiculous. No child like him could create a horcrux…Hm, there’s the fact that I used his blood…but that shouldn’t have been able to do it on his own. If he had some other connection with you, maybe…Have you sensed any strange connections with Potter before?”

Voldemort thought about this, and he realised, to his surprise, that he had. “When I was at Hogwarts, possessing that fool Quirrell,” he said, “Potter would have headaches in my presence, even when I wasn’t practising Legilimency.”

“Headaches?” La Pantera’s ears perked up. “His head hurt when you touched him tonight. Did you mean to do that?”

The glowing red eyes narrowed. “No, I did not. It did not hurt me, but it still hurt him. But that does not explain why I couldn’t kill him.”

“No, it doesn’t. If the ritual had failed, it should have gone the other way. _Grrr,_ I’ll need to try some more diagnostic spells.”

“Very well. Proceed.”

La Pantera waved her knife over him in various ways, casting even deeper spells than she had used to design the ritual—spells that, so far as Voldemort could tell—assessed the condition of his magic, his body, and his soul in ways he had barely studied in the past. It all seemed to be going normally at first, but then, she must have encountered something shocking because she stopped and started shouting. _“¡¿Siete?! ¡Siete planos de exfoliación!”_ _Seven cleavage planes_ , she said _._ “You told me you only had _six_ horcruxes, not seven!”

“What are you talking about, woman? I have only six horcruxes.”

“Not according to my spell. Your soul is torn in seven places, and that means seven horcruxes. Eight pieces. That’s incredibly unstable! I _told_ you making that last horcrux was a bad idea. This is exactly why _I_ only made one of them. You’re lucky you didn’t shatter what’s left of your soul and lose all sense of self! And then where would you be? Trapped in whichever fragment had the largest piece—”

“Enough!” Voldemort roared, drawing his wand on her. “This is impossible! I made five horcruxes before my body was destroyed. I had planned to make the sixth with Potter, but that failed, and the sixth is now Nagini.”

“Wait, with _Potter_?” she said. “You began the ritual before you went to kill him as an infant?”

“Of course I did.”

La Pantera responded with a long string of curses in Nahuatl before she collected herself enough to explain: “ _¡Idiota!_ Have you studied dark magic at all? It’s the _intent_ to murder that splits the soul for the ritual! The sacrifice only powers it. When your Killing Curse reflected and stuck you, it provided enough power to complete the ritual and break off the soul piece, which then attached itself to Potter.”

“What?!” Voldemort hissed.

“That’s why you couldn’t kill Potter,” she said. “He had two souls in him. You just destroyed your own horcrux!”

A moment later, La Pantera regretted for the first time making Voldemort immune to fire, as the air temperature rose to scalding hot in seconds.

“Uh-oh,” she said.

She Apparated far, far away a moment before an inhuman scream ripped from Voldemort’s throat and the room was engulfed in flames.


	112. The Second War Begins

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man, with JK Rowling owning Harry Potter.
> 
> This is the final chapter of The Accidental Animagus, but it leads into not one, but two more stories. The World of The Accidental Animagus is an interlude that introduces magical cultures from around the world, which will be followed by the sequel to The Accidental Animagus, titled Animagus at War.
> 
> Thanks to everyone for reading. And now… the stunning conclusion of The Accidental Animagus!

When Harry awoke the second time, there was sunlight streaming in the window. He was still aching, but he felt warm and comfortable where he lay. He knew at once that he had shifted to cat form again because he felt large fingers gently scratching him behind his ears. He looked up and saw his mum sitting beside him with dark circles around her eyes. She hadn’t slept.

“Good morning, Harry,” she said softly. “How are you feeling?”

He rolled over and shifted to human, and he was pleased to find he could sit up under his own power. “Better,” he said. “Physically, at least.” Once it fully sunk in, he thought he might be spending a lot of time in cat form to cope.

“We’re sorry, Harry. You shouldn’t have to go through this. Especially not after everything else that’s happened. I still almost can’t believe it. And we were the ones who were supposed to protect you…”

“You did all you could, Mum,” he assured her. “We all did. We just have to…learn from it and keep going, I guess.”

She hugged him. “You’re growing up so fast, Harry. Too fast. You should be able to stay a kid at your age.”

“I’ll be okay, Mum…” he said, hoping it was true. “I’ll be okay. I just need time.”

Now that he was awake, within a few minutes, his family was assembled in the Infirmary—his adoptive parents, Hermione, Sirius, and Remus, plus Dumbledore. “I asked Miss Lovegood to wait a little while,” Dumbledore told him. “Remember that she does not know Occlumency, so if you have anything to say that she ought not to know…”

“Right…” he said, making a mental note that Luna should probably learn Occlumency if they were going to stay together. He took a deep breath. Might as well get this out of the way first. “You knew I was a horcrux, Professor?”

“WHAT?!” the Grangers shouted. They stared at him in horror. Then, they turned Dumbledore, who looked shocked.

“Harry, what…what…what are you saying?” Emma stuttered.

But Dumbledore, despite the glares being directed at him, was more pragmatic: “‘Was’? Harry…are you saying it’s… _gone_?”

“Yes, sir, it’s gone.”

To their surprise, Dumbledore broke into a wide smile. “You have no idea how relieved I am to hear that,” he said. “That is the best news I’ve heard in nearly a year.”

“Dumbledore, what…what is this about?” Dan said.

Harry explained: “When Voldemort hit me with the Killing Curse, I woke up in…Limbo, I guess—someplace, you know, In Between. I thought I was dead, but I…wasn’t quite. But when I was there…I met my parents…I met James and Lily.”

“James and Lily?” Sirius whispered. “You saw them?”

“Yeah, I did. We…time didn’t work the same way there, so we, er, talked for a while. But there was something else there—some kind of creature. Mum and Dad told me it was a horcrux. When Voldemort tried to kill me when I was a baby, a piece of his soul broke off and attached to me. But they told me it’s gone, now. They…they weren’t exactly sure why, but when he hit me last night, the Killing Curse killed it instead of me. The ‘connection’ I had with him—why I could speak Parseltongue and got visions from him—it was the horcrux.”

“And it’s gone now?” Dan asked again, just to be sure. Harry nodded. Dan then wheeled on Dumbledore. “And you _knew_?” he demanded.

Dumbledore nodded sadly. “Please understand, Mr. Granger, I did not know for certain until a little over a year ago, and since then, I have been searching for a way to remove the horcrux from Harry safely. Normally, the only way to destroy a horcrux is to destroy the vessel, you see. I wanted to find an alternative before I told you. I did not want to lay that burden on you, Harry, after everything else that has been foisted upon you.

“And I _did_ search. I searched through all the ancient lore I could find. I asked Professor Grayson to see if he could do anything. He knows Aboriginal healing chants over ten thousand years old, but none were suitable. I contacted cursebreakers in Egypt, magical Kabbalists in Israel, Siberian shamans expert in astral projection, even the small Jain magical community in India with its strong commitment to non-violence. None of them were able to provide a method to remove the horcrux safely. I hope you will forgive me this, Harry. I merely wanted to spare you the pain until I was certain it could not be avoided.”

“You did all that?” Harry said. “Wow, Mum said you were looking, but I had no idea. I—thank you for going to such lengths for me, Professor. I’m not sure I agree with what you did, but she told me you were doing it for me…I forgive you, sir.”

Dan and Emma stared at Harry in surprise. It was a big shock to them to hear their son speak about his birth mother like that—the mother he’d apparently, _impossibly_ , met last night. It was nearly as shocking to hear him forgive Dumbledore so easily, although it seemed that the old wizard really had gone to extraordinary lengths to help him.

Dan next turned on Sirius and Remus, though. “Did you know about this?” he demanded.

“We suspected,” Sirius admitted, “but Albus never told us for sure, and we didn’t want to tell you until _we_ were sure. We would have told you right away if we knew, but we thought it was better not to while we were uncertain.”

“Well, I guess that’s not so bad,” he admitted.

“At least we don’t have to worry about it anymore,” Harry said. “I guess it’s good we got that Parseltongue Dictionary done, eh, Mione?”

His sister rolled her eyes and ruffled his hair. “I think I’ve been a bad influence on you, Harry.”

“Nah, that was all Lily,” Sirius countered. “So what else did you talk about with your parents? It better not’ve all been this dark stuff.”

Harry grinned: “I found out Mum’s as big a _Doctor Who_ fan as I am.”

The Grangers laughed loudly. “Oh, Harry, that’s wonderful!” Hermione said. “It’s so nice that you have something in common.”

“Yeah, I know. And they told me how proud they are of me and everything, of course. And they said…” He hesitated to say it. “They said that I had a choice—that I could Go On with them if I wanted…but they said I shouldn’t give up everything I had here for them—” He was cut off as he was mobbed by hugs from Hermione and Sirius, quickly followed by the rest of his family.

“So…yeah, we had a nice, long talk, and they said they knew all along that I would want to come back in the end,” he said. “But the main thing was, they gave me messages they wanted me to bring back with me. And…and could we get Luna in here now, Professor?”

“Of course, Harry.” He motioned to Madam Pomfrey who let out a put-upon sigh and let Luna in from where she clearly waiting out in the corridor. She rushed to Harry’s bedside. She didn’t quite _run_ , but she did look more hurried than Harry could remember seeing her—and more worried. He gave her an encouraging smile, and she bent down to kiss him whilst running both her hands through his hair.

Sirius waited till the count of five before he gave a wolf-whistle, and they broke apart, blushing.

“It’s very good to see you awake again, Harry,” Luna said. She crouched down so that they were eye to eye. “I was here for a little while before curfew last night, but Madam Pomfrey said I shouldn’t wake you. I was worried about you, though—when I saw you were injured in the task and that…that Cedric was dead.” Her calm facade cracked a little bit, which Harry knew for her meant she was in rather a lot of distress. He pulled her closer so he could hug her to him.

“I’ll be alright,” he said. “Eventually. I got cursed pretty badly.”

“I know that wasn’t your only trouble, Harry,” she said. “You even showed everyone your Animagus form. That was brave of you. It might cause you some trouble, but I think it will be nice that you don’t have to hide it. Don’t you?” Luna gave him a slow blink at that, as she had always done, but this time, she smiled, and he knew she was doing it purposefully. Harry grinned back and leaned into her a little more. She had wound up sitting on the edge of the bad from the hug, and she laid an arm across his back and reached up to scratch him behind the ears. Hermione giggled at them, but he let her continue and soon began humming to himself softly.

Luna giggled, too. “Are you _purring_ , Harry?” she said.

“Oh, Harry’s done that for years, Luna,” Hermione said. “It’s just that people don’t often notice.”

“It’s natural to me,” he said. “I’m surprised no one’s ever caught Professor McGonagall doing it.”

“Actually, we did once,” Sirius spoke up.

“Really?”

“I remember that…” Remus said. “That night ended with our largest single point loss that wasn’t Snape-related.”

Harry stared at them and shook his head.

Dumbledore could tell the Grangers were getting anxious, so he took control of the situation: “Harry was just telling us what happened last night, Miss Lovegood, and he thought you should hear it, too.”

“That’s very kind of you, Harry,” she said.

“Well, I had to tell you. And you deserve to know.” He quickly gave her an abridged version of the story he had told the Ministry officials last night. He left out the horcruxes and the details of the ritual; he didn’t know how Luna would react to La Pantera killing a unicorn, and he wasn’t keen to find out. Even as stoic as she was, he could feel her squeezing his hand anxiously at several points, and she hugged him tightly when he mentioned being hit with the Cruciatus Curse.

“I guess he didn’t read the fine print on the ritual, though, because between what it did and the connection I had with him, the Killing Curse didn’t actually kill me. It broke the connection instead.”

She nodded solemnly. “But it nearly did, didn’t it? You went Elsewhere, didn’t you?”

Harry wasn’t at all surprised that Luna worked that out. “Yeah. I woke up someplace In Between…and I saw my parents there.”

He tried to handle it delicately, knowing how Luna had lost her own mother, but she seemed delighted: “You’re very fortunate. It’s extremely rare to be able to speak to your loved ones on the Other Side before you pass on. You talked to them for a while, didn’t you?”

“Of course I did. They told me what was going on—or what they thought was going on—and how proud they were of me. They’ve been watching over me—of course, I knew that, but I didn’t really _know_ it. I mean…my dad quoted _The Princess Bride_.” He laughed a little.

The wizards were confused by that, but the Grangers’ jaws dropped. None of them could quite decide what to say to that until Hermione burst out, _“INCONCEIVABLE!”_

Harry, Dan, and Emma laughed, which only caused further confusion. “It’s a muggle film,” Harry told the others. “It’s really good. We’ll have to show you sometime. It’s exactly the kind of film Dad would’ve— _would_ like. And I guess I have Mum’s taste in television. So anyway, Luna, they said I had a choice to go with them…but they also told me I should come back. That I had too much here to give up.”

Luna blushed and kissed him on the cheek. “I’m glad you did, Harry,” she said.

“Me too. But they…they told me some things to tell you…all of you.”

Everyone in the room was waiting breathlessly. Not knowing what else to do, Harry dived right in and repeated the message James and Lily had given him for Dan, Emma, and Hermione. Unsurprisingly, that led to a lot of tears of joy and hugs and incoherent thanks, which was only compounded when he repeated his parents’ message to Sirius and Remus.

“Just like those two,” Sirius said. “Lily always saw the best in people, and James refused to ever let you feel sorry for yourself.”

“We could tell,” Emma said. “Even before we met you two, we could tell from Harry. He’s so much like them…We’ve always tried to be a family for him who could live up to them, but we never thought we’d be able to hear them say it.”

“You’ve been given a great gift,” Dumbledore said. Even he looked misty-eyed. “I could tell easily from your care and dedication over the years that James and Lily would have approved of all of you as Harry’s family, but of course, it will mean much more to hear it directly.”

It took some time after this for them to settle down and collect themselves enough for Luna to get back to Harry. She had patiently waited off to the side, knowing this was a moment for family. “I’m surprised you included me in this, Harry,” she said. “It seems very private, although it’s very nice that you did.”

Harry wondered a bit about that. He never would have included Cho in a moment like this, but Luna seemed to understand the situation perfectly—or maybe it was that she understood _him_. “Well, I asked you here partly because they had a message for you, too.”

He had told her that already, but Luna’s eyes were still wide, and she blushed a little when Sirius smirked and said, “Oh, and what did Mr. and Mrs. Potter have to say about their little boy’s girlfriend?”

“They like her,” Harry said smugly, although he knew Sirius wouldn’t have a problem with that. He turned back to said girlfriend and continued, “They really like you, Luna. Dad said you’re loyal, smart, and funny in a good way, and they…they hope you’ll stand by me.” He suddenly felt a little uncomfortable, but he set it aside. “Oh, and Dad thinks you should dye your hair red, but I think it looks better the way it is,” he added.

Sirius barked with laughter. “Potter men know what they like, eh Moony?”

Remus rolled his eyes: “As we learnt in excruciating detail for six and a half years, yes. He would have said that about any girl you dated, you know.”

Luna giggled at their antics. “Perhaps I’ll try it anyway. It could be an interesting change.”

Harry smiled weakly. He had a sudden desire to talk to her privately, as much as he wanted to be with his family right now. Emma seemed to recognise his discomfort because she elbowed Dan and made to get up. “We’ll give you two a little time alone,” she said. “Luna, the train leaves in an hour. Harry, Hermione, we’ll be Flooing home so Harry has more time to recover.”

“Besides, everyone would mob you if they saw you now,” Hermione said. “You know how Hogwarts is. They mobbed me, and I wasn’t even there with you. Professor Dumbledore announced you were recovering at breakfast, and that’s it.”

“Alright. Thanks, guys,” Harry said. “Can you ask the Diggorys and Cho to come by before they leave? I need to talk to them, too.”

“Of course,” Dan said. “They should still be here.”

“Great. Oh, and Professor, Mum and Dad had a message for you, too.”

“Yes, Harry?” Dumbledore said.

“Dad said there was secret room on the seventh floor across from the tapestry of the dancing trolls. I was wondering if you knew about it.”

“How interesting. I did, indeed, find a room full of chamberpots in that very corridor a few days ago, but it was gone when I returned to the spot.”

Despite James’s assurances, Harry was a little surprised to find out the room was real. “Wow. Er, he said you have to walk past it three times to open it. And it can turn into different rooms, too.”

“I shall have to look into it, then. And what was the message from your mother?”

“Er, could you come a little closer, Professor?

Dumbledore was puzzled, but he supposed perhaps it was meant to be his ears only, so he stepped beside the bed and turned his ear to Harry.

_WHACK!_

He smacked Dumbledore in back of his head so hard that his hat fell off. His family looked scandalised, though it quickly turned to snickers for Sirius and Remus. Dumbledore summoned his hat back wandlessly and put it on his head. “Yes, well…I suppose I deserved that,” he said. “Good day, Harry. I do hope you will soon feel better.”

The rest of them left, leaving Harry alone with Luna (and Madam Pomfrey hovering in the back). This was the awkward part, he thought as he gazed into her eyes. She _would_ stand by him if he asked—easily—but now that the threat was real…No, he wasn’t going to dump her to try to protect her, but he couldn’t in good conscience let her stay with him without giving her an out. “Voldemort’s gonna be after me even more now, you know,” he said.

“I know,” Luna said with fire in her eyes. “But I suspect he’ll be after me too before long. _The Quibbler_ was very vocal against him in the last war, and we will be again if I have anything to say about it.”

Harry felt a warm feeling in his chest that threated to overflow and bring tears to his eyes. He couldn’t believe even after knowing her for so long that she had _that_ in her…or maybe he could. He’d learnt to expect the unexpected with Luna. He smiled and kissed her softly. “Whatever I did to deserve you,” he whispered, “it couldn’t have been enough.”

* * *

The meeting with Mr. and Mrs. Diggory and Cho was the most difficult part of the morning—almost more painful than the lingering aches from the Cruciatus Curse. Mr. Diggory and Cho were both beside themselves with tears the whole time, and while Mrs. Diggory was more collected, her eyes were red enough that Harry was sure she’d cried herself to exhaustion last night. Even so, when he explained to them what had happened in the maze, they didn’t blame him. He’d given Cedric as much warning as he reasonably could, and Cedric had chosen to face the danger, and that for Harry’s sake. It was hard not to feel guilty about that, but they didn’t blame him.

“He did it for a good cause, then. It was always in his nature to stand up to protect others,” Mrs. Diggory said, no doubt remembering how Cedric had fought Greyback last year. “And just when he’d won the Tournament. He must have been happy. Ambassador Grayson said he would have suffered little from the knife…as awful as it looked…We’ve set the funeral for Tuesday, Harry. The cemetery in Ottery St. Catchpole.”

“Yes, he’ll…he’ll be buried with…full honours of state,” Mr. Diggory managed to get out. “Fudge is arranging it…and providing an Auror guard.”

 _Probably to save face_ , Harry thought, but he nodded.

“We hope you’ll come,” Mrs. Diggory said. “The Creeveys and the Robinses are coming. Professors Dumbledore and Lupin. Most of the people who were involved with the Tournament. Even that nice little McDonald girl who was with Demelza offered to play the violin for it.”

“You should accept,” Harry said. “She’d very good.”

“If you say so, we believe you.”

The other of issue was the gold. The thousand galleons for winning the Tournament would have been split between them, but Harry had never wanted it, and, while Cedric may have had other plans for it, they quickly agreed that it should go to the Cor Humanum Formation, which had supported Cedric and the other werewolves over the past year and was continuing to do good work under Sirius’s and Remus’s management. It was what Harry would have done anyway, so that suited him fine.

“There was one other thing,” Harry said. “Something I’d prefer you’d keep private. You can ask Professor Dumbledore if you want to know more, but in the graveyard, Voldemort hit me with the Killing Curse.”

All three of them gasped, and Cho stuttered, “Y-y-you m-mean you s-survived— _again_?”

“Yes, we don’t want it widely known because it was a weird fluke involving the ritual, and it probably won’t work again. I’m certainly not gonna try it. But anyway, instead of dying like I should have, I wound up someplace In Between…and I saw Cedric there.”

“Y-you saw him?” Mrs. Diggory whispered.

“As he was passing through, yes. He just wanted me to tell you that he loves you. And Cho, he said he wishes you could have had more time together.”

Cho sobbed and wrapped her arms tight around Harry. He was glad Luna wasn’t there to see it. He awkwardly patted her on the head. “It’s not fair…” she cried.

“No, it’s not,” Harry agreed. “He did care for you, though. And I know you really liked him, too. It’s awful, what happened, but he’ll be alright where he is now. My parents were with him, and they’ll see to it he’s alright.” He couldn’t imagine what she was going through. He’d never lost anyone really close to him besides his parents when he was too young to remember. He _thought_ he’d lost Hermione a couple of times, and that had been bad enough. He could tell it was a struggle for her just to be here.

“I still can’t believe that…that foreign…It wasn’t even You-Know-Who! It wasn’t even one of his…She was just some witch he brought in…?”

Harry nodded. “From Mexico, I guess. But Grayson said she’s as bad as Voldemort himself.”

Cho flinched. “I just keep seeing him…lying there…with the knife, and…and…” Suddenly, Cho gasped and thrust herself away from Harry. To his horror, she went rigid, her eyes glazed over, and for a moment, Harry thought she’d gone into shock from anguish, but then, her voice came out with a strange, harsh, sound:

_“The Weird Sisters will be reunited before the summer dies. The Dark Lord regathers his forces, more terrible than ever before. The one who thrice defied him stands before a high mountain to oppose him. But before the leaves begin to turn, the weird sisters will gather together once more in his aid, and he will call new allies to his side, for Mars will reign over Europe. The Weird Sisters will unite before summer dies.”_

She stopped, and Harry and the Diggorys stared at her in shock.

“Wha—what happened?” she said, looking between them in confusion. “Did someone say something?”

“Well…” Harry said, “that changes things.”

* * *

Harry knew enough to tell Mr. And Mrs. Diggory to take Cho straight to Dumbledore, but for himself, Madam Pomfrey didn’t let him out until after lunch. His parents returned and asked if he was ready to leave, but he said he had one last thing to do first, so he wandered through the castle until he came to the dungeons, and more specifically, to Snape’s office.

“Excuse me, Professor Snape?” he called.

He found Snape organising his potions for the end of the year. The man spared him an annoyed glance. “Yes, Potter,” he said. “Have you not seen fit to return home rather than continue to subject us to your presence?”

Harry suppressed his annoyance and said, “I needed to talk to you before I left, sir.”

Snape raised an eyebrow. “And?”

“Er, did Professor Dumbledore tell you what we discussed this morning?”

“You may rest assured that the Headmaster is not in the habit of divulging his personal conversations with his students—even yours, Potter. He did mention that a horcrux within you was destroyed and that he was very relieved by this development, but he did not give details.”

“Oh. Well, you see, when it happened, sir…I wound up in…Limbo, I guess. And I saw my parents there.”

Snape suddenly went very still in what Harry realised after the fact was probably a reflex to keep from dropping his potions. He carefully set down the phials he was organising and turned his full attention on Harry. “You saw Lily?” he said softly, his expression inscrutable.

“Yes, Professor. And James, but…I knew you had been friends once…She said she had a message for the Half-Blood Prince.”

Snape was reportedly a great Occlumens, but even he betrayed his shock slightly with a sharp intake of breath and a widening of his eyes, and it took a visible effort to speak without stuttering, all of which Harry picked up on with interest. “That is correct, Potter,” he said without elaborating.

“Good. She, er, she wanted me to tell you that she knows there’s still good in you, and she’s sorry she didn’t see that before…but she also said you need to quit living in the past because spending your life feeling sorry for yourself doesn’t become you.”

That was apparently too much for him. He turned away and leaned over his workbench. Harry thought he could see a slight trembling in his shoulders, but he might have imagined it. This was getting way too private for him. “If that’ll be all, sir—” he said, and he turned to leave.

“Wait,” Snape stopped him. It took him a couple of deep breaths to work up the strength to say, “A moment, Potter,” and several more to calm himself enough to face him again. Harry couldn’t imagine what this was about, but Snape finally said, “There is something you need to see. This must not leave this room, and it _especially_ must not reach the ears of anyone who does not know Occlumency.”

Harry nodded. Snape drew his wand, and Harry tensed up, ready to draw his own. Had his mum miscalculated somehow? He tensed even more when Snape closed the door and locked it with a flick of his wand, but then, he said, _“Expecto Patronum.”_ A silver shape flowed out of his wand like water, but where Harry had expected a snake or a bat or something similar, he was stunned when it formed itself into the shape of a doe. Harry had never cast the Patronus Charm himself (maybe he should learn it, he thought), but he had seen Remus do it, and he knew the doe was his mother’s Patronus.

“Thank you for bringing that message to me, Harry,” Snape said. “It means more to me than I can safely tell you. I know we have not generally been on good terms, especially this year. I find your antics tiring, and it is not a secret that I strongly dislike certain of your extended family. However, I want you to know where I stand, for I believe you will _need_ to know. This war may take some very dark turns, and it is more than likely that I will be involved. Therefore, I want you to know that no matter what _seems_ to happen, no matter what you may see or hear about me…I am on your side.”

The silver doe vanished, but the import of it remained. It wasn’t that it was impossible to lie whilst casting the Patronus Charm. It wasn’t even that it was impossible for a dark or wicked witch or wizard to cast it. It was a complicated spell, Remus had explained. The truly, irredeemably evil were unable to cast it, with records of their wands producing unpredictable and dangerous backfire effects if they tried to force it. But there were also records of wizards who did very bad things and were still able to cast a Patronus because they genuinely believed they were working towards the Greater Good. The important thing, Remus had said, was that it was impossible to speak maliciously whilst casting it (by one’s own estimation, of course). If Snape said he was on Harry’s side (and used his first name, no less!), then he truly meant it for Harry’s benefit.

“Thank you Professor,” Harry said, and he left silently. After seeing that, he didn’t have the heart to tell him to get a girlfriend and run for it, like he’d originally planned.

* * *

“Well, here we are,” Dan said as they pulled the car up. “Are you sure you want to do this, Harry?”

“Yes, Dad. I have to.”

“You don’t think there will be any trouble?” Hermione checked.

“No, Uncle Vernon was always the violent one, and we can do enough magic wandlessly to handle anything she tries. Let’s go.”

The Grangers climbed out of their car and walked up to the apartment door in Cokeworth. With magic on their side, pulling some strings to find out where Petunia Evans (Harry was surprised that her surname had changed in the interim) had gone was alarmingly easy. Her parents’ house had been sold long ago, but she was living in a cheap apartment in the town where she’d grown up. Harry wondered if Dumbledore could do the same thing for her that he had for them to make her magically Untraceable while still being reachable in the muggle world. She might need it.

Harry knocked on the door. A minute later, it opened a short way, then swung wider as Petunia jumped backwards with a gasp of horror and clutched her chest. “You!” she moaned. “No! No, it can’t be! Y-you’re dead!”

“Dead? What—? Oh.” Harry realised what she meant. “ _Eyes_ , Aunt Petunia.” He pointed at his glasses for emphasis.

Petunia cautiously leaned forward and examined him closely. When she saw the bright green, her own eyes nearly popped out of her head. _“H-H-Harry?”_ she whispered.

“Yes, it’s me. May we come in?”

Her face hardened—not angry, really, but determined. Harry could tell she still didn’t want anything to do with him or magic in general. “I would’ve thought you never wanted to see me again,” she said.

“Honestly, I didn’t—” he started.

“Then don’t bother.” She started to close the door.

“My Mum said you could’ve done better than Vernon,” he said quickly.

Petunia stopped and slowly opened the door again. “What did you say?” she said shakily.

“My Mum,” he said. “I saw her…I met her.” He realised that might not be the best thing to say to her, so he added, “And no, that’s not something you can normally do with magic, but I got whammied by an improvised dark ritual, and it just sort of…happened.”

His aunt slumped and said, “Come in, then.”

Now that Harry got a good look at her, he saw that Petunia was not looking well. Her nine years in prison had aged her at least twice that much, and though she wasn’t yet forty, she looked a good deal older. Always thin and bony, she now appeared unhealthy and world-weary, and she no longer had that sharp, gossipy gleam in her eye.

There was no place to seat five in the apartment—neither the in living room nor at the kitchen table. The Dursleys wouldn’t have been caught dead in that situation when Harry was living with them, but he could guess she wasn’t entertaining guests frequently these days. She pulled two chairs from the kitchen table into the living room in a highly undignified fashion.

“They told me you were adopted,” she said, motioning to the Grangers. “Are these…?”

“Yes, these are my adoptive parents, Daniel and Emma Granger,” Harry said. “They’re dentists. And this is my sister, Hermione.” Petunia shook their hands while she raised an eyebrow at Harry. He guessed her question and added, “Hermione’s like Mum was. She’s a muggle-born witch.”

To his surprise, his aunt didn’t flinch at the word, and to his much greater surprise, she told Hermione, “You’re very lucky, then…Please, have a seat.”

They sat down and stared uncomfortably at one another. Petunia couldn’t seem to bring herself to ask any questions, and none the Grangers had much to say. It was hard to believe this was the same woman who had locked a much younger Harry in a cupboard. Finally, Harry cleared his throat and repeated his abridged version of the story of what happened to him in the graveyard and afterwards. His aunt paled so much when he said Voldemort was back that he thought she might faint.

“I don’t think he’ll bother coming after you,” he tried to assure her. “Not after all these years. But I thought you should know, just in case. Er, I’ll ask Professor Dumbledore if there’s anything he can do to protect you, but it’s probably best if you don’t draw too much attention to yourself.”

“Won’t be too much trouble,” she muttered to herself. “But how did you meet Lily?”

He told her, and he was surprised once again that his answer elicited a brief look of wide-eyed wonder.

“She asked me to tell you that she never stopped wanting her sister back, and that it’s not too late for you to be a better person.”

Petunia broke down in tears at this point. The Grangers watched uncomfortably as she sobbed into a tissue. None of them were keen to reach out to her, but they couldn’t really do anything else. Eventually, though, her tears slowed, and she started to speak again. “They…they…they m-made me t-take counselling…in the prison,” she said as she dried her eyes. “They said I was irrational because I blamed you for everything. Ha!” she laughed bitterly. “But I did. And they made me go back and look at my life, and they made me realise that I was jealous of Lily. And of course, I was. I even wrote to Dumbledore and begged him to let me come to Hogwarts, and when he said no, I convinced myself that they were all freaks, and Lily was a freak, and I never wanted to go anyway.

“Oh, I couldn’t tell the counsellors about magic. I…I considered saying it and getting myself transferred to a mental hospital, but I figured your kind would find out eventually. But I told them Lily got to go to a school for the gifted, and I didn’t, and…yes, I was jealous. It took a while, but I understood how much I’d shut her out myself. And how badly I was raising both you and my own son…And they also showed me how, even though I was wrong, Vernon was making me worse. That was when I got the divorce…The last time I saw him, he still only regretted beating you, not any of the rest of it.”

Harry was amazed. His mum had told him she had been watching over her sister, but he hadn’t imagined she’d seen a transformation like this. His aunt was almost a different woman. “Well, I’m…I’m glad you got the help you needed,” he said. They all sat silently for several minutes, no one having anything to say.

Finally, he asked, “How’s Dudley.”

Petunia smiled. “Dudley’s fine,” she said. “He’s taken up boxing. He’s very good at it…I worry about his turning out like his father; Vernon was a boxer, too, in his day, but Marge seems to have whipped him into shape.”

Harry flinched a bit.

“Not literally, I mean. She’s actually come around some, if you can believe it.”

Harry couldn’t.

“I was worried about Dudley—growing up without his mummy. And Marge blamed _me_ for everything for a long time. But I think after the divorce, she lost that excuse for how awful her brother was. It think he might’ve had time added for fighting in prison by now. Anyway, she’s been civil with me since I got out, and she’s let me visit. And she insists that Dudley hasn’t received any cautions for bullying in years, so I’m still hopeful he’ll turn out better than we did.”

“Well…I hope he does, too.”

They sat a while longer and exchanged a few very forced pleasantries. Petunia made a few token enquiries about the Granger’s lives, but she pointedly did not any questions about magic or Hogwarts or Harry’s and Hermione’s education or accomplishments. Her guests soon excused themselves, anyway, and she seemed happy to see them go.

Although, just as they left, her “Thank you for coming, Harry,” sounded reasonably sincere.

* * *

The funeral of Cedric Diggory was held in the evening of the twenty-seventh of June on the green fields by the cemetery in Ottery St. Catchpole. The sky was clear, and a warm summer breeze was blowing in from the ocean, giving the whole village a calm and peaceful feel to it.

It was well attended by the standards of the small wizarding world. The other three wizarding families in the village, the Weasleys, the Lovegoods, and the Fawcetts, were of course in attendance. Luna stood by Harry, holding his hand, with his entire family there as well. The Creeveys and the Robinses paid their respects, as did the families of Gabriel Truman and Ellen Towler, the now-graduated prefects who were also bitten in Greyback’s attack. A few friends of friends, including Neville Longbottom and Natalie McDonald, also came in solidarity. Then, there were the Ministry officials: Dumbledore, Fudge, Grayson, the real David Monroe, looking very awkward about the whole thing and with a Healer by his side, Catriona McCormack, Ludo Bagman, and a full complement of Aurors.

And finally, besides a few family friends, there were Cedric’s and Harry’s fellow champions: Fleur Delacour and Viktor Krum, who were determined to give Cedric a champion’s sendoff. Madame Maxime was also there, though not Karkaroff, who had fled as soon as Harry shouted Voldemort’s return.

“It is terrible to see Tournament end like this,” Viktor told Harry. “And more terrible to see good friendship end like this.”

“We can still write each other,” Harry told him. “All three of us,” he added to Fleur. “I have a feeling we’re going to need all the friends we can get very soon.”

“ _Da_. Ve cannot allow dark vizards to stop our friendship,” he agreed. “And you have made good start on that.”

“I hope so.”

“You have, Harry. You did good vork to bring schools together vhen ve expected only competition, and your game, Ricochet, is, how do you say? Idea whose time has come. I vill be sure to introduce it in Bulgaria.”

“And we will een France,” Fleur agreed.

Harry smiled weakly. “At least some good came of it,” he agreed. “But it’s not my game. It’s Cedric’s. He and Cho played the first match. It should be their legacy.”

“ _Da_. That is good thought. Keep flying, Harry Potter. I look forvard to rematch someday.”

Harry shook Viktor’s hand. “So do I, Viktor Krum. I’m sorry I won’t be able to face you in “98. I’m sure you understand, if there’s a war coming, it’ll need my undivided attention. But God willing, I’ll be available in 2002.”

He nodded and continued, “You know, if it had been fair tournament, Cedric vould have von, you in second, and Fleur in third. You all had better strategy than I did even before I attacked all of you.”

“No, Viktor,” Harry corrected, “if it had been a _fair_ tournament, it would have been Cedric in first, Fleur in second, you in third, and me sitting happily on the sidelines.”

“Perhaps.”

Viktor’s family had already gone back to Bulgaria, but Fleur’s had come with her, and Monsieur Delacour spoke up now: “We do not blame you for what you did, Monsieur Krum. Eet ees a _tragedie_ on all accounts. Lord Potter, we want you to know zat you ‘ave our support, such as eet ees. Our influence in France ees not great, but we will be seeking to increase it to aid Britain. I ‘ave friends in zee French Ministry.”

“Thank you, Monsieur Delacour,” Harry said. “We really appreciate that.”

“Fixed or not, your performance in zee Tournament was very good, ‘Arry,” Fleur spoke up. “You showed skill and power even I ‘ad not expected, and not just by being an animagus.”

Harry shrugged awkwardly. “It had nothing to do with the Tournament. That’s happens when you grow up with a psychopath after your head. And I never would have made it through the tasks if I weren’t an animagus and a Parselmouth.”

“Hmm, perhaps,” she said cryptically.

“‘Arry! ‘Arry!” Gabrielle whispered by her sister’s side. Harry bent down closer to her. “Zat must ‘ave been very scary. Eet was very brave of you to bring Cedric back to his parents,” she said, and she stood on her toes and kissed him on the cheek.

Harry blushed bright red. He hadn’t really had much choice in the matter.

Gabrielle then crossed her arms and looked Luna up and down critically, which looked rather silly coming from an eight-year-old. Finally, she pointed at Harry and said, “You take good care of him.”

“Don’t worry, Gabrielle. I will,” Luna replied.

Feeling rather confused, Harry escorted Luna and his own family to their seats. However, before he could sit down, there was a commotion at the back of the seating area as people began turning around, shouting, and pointing at a lone figure coming over the hill. The Aurors all drew their wands, and Harry immediately tensed. The man was filthy, dressed in rags. His teeth, they could see, were pointed, his eyes were yellow, and he was unnaturally hairy all over. But no one moved yet, as he was waving a white cloth back and forth above his head.

“Merlin’s beard, that’s Samuel Lateran,” Remus said softly.

“Who?” Hermione asked.

“Feral werewolf. He’s the alpha—or they think he’s the alpha—of what’s left of Greyback’s pack. Not sure if he’s wanted for anything, but for him to be here…I should talk to him.” Remus broke from the ranks and approached the feral man.

“Lupin,” he said hoarsely.

“Lateran,” Remus greeted him. “I’m surprised to see you showing yourself in public, especially in front of Aurors.”

“Why so surprised, Lupin? We heard rumours of a werewolf being buried with full Ministry honours. We had to check it out, see if it was true, pay our respects. If the Aurors want to haul me in, I won’t stop them, but my pack would appreciate it if you respected the truce.” He held up the white cloth again.

“The rumour’s true,” Remus confirmed. “Diggory’s getting full honours. I can’t promise anything about the Aurors.”

“It’s worth it to hear this news. Diggory’s done more for our cause than Greyback did in his entire life. Pity he had to die for it. Of course, you’re no slacker in that department, either. And I can’t believe I’m actually saying that about a _domestic_. But even I can admit the Cor Humanum Foundation is doing some good…You’re a pet, maybe, but not slacker.” He laughed hoarsely.

Remus scowled. Didn’t feral wolves at least remember basic etiquette? “I’ll go talk to them,” he said. He marched over the nearest Auror and, after a conversation that seemed quite heated, Lateran was allowed to attend the funeral in peace, albeit with one Auror guarding him on either side.

The officiant was a little old wizard in plain black priest’s robes. Harry had never seen a wizard priest before, but it stood to reason there must be at least a few. He didn’t know if this was the priest at the Diggorys’ church, or if they even went to church, or maybe the only all-wizard churches were in Hogsmeade, but it didn’t matter much. He gave a speech that was generic and mercifully short before he called up the mourners to speak.

Fudge was first, since he had an official function, though it was one that most of the audience didn’t know about. “Believe it or not, I don’t intend to keep you long,” he said, to a bit of laughter. “This is a day for friends and family. I do want to read an announcement that the Wizengamot approved this morning: Cedric Diggory distinguished himself magically and in other skills in the Tetrawizard Tournament, achieving the position of first place. Upon reaching the end of the third task, he was informed of a credible threat of danger in taking the Tetrawizard Cup by his fellow champion and friend, Lord Harry Potter. Upon hearing of this threat and being given the choice either to avoid it or to disregard the warning and claim sole victory, he instead resolved to stand beside Lord Potter and face the unknown danger together. In doing so, he was attacked and murdered by a servant of the Dark Lord, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.” Well, it was too much to expect him to use Voldemort’s name. “For this selfless and courageous act in defence of a friend and ally, the Wizengamot is pleased to award Cedric Diggory with the Order of Merlin, Third Class.”

Fudge stepped up to the casket and pinned the bronze Order of Merlin medal to Cedric’s robes. This was in large part a political act—an act of defiance against Voldemort, though few would say so out loud. Instead of sitting down, he returned to the lectern and said, “At this time, I would like to invite Lord Potter, if he wishes, to come forward and say a few words.”

Harry had expected one of Cedric’s parents to speak next, but he supposed it wasn’t unreasonable since he was named in the citation, so he stepped forward and looked out uncomfortably at the audience. Checking the cue cards he had prepared for his speech, he said, “I didn’t know Cedric very well before Greyback’s attack last year. He was a Quidditch rival, and I thought he was a fair flier, but honestly, I didn’t think he was extraordinary. After the attack, I learnt a lot more. I learnt he was amazingly principled, really smart, and a brilliant duellist. I wanted to support him because of the attack, but as I got to know him better, I was proud to call him my friend, _and_ the true Hogwarts Champion.

“I want everyone to know today that I didn’t deserve that Tetrawizard Cup any more than the Man in the Moon. I wasn’t supposed to be in it. I didn’t _want_ to be in it. Cedric won that Tournament by his own power and wits, _despite_ Voldemort fixing it in my favour. He deserved better than to have to share that honour, and he so much more deserved better than to be murdered just because he was in the way.

“I had a lot to thank him for because of what he did for his fellow werewolves, for helping us design Ricochet, for supporting me all the way through the Tournament when the spotlight _should_ have been on him, and for standing by me at the end…Cedric was brave, he was loyal, and he never hesitated to stand up for what he believed in, and I thank Minister Fudge and the Wizengamot for giving him the recognition he deserves.”

He sat down, then, and others stood to speak, though they started to blur together after a while. Mr. and Mrs. Diggory told about how much they loved Cedric and how proud they were of him. Dumbledore spoke about the choice between doing what is right and what is easy. Cho said she would treasure his memory forever. Demelza went up and talked about how much she looked up to Cedric for helping make a better life for werewolves. Samuel Lateran did not speak, but Harry could guess he shared the sentiment.

Finally, all the speakers were done, and it was time for the burial. The officiant called forward four pallbearers, but not the four whom most people expected. While Cedric’s parents came forward to stand by the casket, the pallbearers were Dumbledore, Grayson, Harry, and Hermione.

This had come from an offhand remark Harry had made, that it didn’t seem quite proper to bury Cedric by magic—that it seemed too easy—that to really pay tribute to his memory, they ought to do the hard work of digging his grave by hand. Remus had said that this was an opinion of some wizards, but most felt it was an unfitting tribute to a wizard _not_ to use magic. Sirius, however, with his rejection of pureblood culture, was intrigued by the notion, and he spoke to the Diggorys about it. They thought it was a nice thought despite holding to the opposing view, and after some discussion, it was decided that it would be a _purer_ tribute, and more universal in symbolism, if the burial was done without _wands_. It was also fitting because Cedric had learnt a fair bit of wandless magic himself from Grayson’s lessons.

However, there were only four wandless magic users on hand who were strong enough to help with the task. Dumbledore and Grayson each could have done it on his own easily, but they called up all four to make it close to a complete half-dozen. Dumbledore closed the casket with a wave of his hand, and Harry and Hermione took their places at Cedric’s feet, and the four of them carefully lifted the casket into the air.

Natalie McDonald, who had played the processional at the beginning of the service, now took up her violin again and began playing a slow, mournful rendition of _Abide with Me_ , and the pallbearers levitated the casket towards a large headstone that read:

 

CEDRIC WILFRID DIGGORY

1 OCTOBER 1977 — 24 JUNE 1995

_Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above._

 

Most of those eyes that had run dry moistened again as they lowered the casket into the ground. Demelza, no longer able to cry on her friend’s shoulder, clung to her mother. Colin and Ginny looked like they were each keeping each other from falling over. Cho collapsed by the graveside and had to be helped up by Mrs. Diggory. Natalie kept playing, but tears were streaming down her face. Samuel Lateran actually knelt before the grave.

When the casket was at the bottom of the grave, the pallbearers—though mostly Dumbledore and Grayson—began to move the mound of dirt that had been placed a tasteful distance away and Disillusioned during the service to fill in the grave. It was more difficult than most of the wandless magic Harry and Hermione had tried. The best way they could find to focus on it was to move their hands as if they were trying to paddle through molasses to push small mounds into the grave. It wasn’t as fast as using wands, but with the professors’ help, they filled it in a few minutes. When they were done, Dumbledore waved his hand and cleaned up all the stray dirt while Grayson chanted a spell that caused grass to grow over the fresh plot and red poppies to grow around the gravestone.

Natalie took up the strain again for the recessional, and the mourners departed in silence. They were finished for the day. There was nothing more to be done. Today, they buried their dead and mourned their loss. Tomorrow, their work would begin.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [For a long run](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16775806) by [mcepl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mcepl/pseuds/mcepl)




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